(NOTE: The electronic text obtained from The Electronic Bible Society was
not completely corrected. EWTN has corrected all mistakes found.)
Transliteration of Greek words: All phonetical except: w = omega; h serves
three puposes: 1. = Eta; 2. = rough breathing, when appearing intially
before a vowel; 3. = in the aspirated letters theta = th, phi = ph, chi =
ch. Accents are given immediately after their corresponding vowels: acute =
' , grave = `, circumflex = ^. The character ' doubles as an apostrophe,
when necessary.
TERTULLIAN
THE CHAPLET, OR DE CORONA.(1)
[Note: Before the time of Constantine, when the Church was subject to persecution
by a pagan State, there was minimal participation by Christians in the military.
Tertullian was noteworthy for his opposition to military service on moral
grounds--that the function of the military was incompatible with the Christian�s
role as peace-maker--but he did not represent the common position of the Church.
This was better reflected, after the Edict of Toleration (313), in a decree from
the Council of Arles (314), which threatened deserters from the military with
excommunication, even in time of peace. Since the 4th & 5th centuries, Catholic
theologians have consistently taught that there is no contradiction between military
service and the Christian will to peace. This was still the teaching of Vatican II.
"Those too who devote themselves to the military service of their country should
regard themselves as the agents of security and freedom of peoples. As long as they
fulfill this role properly, they are making a genuine contribution to the
establishment of peace" (Gaudium et spes, 79).]
CHAP. I.
VERY lately it happened thus: while the bounty of our most excellent
emperors(2) was dispensed in the camp, the soldiers, laurel-crowned, were
approaching. One of them, more a soldier of God, more stedfast than the
rest of his brethren, who had imagined that they could serve two masters,
his head alone uncovered, the useless crown in his hand--already even by
that peculiarity known to every one as a Christian--was nobly conspicuous.
Accordingly, all began to mark him out, jeering him at a distance, gnashing
on him near at hand. The murmur is wafted to the tribune, when the person
had just left the ranks..The tribune at once puts the question to him, Why
are you so different in your attire? He declared that he had no liberty to
wear the crown with the rest. Being urgently asked for his reasons, he
answered, I am a Christian. O soldier! boasting thyself in God. Then the
case was considered and voted on; the matter was remitted to a higher
tribunal; the offender was conducted to the prefects. At once he put away
the heavy cloak, his disburdening commenced; he loosed from his foot the
military shoe, beginning to stand upon holy ground; a he gave up the sword,
which was not necessary either for the protection of our Lord; from his
hand likewise dropped the laurel crown; and now, purple-clad with the hope
of his own blood, shod with the preparation of the gospel, girt with the
sharper word of God, completely equipped in the apostles' armour, and
crowned more worthily with the white crown of martyrdom, he awaits in
prison the largess of Christ. Thereafter adverse judgments began to be
passed upon his conduct--whether on the part of Christians I do not know,
for those of the heathen are not different--as if he were headstrong and
rash, and too eager to die, because, in being taken to task about a mere
matter of dress, he brought trouble on the bearers of the Name,(4)--he,
forsooth, alone brave among so many soldier-brethren, he alone a Christian.
It is plain that as they have rejected the prophecies of the Holy
Spirit,(5) they are also purposing the refusal of martyrdom. So they murmur
that a peace so good and long is endangered for them. Nor do I doubt that
some are already turning their back on the Scriptures, are making ready
their luggage, are equipped for flight from city to city; for that is all
of the gospel they care to remember. I know, too, their pastors are lions
in peace, deer in the fight. As to the questions asked for extorting
confessions from us, we shall teach elsewhere. Now, as they forth also the
objection--But where are we forbidden to be crowned?--I shall take this
point up, as more suitable to be treated of here, being the essence, in
fact, of the present contention. So that, on the one hand, the inquirers
who are ignorant, but anxious, may be instructed; and on the other, those
may be refuted who try to vindicate the sin, especially the laurel-crowned
Christians themselves, to whom it is merely a question of debate, as if it
might be regarded as either no trespass at all, or at least a doubtful one,
because it may be made the subject of investigation. That it is neither
sinless nor doubtful, I shall now, however, show.
CHAP. II.
I affirm that not one of the Faithful has ever a crown upon his head,
except at a time of trial. That is the case with all, from catechumens to
confessors and martyrs,(1) or (as the case may be) deniers. Consider, then,
whence the custom about which we are now chiefly inquiring got its
authority. But when the question is raised why it is observed, it is
meanwhile evident that it is observed. Therefore that can neither be
regarded as no offence, or an uncertain one, which is perpetrated against a
practice which is capable of defence, on the ground even of its repute, and
is sufficiently ratified by the support of general acceptance. It is
undoubted, so that we ought to inquire into the reason of the thing; but
without prejudice to the practice, not for the purpose of overthrowing it,
but rather of building it up, that you may all the more carefully observe
it, when you are also satisfied as to its reason. But what sort of
procedure is it, for one to be bringing into debate a practice, when he has
fallen from it, and to be seeking the explanation of his having ever had
it, when he has left it off? Since, although he may wish to seem on this
account desirous to investigate it, that he may show that he has not done
wrong in giving it up, it is evident that he nevertheless transgressed
previously in its presumptuous observance. If he has done no wrong to-day
in accepting the crown he offended before in refusing it. This treatise,
therefore, will not be for those who not in a proper condition for inquiry,
but for those who, with the real desire of getting instruction, bring
forward, not a question for debate, but a request for advice. For it is
from this desire that a true inquiry always proceeds; and I praise the
faith which has believed in the duty of complying with the rule, before it
has learned the reason of it. An easy thing it is at once to demand where
it is written that we should not be crowned. But is it written that we
should be crowned? Indeed, in urgently demanding the warrant of Scripture
in a different side from their own, men prejudge that the support of
Scripture ought no less to appear on their part. For if it shall be said
that it is lawful to be crowned on this ground, that Scripture does not
forbid it, it will as validly be retorted that just on this ground is the
crown unlawful, because the Scripture does not enjoin it. What shall
discipline do? Shall it accept both things, as if neither were forbidden?
Or shall it refuse both, as if neither were enjoined? But "the thing which
is not forbidden is freely permitted." I should rather say(2) that what has
not been freely allowed is forbidden.
CHAP. III.
And how long shall we draw the saw to and fro through this line, when
we have an ancient practice, which by anticipation has made for us the
state, i.e., of the question? If no passage of Scripture has prescribed it,
assuredly custom, which without doubt flowed from tradition, has confirmed
it. For how can anything come into use, if it has not first been handed
down? Even in pleading tradition, written authority, you say, must be
demanded. Let us inquire, therefore, whether tradition, unless it be
written, should not be admitted. Certainly we shall say that it ought not
to be admitted, if no cases of other practices which, without any written
instrument, we maintain on the ground of tradition alone, and the
countenance thereafter of custom, affords us any precedent. To deal with
this matter briefly, I shall begin with baptism.(3) When we are going to
enter the water, but a little before, in the presence of the congregation
and under the hand of the president, we solemnly profess that we disown the
devil, and his pomp, and his angels. Hereupon we are thrice immersed,
making a somewhat ampler pledge than the Lord has appointed in the Gospel.
Then when we are taken up (as new-born children),(4) we taste first of all
a mixture of milk and honey, and from that day we refrain from the daily
bath for a whole week. We take also, in congregations before daybreak, and
from the hand of none but the presidents, the sacrament of the Eucharist,
which the Lord both commanded to be eaten at meal-times, and enjoined to be
taken by all alike.(5) As often as the anniversary comes round, we make
offerings for the dead as birthday honours. We count fasting or kneeling in
worship on the Lord's day to be unlawful. We rejoice in the same privilege
also from Easter to Whitsunday. We feel pained should any wine or bread,
even though our own, be cast upon the ground. At every forward step and
movement, at every going in and out, when we put on our our clothes and
shoes, when we bathe, when we sit at table, when we light the lamps, on
couch, on
seat, in all the ordinary actions of daily life, we trace upon the forehead
the sign.(1)
CHAP. IV.
If, for these and other such rules, you insist upon having positive
Scripture injunction, you will find none. Tradition will be held forth to
you as the originator of them, custom as their strengthener, and faith as
their observer. That reason will support tradition, and custom, and faith,
you will either yourself perceive, or learn from some one who has.
Meanwhile you will believe that there is some reason to which submission is
due. I add still one case more, as it will be proper to show you how it was
among the ancients also. Among the Jews, so usual is it for their women to
have the head veiled, that they may thereby be recognised. I ask in this
instance for the law. I put the apostle aside. If Rebecca at once drew down
her veil, when in the distance she saw her betrothed, this modesty of a
mere private individual could not have made a law, or it will have made it
only for those who have the reason which she had. Let virgins alone be
veiled, and this when they are coming to be married, and not till they have
recognised their destined husband. If Susanna also, who was subjected to
unveiling on her trial,(2) furnishes an argument for the veiling of women,
I can say here also, the veil was a voluntary thing. She had come accused,
ashamed of the disgrace she had brought on herself, properly concealing her
beauty, even because now she feared to please. But I should not suppose
that, when it was her aim to please, she took walks with a veil on in her
husband's avenue. Grant, now, that she was always veiled. In this
particular case, too, or, in fact, in that of any other, I demand the
dress-law. If I nowhere find a law, it follows that tradition has given the
fashion in question to custom, to find subsequently (its authorization in)
the apostle's sanction, from the true interpretation of reason. This
instances, therefore, will make it sufficiently plain that you can
vindicate the keeping of even unwritten tradition established by custom;
the proper witness for tradition when demonstrated by long-continued
observance.(3) But even in civil matters custom is accepted as law, when
positive legal enactment is wanting; and it is the same thing whether it
depends on writing or on reason, since reason is, in fact, the basis of
law. But, (you say), if reason is the ground of law, all will now
henceforth have to be counted law, whoever brings it forward, which shall
have reason as its ground.(4) Or do you think that every believer is
entitled to originate and establish a law, if only it be such as is
agreeable to God, as is helpful to discipline, as promotes salvation, when
the Lord says, "But why do you not even of your own selves judge what is
right?"(5) And not merely in regard to a judicial sentence, but in regard
to every decision in matters we are called on to consider, the apostle also
says, "If of anything you are ignorant, God shall reveal it unto you;"(6)
he himself, too, being accustomed to afford counsel though he had not the
command of the Lord, and to dictate of himself(7) as possessing the Spirit
of God who guides into all truth. Therefore his advice has, by the warrant
of divine reason, become equivalent to nothing less than a divine command.
Earnestly now inquire of this teacher,(8) keeping intact your regard for
tradition, from whomsoever it originally sprang; nor have regard to the
author, but to the authority, and especially that of custom itself, which
on this very account we should revere, that we may not want an interpreter;
so that if reason too is God's gift, you may then learn, not whether custom
has to be followed by you, but why.
CHAP. V.
The argument for Christian practices becomes all the stronger, when
also nature, which is the first rule of all, supports them. Well, she is
the first who lays it down that a crown does not become the head. But I
think ours is the God of nature, who fashioned man; and, that he might
desire, (appreciate, become partaker of) the pleasures afforded by His
creatures, endowed him with certain senses, (acting) through members,
which, so to speak, are their peculiar instruments. The sense of hearing he
has planted in the ears; that of sight, lighted up in the eyes; that of
taste, shut up in the mouth; that of smell, wafted into the nose; that of
touch, fixed in the tips of the fingers. By means of these organs of the
outer man doing duty to the inner man, the enjoyments of the divine gifts
are conveyed by the senses to the soul.(9) What, then, in flowers affords
you enjoyment? For it is the flowers of the field which are the peculiar,
at least the chief, material of crowns. Either smell, you say, or colour,
or both together. What will be the senses of colour and smell? Those of
seeing and smelling, I suppose. What members have had these senses allotted
to them? The eyes and the nose, if I am not mistaken. With sight and smell,
then, make use of flowers, for these are the senses by which they are meant
to be enjoyed; use them by means of the eyes and nose, which are the
members to which these senses belong. You have got the thing from God, the
mode of it from the world; but an extraordinary mode does not prevent the
use of the thing in the common way. Let flowers, then, both when fastened
into each other and tied together in thread and rush, be what they are when
free, when loose--things to be looked at and smelt. You count it a crown,
let us say, when you have a bunch of them bound together in a series, that
you may carry many at one time that you may enjoy them all at once. Well,
lay them in your bosom if they are so singularly pure, and strew them on
your couch if they are so exquisitely soft, and consign them to your cup if
they are so perfectly harmless. Have the pleasure of them in as many ways
as they appeal to your senses. But what taste for a flower, what sense for
anything belonging to a crown but its band, have you in the head, which is
able neither to distinguish colour, nor to inhale sweet perfumes, nor to
appreciate softness? It is as much against nature to long after a flower
with the head, as it is to crave food with the ear, or sound with the
nostril. But everything which is against nature deserves to be branded as
monstrous among all men; but with us it is to be condemned also as
sacrilege against God, the Lord and Creator of nature.
CHAP. VI.
Demanding then a law of God, you have that common one prevailing all
over the world, engraven on the natural tables to which the apostle too is
wont to appeal, as when in respect. of the woman's veil he says, "Does not
even Nature teach you?"(1)--as when to the Romans, affirming that the
heathen do by nature those things which the law requires,(2) he suggests
both natural law and a law-revealing nature. Yes, and also in the first
chapter of the epistle he authenticates nature, when he asserts that males
and females changed among themselves the natural use of the creature into
that which is unnatural,(3) by way of penal retribution for their error. We
first of all indeed know God Himself by the teaching of Nature, calling Him
God of gods, taking for granted that He is good, and invoking Him as Judge.
Is it a question with you whether for the enjoyment of His creatures,
Nature should be our guide, that we may not be carried away in the
direction in which the rival of God has corrupted, along with man himself,
the entire creation which had been made over to our race for certain uses,
whence the apostle says that it too unwillingly became subject to vanity,
completely bereft of its original character, first by vain, then by base,
unrighteous, and ungodly uses? It is thus, accordingly, in the pleasures of
the shows, that the creature is dishonoured by those who by nature indeed
perceive that all the materials of which shows are got up belong to God,
but lack the knowledge to perceive as well that they have all been changed
by the devil. But with this topic we have, for the sake of our own play-
lovers, sufficiently dealt, and that, too, in a work in Greek.(4)
CHAP. VII.
Let these dealers in crowns then recognize in the meantime the
authority of Nature, on the ground of a common sense as human beings, and
the certifications of their peculiar religion, as, according to the last
chapter, worshippers of the God of nature; and, as it were, thus over and
above what is required, let them consider those other reasons too which
forbid us wearing crowns, especially on the head, and indeed crowns of
every sort. For we are obliged to turn from the rule of Nature, which we
share with mankind in general, that we may maintain the whole peculiarity
of our Christian discipline, in relation also to other kinds of crowns
which seem to have been provided for different uses, as being composed of
different substances, lest, because they do not consist of flowers, the use
of which nature has indicated (as it does in the case of this military
laurel one itself), they may be thought not to come Under the prohibition
of our sect, since they have escaped any objections of nature. I see, then,
that we must go into the matter both with more research, and more fully,
from its beginnings on through its successive stages Of growth to its more
erratic developments. For this we need to turn to heathen literature, for
things belonging to the heathen must be proved from their own documents.
The little of this I have acquired, will, I believe, be enough. If there
really was a Pandora, whom Hesiod mentions as the first of women, hers was
the first head the graces crowned, for she received gifts from all the gads
whence she got her name Pandora. But Moses, a prophet, not a poet-shepherd,
shows us the first woman Eve having her loins more naturally girt about
with leaves than her temples with flowers. Pandora, then, is a myth. And so
we have to blush for the origin of the crown, even on the ground of the
falsehood connected with it; and, as will soon appear, on the ground no
less of its realities. For it is an undoubted fact that certain persons
either originated the thing, or shed lustre on it. Pherecydes relates that
Saturn was the first who wore a crown; Diodorus, that Jupiter, after
conquering the Titans, was honoured with this gift by the rest of the gods.
To Priapus also the same author assigns fillets; and to Ariadne a garland
of gold and of Indian gems, the gift of Vulcan, afterwards of Bacchus, and
subsequently turned into a constellation. Callimachus has put a vine crown
upon Juno. So too at Argos, her statue, vine-wreathed, with a lion's skin
placed beneath her feet, exhibits the stepmother exulting over the spoils
of her two step-sons. Hercules displays upon his head sometimes poplar,
sometimes wild-olive, sometimes parsley. You have the tragedy of Cerberus;
you have Pindar; and besides Callimachus, who mentions that Apollo, too
when he had killed the Delphic serpent, as a suppliant, put on a laurel
garland; for among the ancients suppliants were wont to be crowned.
Harpocration argues that Bacchus the same as Osiris among the Egyptians,
was designedly crowned with ivy, because it is the nature of ivy to protect
the brain against drowsiness. But that in another way also Bacchus was the
originator of the laurel crown (the crown) in which he celebrated his
triumph over the Indians, even the rabble acknowledge, when they call the
days dedicated to him the "great crown." If you open, again, the writings
of the Egyptian Leo, you learn that Isis was the first who discovered and
wore ears of corn upon her head--a thing more suited to the belly. Those
who want additional information will find an ample exposition of the
subject in Claudius Saturninus, a writer of distinguished talent who treats
this question also, for he has a book on crowns, so explaining their
beginnings as well as causes, and kinds, and rites, that you find all that
is charming in the flower, all that is beautiful in the leafy branch, and
every sod or vine-shoot has been dedicated to some head or other; making it
abundantly clear how foreign to us we should judge the custom of the
crowned head, introduced as it was by, and thereafter constantly managed
for the honour of, those whom the world has believed to be gods. If the
devil, a liar from the beginning, is even in this matter working for his
false system of godhead (idolatry), he had himself also without doubt
provided for his god-lie being carried out. What sort of thing, then, must
that be counted among the people of the true God, which was brought in by
the nations in honour of the devil's candidates, and was set apart from the
beginning to no other than these; and which even then received its
consecration to idolatry by idols and in idols yet alive? Not as if an idol
were anything, but since the things which others offer up to idols belong
to demons. But if the things which others offer to them belong to demons
how much more what idols offered to themselves, when they were in life! The
demons themselves, doubtless, had made provision for themselves by means of
those whom they had possessed, while in a state of desire and craving,
before provision had been actually made.
CHAP. VIII.
Hold fast in the meantime this persuasion, while I examine a question
which comes in our way. For I already hear it is said, that many other
things as well as crowns have been invented by those whom the world
believes to be gods, and that they are notwithstanding to be met with both
in our present usages and in those of early saints, and in the service of
God, and in Christ Himself, who did His work as man by no other than these
ordinary instrumentalities of human life. Well, let it be so; nor shall I
inquire any further back into the origin of this things. Let Mercury have
been the first who taught the knowledge of letters; I will own that they
are requisite both for the business and commerce of life, and for
performing our devotion to God. Nay, if he also first strung the chord to
give forth melody, I will not deny, when listening to David, that this
invention has been in use with the saints, and has ministered to God. Let
AEsculapius have been the first who sought and discovered cures: Esaias(1)
mentions that he ordered Hezekiah medicine when he was sick. Paul, too,
knows that a little wine does the stomach good.(2) Let Minerva have been
the first who built a ship: I shall see Jonah and the apostles sailing.
Nay, there is more than this: for even Christ, we shall find, has ordinary
raiment; Paul, too, has his cloak.(1) If at once, of every article of
furniture and each household vessel, you name some god of the world as the
originator, well, I must recognise Christ, both as He reclines on a couch,
and when He presents a basin for the feet of His disciples, and when He
pours water into it from a ewer, and when He is girt about with a linen
towel(2)--a garment specially sacred to Osiris. It is thus in general I
reply upon the point, admitting indeed that we use along with others these
articles, but challenging that this be judged in the light of the
distinction between things agreeable and things opposed to reason, because
the promiscuous employment of them is deceptive, concealing the corruption
of the creature, by which it has been made subject to vanity. For we affirm
that those things only are proper to be used, whether by ourselves or by
those who lived before us, and alone befit the service of God and Christ
Himself, which to meet the necessities of human life supply what is simply;
useful and affords real assistance and honourable comfort, so that they may
be well believed to have come from God's own inspiration, who first of all
no doubt provided for and taught and ministered to the enjoyment, I should
suppose, of His own man. As for the things which are out of this class,
they are not fit to be used among us, especially those which on that
account indeed are not to be found either with the world, or in the ways of
Christ.
CHAP. IX.
In short, what patriarch, what prophet, what Levite, or priest, or
ruler, or at a later period what apostle, or preacher of the gospel, or
bishop, do you ever find the wearer of a crown?(3) I think not even the
temple of God itself was crowned; as neither was the ark of the testament,
nor the tabernacle of witness, nor the altar, nor the candlestick crowned
though certainly, both on that first solemnity of the dedication, and in
that second rejoicing for the restoration, crowning would have been most
suitable if it were worthy of God. But if these things were figures of us
(for we are temples of God, and altars, and lights, and sacred vessels),
this too they in figure set forth, that the people of God ought not to be
crowned. The reality must always correspond with the image. If, perhaps,
you object that Christ Himself was crowned, to that you will get the brief
reply: Be you too crowned, as He was; you have full permission. Yet even
that crown of insolent ungodliness was not of any decree of the Jewish
people. It was a device of the Roman soldiers, taken from the practice of
the world,--a practice which the people of God never allowed either on the
occasion of public rejoicing or to gratify innate luxury: so they returned
from the Babylonish captivity with timbrels, and flutes, and psalteries,
more suitably than with crowns; and after eating and drinking, uncrowned,
they rose up to play. Neither would the account of the rejoicing nor the
exposure of the luxury have been silent touching the honour or dishonour of
the crown. Thus too Isaiah, as he says, "With timbrels, and psalteries, and
flutes they drink wine,"(4) would have added "with crowns," if this
practice had ever had place in the things of God.
CHAP. X.
So, when you allege that the ornaments of the heathen deities are found
no less with God, with the object of claiming among these for general use
the head-crown, you already lay it down for yourself, that we must not have
among us, as a thing whose use we are to share with others, what is not to
be found in the service of God. Well, what is so unworthy of God indeed as
that which is worthy of an idol? But what is so worthy of an idol as that
which is also worthy of a dead man? For it is the privilege of the dead
also to be thus crowned, as they too straightway become idols, both by
their dress and the service of deification, which (deification) is with us
a second idolatry. Wanting, then, the sense, it will be theirs to use the
thing for which the sense is wanting, just as if in full possession of the
sense they wished to abuse it. When there ceases to be any reality in the
use, there is no distinction between using and abusing. Who can abuse a
thing, when the precipient nature with which he wishes to carry out his
purpose is not his to use it? The apostle, moreover, forbids us to abuse,
while he would more naturally have taught us not to use, unless on the
ground that, where there is no sense for things, there is no wrong use of
them. But the whole affair is meaningless, and is, in fact, a dead work so
far as concerns the idols; though, without doubt, a living one as respects
the demons(5) to whom the religious rite belongs. "The idols of the
heathen," says David, "are silver and gold." "They have eyes, and see not;
a nose, and smell not; hands, and they will not handle."(1) By means of
these organs, indeed, we are to enjoy flowers; but if he declares that
those who make idols will be like them, they already are so who use
anything after the style of idol adornings. "To the pure all things are
pure: so, likewise, all things to the impure are impure;"(2) but nothing is
more impure than idols. The substances are themselves as creatures of God
without impurity, and in this their native state are free to the use of
all; but the ministries to which in their use they are devoted, makes all
the difference; for I, too, kill a cock for myself, just as Socrates did
for Aesculapius; and if the smell of some place or other offends me, I burn
the Arabian product myself, but not with the same ceremony, nor in the same
dress, nor with the same pomp, with which it is done to idols.(3) If the
creature is defiled by a mere word, as the apostle teaches, "But if any one
say, This is offered in sacrifice to idols, you must not touch it,"(4) much
more when it is polluted by the dress, and rites, and pomp of what is
offered to the gods. Thus the crown also is made out to be an offering to
idols;(5) for with this ceremony, and dress, and pomp, it is presented in
sacrifice to idols, its originators, to whom its use is specially given
over, and chiefly on this account, that what has no place among the things
of God may not be admitted into use with us as with others. Wherefore the
apostle exclaims, "Flee idolatry:"(6) certainly idolatry whole and entire
he means. Reflect on what a thicket it is, and how many thorns lie hid in
it. Nothing must be given to an idol, and so nothing must be taken from
one. If it is inconsistent with faith to recline in an idol temple, what is
it to appear in an idol dress? What communion have Christ and Belial?
Therefore flee from it; for he enjoins us to keep at a distance from
idolatry--to have no close dealings with it of any kind. Even an earthly
serpent sucks in men at some distance with its breath. Going still further,
John says, "My little children, keep yourselves from idols,"(7)--not now
from idolatry, as if from the service of it, but from idols--that is, from
any resemblance to them: for it is an unworthy thing that you, the image of
the living God, should become the likeness of an idol and a dead man. Thus
far we assert, that this attire belongs to idols, both from the history of
its origin, and from its use by false religion; on this ground, besides,
that while it is not mentioned as connected with the worship of God, it is
more and more given over to those in whose antiquities, as well as
festivals and services, it is found. In a word, the very doors, the very
victims and altars, the very servants and priests, are crowned. You have,
in Claudius, the crowns of all the various colleges of priests. We have
added also that distinction between things altogether different from each
other--things, namely, agreeable, and things contrary to reason--in answer
to those who, because there happens to be the use of some things in common,
maintain the right of participation in all things. With reference to this
part of the subject, therefore, it now remains that the special grounds for
wearing crowns should be examined, that while we show these to be foreign,
nay, even opposed to our Christian discipline, we may demonstrate that none
of them have any plea of reason to support it, on the basis of which this
article of dress might be vindicated as one in whose use we can
participate, as even some others may whose instances are cast up to us.
CHAP. XI.
To begin with the real ground of the military crown, I think we must
first inquire whether warfare is proper at all for Christians. What sense
is there in discussing the merely accidental, when that on which it rests
is to be condemned? Do we believe it lawful for a human oath(8) to be
superadded to one divine, for a man to come under promise to another master
after Christ, and to abjure father, mother, and all nearest kinsfolk, whom
even the law has commanded us to honour and love next to God Himself, to
whom the gospel, too, holding them only of less account than Christ, has in
like manner rendered honour? Shall it be held lawful to make an occupation
of the sword, when the Lord proclaims that he who uses the sword shall
perish by the sword? And shall the son of peace take part in the battle
when it does not become him even to sue at law? And shall he apply the
chain, and the prison, and the torture, and the punishment, who is not the
avenger even of his own wrongs? Shall he, forsooth, either keep watch-
service for others more than for Christ, or shall he do it on the Lord's
day, when he does not even do it for Christ Himself? And shall he keep
guard before the temples which he has renounced? And shall he take a meal
where the apostle has forbidden him?(1) And shall he diligently protect by
night those whom in the day-time he has put to flight by his exorcisms,
leaning and resting on the spear the while with which Christ's side was
pierced? Shall he carry a flag,(2) too, hostile to Christ? And shall he ask
a watchword from the emperor who has already received one from God? Shall
he be disturbed in death by the trumpet of the trumpeter, who expects to be
aroused by the angel's trump? And shall the Christian be burned according
to camp rule, when he was not permitted to burn incense to an idol, when to
him Christ remitted the punishment of fire? Then how many other offences
there are involved in the performances of camp offices, which we must hold
to involve a transgression of God's law, you may see by a slight survey.
The very carrying of the name over from the camp of light to the camp of
darkness is a violation of it. Of course, if faith comes later, and finds
any preoccupied with military service, their case is different, as in the
instance of those whom John used to receive for baptism, and of those most
faithful centurions, I mean the centurion whom Christ approves, and the
centurion whom Peter instructs; yet, at the same time, when a man has
become a believer, and faith has been sealed, there must be either an
immediate abandonment of it, which has been the course with many; or all
sorts of quibbling will have to be resorted to in order to avoid offending
God, and that is not allowed even outside of military service;(3) or, last
of all, for God the fate must be endured which a citizen-faith has been no
less ready to accept. Neither does military service hold out escape from
punishment of sins, or exemption from martyrdom. Nowhere does the Christian
change his character. There is one gospel, and the same Jesus, who will one
day deny every one who denies, and acknowledge every one who acknowledges
God,--who will save, too, the life which has been lost for His sake; but,
on the other hand, destroy that which for gain has been saved to His
dishonour. With Him the faithful citizen is a soldier, just as the faithful
soldier is a citizen.(4) A state of faith admits no plea of necessity; they
are under no necessity to sin, whose one necessity is, that they do not
sin. For if one is pressed to the offering of sacrifice and the sheer
denial of Christ by the necessity of torture or of punishment, yet
discipline does not connive even at that necessity; because there is a
higher necessity to dread denying and to undergo martyrdom, than to escape
from suffering, and to render the homage required. In fact, an excuse of
this sort overturns the entire essence of our sacrament, removing even the
obstacle to voluntary sins; for it will be possible also to maintain that
inclination is a necessity, as involving in it, forsooth, a sort of
compulsion. I have, in fact, disposed of this very allegation of necessity
with reference to the pleas by which crowns connected with official
position are vindicated, in support of which it is in common use, since for
this very reason offices must be either refused, that we may not fall into
acts of sin, or martyrdoms endured that we may get quit of offices.
Touching this primary aspect of the question, as to the unlawfulness even
of a military life itself, I shall not add more, that the secondary
question may be restored to its place. Indeed, if, putting my strength to
the question, I banish from us the military life, I should now to no
purpose issue a challenge on the matter of the military crown. Suppose,
then, that the military service is lawful, as far as the plea for the crown
is concerned.(5)
CHAP. XII.
But I first say a word also about the crown itself. This laurel one is
sacred to Apollo or Bacchus--to the former as the god of archery, to the
latter as the god of triumphs. In like manner Claudius teaches; when he
tells us that soldiers are wont too to be wreathed in myrtle. For the
myrtle belongs to Venus, the mother of the AEneadae, the mistress also of
the god of war, who, through Ilia and the Romuli is Roman. But I do not
believe that Venus is Roman as well as Mars, because of the vexation the
concubine gave her.(6) When military service again is crowned with olive,
the idolatry has respect to Minerva, who is equally the goddess of arms--
but got a crown of the tree referred to, because of the peace she made with
Neptune. In these respects, the superstition of the military garland will
be everywhere defiled and all-defiling. And it is further defiled, I should
think, also in the grounds of it. Lo the yearly public pronouncing of vows,
what does that bear on its face to be? It takes place first in the part of
the camp where the general's tent is, and then in the temples. In addition
to the places, observe the words also: "We vow that you, O Jupiter, will
then have an ox with gold-decorated horns." What does the utterance mean?
Without a doubt the denial (of Christ). Albeit the Christian says nothing
in these places with the mouth, he makes his response by having the crown
on his head. The laurel is likewise commanded (to be used) at the
distribution of the largess. So you see idolatry is not without its gain,
selling, as it does, Christ for pieces of gold, as Judas did for pieces of
silver. Will it be "Ye cannot serve God and mammon"(1) to devote your
energies to mammon, and to depart from God? Will it be "Render unto Caesar
the things which are Caesar's, and unto God the things which are God's,"(2)
not only not to render the human being to God, but even to take the
denarius from Caesar? Is the laurel of the triumph made of leaves, or of
corpses? Is it adorned with ribbons, or with tombs? Is it bedewed with
ointments, or with the tears of wives and mothers? It may be of some
Christians too;(3) for Christ is also among the barbarians.(4) Has not he
who has carried (a crown for) this cause on his head, fought even against
himself? Another son of service belongs to the royal guards. And indeed
crowns are called (Castrenses), as belonging to the camp; Munificoe
likewise, from the Caesarean functions they perform. But even then you are
still the soldier and the servant of another; and if of two masters, of God
and Caesar: but assuredly then not of Caesar, when you owe yourself to God,
as having higher claims, I should think, even in matters in which both have
an interest.
CHAP. XIII.
For state reasons, the various orders of the citizens also are crowned
with laurel crowns; but the magistrates besides with golden ones, as at
Athens, and at Rome. Even to those are preferred the Etruscan. This
appellation is given to the crowns which, distinguished by their gems and
oak leaves of gold, they put on, with mantles having an embroidery of palm
branches, to conduct the chariots containing the images of the gods to the
circus. There are also provincial crowns of gold, needing now the larger
heads of images instead of those of men. But your orders, and your
magistracies, and your very place of meeting, the church, are Christ's. You
belong to Him, for you have been enrolled in the books of life.(6) There
the blood of the Lord serves for your purple robe, and your broad stripe is
His own cross; there the axe is already laid to the trunk of the tree;(7)
there is the branch out of the root of Jesse.(8) Never mind the state
horses with their crown. Your Lord, when, according to the Scripture, He
would enter Jerusalem in triumph, had not even an ass of His own. These
(put their trust) in chariots, and these in horses; but we will seek our
help in the name of the Lord our God.(9) From so much as a dwelling in that
Babylon of John's Revelation(10) we are called away; much more then from
its pomp. The rabble, too, are crowned, at one time because of some great
rejoicing for the success of the emperors; at another, on account of some
custom belonging to municipal festivals. For luxury strives to make her own
every occasion of public gladness. But as for you, you are a foreigner in
this world, a citizen of Jerusalem, the city above. Our citizenship, the
apostle says, is in heaven.(11) You have your own registers, your own
calendar; you have nothing to do with the joys of the world; nay, you are
called to the very opposite, for "the world shall rejoice, but ye shall
mourn."(12) And I think the Lord affirms, that those who mourn are happy,
not those who are crowned. Marriage, too, decks the bridegroom with its
crown; and therefore we will not have heathen brides, lest they seduce us
even to the idolatry with which among them marriage is initiated. You have
the law from the patriarchs indeed; you have the apostle enjoining people
to marry in the Lord.(13) You have a crowning also on the making of a
freeman; but you have been already ransomed by Christ, and that at a great
price. How shall the world manumit the servant of another? Though it seems
to be liberty, yet it will come to be found bondage. In the world
everything is nominal, and nothing real. For even then, as ransomed by
Christ, you were under no bondage to man; and now, though man has given you
liberty, you are the servant of Christ. If you think freedom of the world
to be real, so that you even seal it with a crown, you have returned to the
slavery of man, imagining it to be freedom; you have lost the freedom of
Christ, fancying it is slavery. Will there be any dispute as to the cause
of crown-wearing, which contests in the games in their turn supply, and
which, both as sacred to the gods and in honour of the dead, their own
reason at once condemns? It only remains, that the Olympian Jupiter, and
the Nemean Hercules, and the wretched little Archemorus, and the hapless
Antinous, should be crowned in a Christian, that he himself may become a
spectacle disgusting to behold. We have recounted, as I think, all the
various causes of the wearing of the crown, and there is not one which has
any place with us: all are foreign to us, unholy, unlawful, having been
abjured already once for all in the solemn declaration of the sacrament.
For they were of the pomp of the devil and his angels, offices of the
world,(1) honours, festivals, popularity huntings, false vows, exhibitions
of human servility, empty praises, base glories, and in them all idolatry,
even in respect of the origin of the crowns alone, with which they are all
wreathed. Claudius will tell us in his preface, indeed, that in the poems
of Homer the heaven also is crowned with constellations, and that no doubt
by God, no doubt for man; therefore man himself, too, should be crowned by
God. But the world crowns brothels, and baths, and bakehouses, and prisons,
and schools, and the very amphitheatres, and the chambers where the clothes
are stripped from dead gladiators, and the very biers of the dead. How
sacred and holy, how venerable and pure is this article of dress, determine
not from the heaven of poetry alone, but from the traffickings of the whole
world. But indeed a Christian will not even dishonour his own gate with
laurel crowns, if so be he knows how many gods the devil has attached to
doors; Janus so-called from gate, Limentinus from threshold, Forcus and
Carna from leaves and hinges; among the Greeks, too, the Thyraean Apollo,
and the evil spirits, the Antelii.
CHAP. XIV.
Much less may the Christian put the service of idolatry on his own
head--nay, I might have said, upon Christ, since Christ is the Head of the
Christian man--(for his head) is as free as even Christ is, under no
obligation to wear a covernig, not to say a band. But even the head which
is bound to have the veil, I mean woman's, as already taken possession of
by this very thing, is not open also to a band. She has the burden of her
own humility to bear. If she ought not to appear with her head uncovered on
account of the angels,(2) much more with a crown on it will she offend
those (elders) who perhaps are then wearing crowns above.(3) For what is a
crown on the head of a woman, but beauty made seductive, but mark of utter
wantonness,--a notable casting away of modesty, a setting temptation on
fire? Therefore a woman, taking counsel from the apostles' foresight,(4)
will not too elaborately adorn herself, that she may not either be crowned
with any exquisite arrangement of her hair. What sort of garland, however,
I pray you, did He who is the Head of the man and the glory of the woman,
Christ Jesus, the Husband of the church, submit to in behalf of both sexes?
Of thorns, I think, and thistles,--a figure of the sins which the soil of
the flesh brought forth for us, but which the power of the cross removed,
blunting, in its endurance by the head of our Lord, death's every sting.
Yes, and besides the figure, there is contumely with ready lip, and
dishonour, and infamy, and the ferocity involved in the cruel things which
then disfigured and lacerated the temples of the Lord, that you may now be
crowned with laurel, and myrtle, and olive, and any famous branch, and
which is of more use, with hundred-leaved roses too, culled from the garden
of Midas, and with both kinds of lily, and with violets of all sorts,
perhaps also with gems and gold, so as even to rival that crown of Christ
which He afterwards obtained. For it was after the gall He tasted the
honeycomb(5) and He was not greeted as King of Glory in heavenly places
till He had been condemned to the cross as King of the Jews, having first
been made by the Father for a time a little less than the angels, and so
crowned with glory and honour. If for these things, you owe your own head
to Him, repay it if you can, such as He presented His for yours; or be not
crowned with flowers at all, if you cannot be with thorns, because you may
not be with flowers.
CHAP. XV.
Keep for God His own property untainted; He will crown it if He choose.
Nay, then, He does even choose. He calls us to it. To him who conquers He
says, "I will give a crown Of life."(6) Be you, too, faithful unto death,
and fight you, too, the good fight, whose crown the apostle feels so
justly confident has been laid up for him. The angel(2) also, as he goes
forth on a white horse, conquering and to conquer, receives a crown of
victory; and another(3) is adorned with an encircling rainbow (as it were
in its fair colours)--a celestial meadow. In like manner, the elders sit
crowned around, crowned too with a crown of gold, and the Son of Man
Himself flashes out above the clouds. If such are the appearances in the
vision of the seer, of what sort will be the realities in the actual
manifestation? Look at those crowns. Inhale those odours. Why condemn you
to a little chaplet, or a twisted headband, the brow which has been
destined for a diadem? For Christ Jesus has made us even kings to God and
His Father. What have you in common with the flower which is to die? You
have a flower in the Branch of Jesse, upon which the grace of the Divine
Spirit in all its fulness rested--a flower undefiled, unfading,
everlasting, by choosing which the good soldier, too, has got promotion in
the heavenly ranks. Blush, ye fellow-soldiers of his, henceforth not to be
condemned even by him, but by some soldier of Mithras, who, at his
initiation in the gloomy cavern, in the camp, it may well be said, of
darkness, when at the sword's point a crown is presented to him, as though
in mimicry of martyrdom, and thereupon put upon his head, is admonished to
resist and east it off, and, if you like, transfer it to his shoulder,
saying that Mithras is his crown. And thenceforth he is never crowned; and
he has that for a mark to show who he is, if anywhere he be subjected to
trial in respect of his religion; and he is at once believed to be a
soldier of Mithras if he throws the crown away--if he say that in his god
he has his crown. Let us take note of the devices of the devil, who is wont
to ape some of God's things with no other design than, by the faithfulness
of his servants, to put us to shame, and to condemn us.
Taken from "The Early Church Fathers and Other Works" originally published
by Wm. B. Eerdmans Pub. Co. in English in Edinburgh, Scotland beginning in
1867. (ANF 3, Roberts and Donaldson). The digital version is by The
Electronic Bible Society, P.O. Box 701356, Dallas, TX 75370, 214-407-WORD.
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