Who were the Alogi?

In the latter half of the second, or early part of the third, century certain people whom Epiphanius (Hær., LI., 3, 4) called Alogi (irrationalists), represented by one Caius of Rome, resisted the doctrine of the Logos, and "from the Evangelist's use of the term" they held that he must have been, not an Apostle, but Cerinthus or other Gnostic. Reference might be made to Stanton (pp. 198-212). Lightfoot remarks that their questioning the Johannine authorship of the Gospel is "just one of those exceptions which strengthen the rule" (p. 61). Large use was, of course, made of John's Preface in the Arian controversy; as to which see Dorner's standard work on "The History of the Person of Christ," or Pullan's small but valuable book, "Early Christian Doctrine." That Christianity itself was at stake Thomas Carlyle owned in his later life, stating to Froude that he had come to see that if the Arians had won it would have dwindled away to a legend ("Life in London," ii., p. 462). Harnack adds his testimony: "The opponents were right: thus doctrine leads back to heathenism."

1a Indications of authorship present themselves in the Gospel itself at John 1:14, John 19:35, John 21:24. So much of the tradition as concerns the Apostle's connection with it is pieced together from the "Church History" of Eusebius (iii., chapter 24), who has preserved the Preface to comments on Logia of the Lord, by Papias, Bishop of Hierapolis (see Col. 4:13) about A.D. 130 or 140 (see Sanday, "Gospels in the Second Century," pp. 145-160, or Stanton, pp. 166-168), from the Muratorian Fragment, about A.D. 170 (see Westcott on the Canon), and from Irenæus in his treatise against heresies (A.D. 180), whose statement in iii. 11 Weizsäcker acknowledges as documentary evidence, not mere tradition. The language of Papias is too vague to be of any help as to this Gospel and its authorship. Justin Martyr came in between this Papias and Irenæus. He seems to quote from the Gospel in both his Apology and his Dialogue with Trypho, but does not name the author. The Muratorian Fragment, however, is distinct in its evidence, not only for the Apostolic authorship, but for the supreme value it attached to the fourth Gospel. By the time of Irenæus acceptance of the Johannine authorship is clear; of him Jülicher candidly says that "he was not the man to spin tradition out of his own brain" (p. 405). Indeed, the late Dr. Ezra Abbot, an American Unitarian, was convinced that we need not travel lower down for recognition of John's authorship than the time of Justin Martyr — i.e., in the middle of the second century (p. 80, cf. Stanton, pp. 181-191). Justin's adherent, Tatian (A.D. 160), seems to have used this Gospel for his "Diatessaron," which begins with "In the beginning was the Word" (cf. testimony of Theodoret, in Zahn). As far as is known, recognised opponents of Christianity, such as Celsus and Porphyry, did not attempt to disturb the received opinion. It is true that so-called Alogi (see note on John 1:1) attributed the authorship to Cerinthus, and the acceptance of the Johannine claim in the second century was retarded by the circumstance that the Gnostic heretic did actually appeal to this Gospel (see notes on John 1:3, 5, 14, etc.). So according to Origen, Heracleon in Italy (170-180), whilst the Alexandrian Basilides, "about the year 175," as wrote Matthew Arnold ("God and the Bible," p. 268 f.), "had before him the fourth Gospel." Zahn (ii. 459 note) gives ample references for such writers, as well as to Theophilus of Antioch, who died in 186, the first of the orthodox distinctly naming the author. Stanton well says: "That this Gospel, umlike as it is to the Synoptics, should have overborne the resistance offered to its acceptance is, humanly, only to be explained by its Apostolic authorship" (p. 277; cf. Sadler, Introduction to Commentary, xxv.).

Abarbanel, 423 Abbot (Dr. Ezra), 1 Abbott (Dr. E. A.), 1, 6,17, 46, 62, 64, 85, 89, 114, 205, 226 Aben Ezra, 423 Abiding in Christ, 146, 322 Achelis (Dr T.), 9 Æschylus, reference to, 336 ajgapa'n, filei'n, 467 ff., 357, 386 Agnosticism 7, 328 ajqetei'n, 245 aijevw, 237, 303, 363, 276, 277 ajlhqhv", ajlhqinov", 160, 283, 312b Alford (Dean) 12, 14, 183, 256, 411 Allegories, 213, 214 "Alogi," 9 Alsbech, 423 American revision, 164a Altruism, 290b ajmnov", ajrnivon, 24 tma, rabbinic use of, 122 ajnabevbhken, proleptic perfect, 59f.: ajnasthvsontai 108 Anderson (Sir R.), 1, 8, 12a, 16, 22, 32, 115, Andrewes(Bp.), 159a, 336 Andrews (S. J.), 247 Annas, trial before, 397, 328 ajntiv, 24 Antichrist, coming in his own name, 126 Antinomianism, 140, 271 anwqen, 64 Aorist, force of, 284, 376, 107 ajpeiqw'n, 79 ajporouvmenoi, 258 a{ptou, a{fh/, 444 Aquila, 424, version of, 20 Arianism, 26, 199 Aristion, 379 Arminianism, 274, 319, 321 Arnold (M.), 1, 68, 284 Ascension, none in the fourth Gospel, 3; of Son of man, climax for faith, 152 Asceticism, 417 Athanasian Creed, 112, 280, 366 Athanasius, 26b, 107, 366 Augustine, 3, 176, 184, 266, 257, 460, Bacon (Prof.), 1, 61, 161, 260, 379a Baedeker (Dr. F. W.), 185 Baptism, John's, 21, 47; Christian, 23, 47ff; of the Holy Ghost, 28; sign of death 48; misapplication of, 266 Baptismal service, the 48, 321 Bar Abba, 406 Bar Kochba, 113 Barry (Dr. W.), 1. la Barth (Prof.), 1, 68, 149 Basilides, 18, 1, 13, 88 bastajzein, 224 Bauer (B.), 205 Baur (F. a ), 1a, 376 "Believe," 59, 115, 138, 814, 321f Believer, gives account, 66 Bellett (J. G.), 127a, 316, 349, 353, 364, 370 Bengel (J. A.), 60, 184, 414; 436, 24, 32, 64, 77, 111, 112, 154, 216, 330, 346, 351, 392 Benisch (Dr. A.) 423 Benn (A. W.), 61, 278b Bernard (T. D.), 61, 270, 277a, 280, 312c, 317a, 336 Bernard of Clairvaux, 278 Bethany, 29 Bethlehem, 151 Bethsaida, 40, 282 Bevan (Mrs.), 278b Beyschlag (W.), 1a, 108, 111, 312 Beza, 363, 112, 154 Birks, (T. R.) 114 Blakesley 184 Blass (F.), 1a. 10, 21, 49, 53, 18, 101, 111, 154, Bleek (F. ),1a, 330 Blindness, spiritual, arising from sin, 211 Blood and water, 266, 421f Bloomfield, 376 Body of Christ, the Vine and the, 319, 321 Boanerges. 1 Boothroyd, 423 Born of water, etc., 66 Bousset (Prof.), 1,1a, 43, 45, 113 bovskein, poimaivnein, 386 Brethren of the Lord 167, 137 Bretschneider (C. G.), 1; Briggs (Prof.), la, 83, 64, 73, 75, 76 Bruce (Dr. A B.), 7 Bunsen (Chevalier), 1, 7 Burgon (Dean), 111, 112,127, 317, 346 Burial of JESUS, prophecy fulfilled in, Burkitt (Prof ), 127, 149, 160, 173, 205, 210 Buttmann (P. C.), 353 Caiaphas, "high priest of that year" 217 trial before, 334, 344 Cain, the way of, 137 Caius of Rome, P Calvin, 12, 23, 272, 319, 321, 330, 448 Cana, 47 Carlyle (I.), 9 Carpenter (Bp. Boyd), 127 Carr (A.), 13, 21, 26, 34, 88, 96, 112, 137, 150, 184, 18, 220a, 300, 361 Carson (A.), 126 Cartwright. 47 Cassels (W. B.), 1, 8, 29, 168, 183, 187a, 197, 205, 212a, 215 Censure of others, 276 Cerinthus, 1, 9 Chagigah, 336 Charles (Prof.), 65, 322 Chase (Bp.), 310a Cheetham (Archd.), 61, 278b "Chief priests," 153 Chiliasm, of the Evangelist, 394 Christ, the Person of, 1, 9ff, 301f as personal Name, 312c, pivot of everything 28; sole centre for His people on earth, 29ff; not detached from "Jesus" before death, 18, 23; in contrast with law, 67, 107; His heavenly intercession as Priest 132; as glorified known by the Christian, 442, abiding fellowship with, eating His flesh, 146: confession of, 261; Lordship of, 276: Advocate with the Father, 274; glorification of, central fact for Christian 294; absent, would prove himself divine, 303; obedience to words of, 310, dwelling-place of the soul, 318. His death, and going to the Father, 369; sanctifying Himself, Christadelphianism, 281 Christendom, 42, 439 "Christian Science," 23 Christianity, characteristics of, 444; that usually styled, 446 Chrysostom, 184, 380f., 14, 26b, 111, 112, 164a, 223, 330, 331, 366, 394 Church, always distinct from Israel 221; heavenly relationship Of the, 319, idea of, 291b Chwolson, 347 Clement of Alexandria 1, 7, 26 "Coming into the world," 1 Coit (Dr. S.), 9, 290b Communion in one kind, 151; as condition of fruit-bearing, 322, maintenance of, 268 Comte (A.), 9 Congregation, the great, 452 Conscience, awakened for sense of grace, 87; purged, 91 Conversion, constituents of, 42 Copyists ignorance of, 177 Corn of wheat, in recent researches, 232a Correggio, 341 Cosmogony, Biblical, 9. Courage, true Christian, 291 Creation, by the WORD, l0f., 9A Credner (C. A.), 1 Creeds, 21, 112, 280, 374 Cross, necessary for eternal life, 61ff.; God glorified In the, 285f. Cyril of Alexandria, 184, 381 D'Alma, 174 Darby (J. N.), 15, 52, 61, 78, 79, 112, 183, 195, 270, 271 290, 298, 330 Darkness. 13, 68 Darwinism, 9, Davidson (Dr.

I am fully satisfied that the East was the origin of much more of all this than we are aware of, corrected partially in these Alexandrian Fathers by Christianity, and already in Plato (and, I suppose, Pythagoras) by Grecian habits of thought. The root of it was, that there was a supreme unknown God who dwelt in the depths of silence, and could have no connection with matter. Hence emanations and the Demiurge, an inferior creator, resulting in Gnosticism — the plague of the early church. Platonism, with its emanated demons and the Alexandrian philosophy, divides into the Christian and heathen parties, Clement giving his perfect Christian the name of Gnostic. Early there was a Jewish party, whom Philo represents. In all Logos was an inferior being, though divine. It resulted, in another form, in Arianism, the doctrine more or less of the Alexandrian ante-Nicene Fathers (not of Irenaeus), combated by Athanasius when it came formally to a head in Arius. Thus it was that Dr. Newman came to be called an Arian. He had imbibed a delight in these ante-Nicene statements. Hence, too, arose asceticism. Matter held, as Plato teaches, the soul down as a nail to the earth; it was to be mortified. Asceticism began in the Alexandrian church, partly indeed by persons who fled in the Decian persecution. Hence forbidding to marry, not that people might be more devoted, but as evil for the Gnostic.

In all ancient mythology and tradition, heathen and Jewish, will be found the craving of the human mind after truths which revelation gives as in their perfection. Infidels have consequently alleged that these truths were borrowed from the traditions, than which nothing can be more false. They were the source of Arianism and Gnosticism, Universalism and Annihilationism. Thus Rationalists tell us that the doctrine of the λόγος, or Word, was derived from the Alexandrian or even Palestinian Jews. These had their Memra, those their λόγος; and Philo speaks largely of it, and makes the visible world itself an expression, so to speak, of the λόγος, a living expression of it. But mark the real bearing of this. The reason was, that the supreme God could not by any possibility be in connection with matter. The mystic Rabbins held God for a kind of non-existence, because there was no such connection with what we hold to exist. Hence there was a secondary God, the λόγος, or Word, which partook of His nature but was not the Supreme, and He then revealed Himself and was in communication with the creature. Yet in general, matter (ὔλη) was a thing evil in itself, a bond to the soul, and eternal too.

331 Now Christianity teaches the exact contrary of this doctrine of the λόγος (word). The λόγος is God — created everything; and the very essence of Christianity is the immediate personal connection, in incarnation, between God and the creature — God and man in one person. All the fulness of the Godhead dwelt in him bodily. "The Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us," that Word which, in the beginning, was, when all began. In eternity He was God, and personally too with God. By Him was everything made, and the Father dwelt in Him and He was in the Father. "We know him that is true, and are in him that is true, in his Son, Jesus Christ. He is the true God and eternal life." One of the striking facts of the First Epistle of John is that it is impossible to separate Christ and God. It is one Person, one Being. Thus, "And now, little children, abide in him, that when he shall appear we may have confidence and not be ashamed before him at his coming." (Chap. 2:28.) Whose coming? Clearly, Christ's. Continue: "If ye know that he is righteous, ye know that every one that doeth righteousness is born of him." Of whom? Of God; and so it follows, "Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us that we should be called the sons of God … Beloved, now are we the sons of God." Here, clearly, the person or being of whom he speaks is God. But continue: "Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it hath not yet appeared what we shall be, but we know that when he shall appear, we shall be like him." Here it is again Christ; for it is, "Christ our life shall appear." And "He was manifested to take away our sins," continues John himself. That is, the apostle, the Spirit of God, does take up, and in a great measure anticipatively, the question of the λόγος, and gives us the exact opposite to the Platonic and Alexandrian doctrines — the full divine truth, in answer to all the wanderings and speculations which the cravings of need and the glimmerings of tradition had led men's hearts to suggest to themselves and systematize.

It is to me as evident as possible historically, that the Arian doctrine came direct from Philo, at least from the Alexandrian school of philosophers, or Platonist Jews, who held that the supreme God could not be directly connected with the material creation; and spoke of the λόγος, the Word, as between the supreme God and the creation, begotten perhaps rather than made; yet after all existing as a creature by the will of the Creator, the supreme God. Now, save the dear good old Irenaeus, and a word or two from Polycarp and Ignatius, all the earlier Greek Fathers were of this school. Justin Martyr, a Platonist, taught this doctrine; so Clemens, so Origen. It was Platonism, not Scripture, and deeply infected the assembly. These Fathers are no way to be trusted; they shew it, and this spread west too, in the existence of the words ἐνδιάθετος and προφοριχός: all that is directly and verbally from the Philo school. I accept none of this. I find it met in face by John and Paul, carefully and fully met. I read, "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." John 1:1. Wherever my mind can go back to as a beginning as to time, there He was. And that there may be no plea of ἐνδιάθετος that is His inherence as reason without being a person, he adds, "He was in the beginning with God" — always a distinct person. And lest any inferiority should be alleged, Paul tells us, "All the fulness was pleased to dwell in him," for this is the true force of the passage. And so the fact is declared to have been, "For in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily." Col. 2:9. As a person He emptied Himself, ἑαυτὸν ἐχένωσεν. He could not have done so save as God. A creature who leaves his first estate sins therein. The sovereign Lord can descend in grace. In Him it is love. Then, as in that position, He receives all. All the words He has are given to Him. He is, though unchangeable in nature as God, yet in His path a dependent man. He lives by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God — is sealed by the Father; the glory He had before the world is now given Him of the Father. Now in this state of obedient servant, with a revelation which God gave to Him, the day and hour of His judicial action was not revealed. "It is not for you," He says to His disciples, "to know the times or the seasons which the Father hath put in his own power." Acts 1:7. And to this exactly Psalm 110 answers (as has been observed by another), "Sit on my right hand till I make thine enemies thy footstool." When? Sit there in this place of divine glory till; no more is said. Now, I do not pretend to explain — God forbid I should! — how this is.

I cannot but regard John 1:2 as a striking and complete setting aside of the Alexandrian and Patristic distinction of λόγος ἐνδιάθετος and λόγος προφορικός. Some of the earlier Greek fathers, who were infected with Platonism, held that the λόγος was conceived in God's mind from eternity, and only uttered, as it were, in time. This has given a handle to Arians, who, like other unbelievers, greedily seek the traditions of men. The apostle here asserts, in the Holy Ghost, the eternal personality of the Word with God.

Most of the Ante-Nicene Fathers held that Christ, though eternal as the word-mind (endiathetos) in God, only became a person (apophorikos) when God was about to create the world, a notion utterly refuted by John 1:2. "He was in the beginning with God," i.e. distinct personality, and that from eternity. We often hear the earlier period of the Church spoken of as its purer period. No mistake could be more gross; never was heresy and puerile nonsense more rife, or so rife.

Arianism was the natural growth of the Gnostic opinions; and Alexandria the hotbed of metaphysical questions and subtle distinctions, its birthplace. Paul of Samosata, and Sabellius of Libya, in the third century, taught similar false doctrines to Arius in the fourth. The Gnostic sects in their different varieties, and the Manichean, which was the Persian religion with a mixture of Christianity, may be considered rather as rival religions, than as christian factions nevertheless they did their evil work among Christians as to the doctrine of the Trinity. Nearly all of these heresies as they are usually called, had fallen under the royal displeasure, and their followers subjected to penal regulations. The Montanists, Paulites, Novatians, Marcionites, and Valentinians were amongst the proscribed and persecuted sects. But there was another, a deeper, a darker, and a much more influential heresy than had yet arisen, about to burst forth and that from the very bosom of the so-called holy Catholic church. It happened in this way.

Before the first century closed there arose the Gnostics — i.e. "The knowing Ones" — who claimed to give a more intellectual version of the faith than had been given by the "unlearned and ignorant men" (Acts 4:13), as the Apostles were from a worldly standpoint. Thus they turned some aside. It was an adulteration, and hence John's repeated reference to what was "from the beginning." Nothing other or different from that is set before us in the Scriptures.