CHRIST IN THE MIDDLE AGES
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figure of Christ stands in the apse, fronting the worshippers, portrayed on a dark-blue ground amid golden-edged clouds of sunset ; His right hand is raised in blessing, His left holds a written scroll. The figures of St. Peter and St. Paul, witli palm-trees of Paradise and the phoenix (the em- blem of the Resurrection), stand on each side of the Christ, and beneath His feet flows the river Jordan. Below this again is the representation of the Lamb, with the four rivers of Paradise and twelve sheep on either side.
The representations of the suffering and dying Christ, which became the favourites of a later age, have, of course, an independent value. Neverthe- less there is a peculiar beauty and significance in the mingled majesty and tenderness of those earlier pictures of the living Christ, which ex- pressed the love o^ those whose faith in Him had literally overcome the world. See Christ in Art.
7. The two strands of tlieology and devotion which we have endeavoured to trace in the early Church seem fittingly to meet in the most remark- able man after St. Paul whom the Church has seen, the great Athanasius. It was largely due, as we have seen, to him that the traditional belief of the Church, at the greatest crisis of Church history, took its clear and definite and accurately reasoned shape in the Catholic creeds. And it is interesting to note that the secret of Athanasius' defence of the Homoousion was seen by his con- temporaries to lie in his own personal devotion from childhood onwards to the Person of the Re- deemer. ' Athanase etait enflamme, des sa jeunesse, de la passion qui fait les saints, I'amour de Jesus Christ' (De Broglie, L'i^glise et r Empire, i. 372). ' His maintenance of dogma was a lifelong act of devotion' (Bright, Church Hist. p. 149). The great treatise On the Incarnation of the Word, which marks an epoch in theological writings, is no mere dogmatic statement, but glows with tlie pure passion of belief. It is the work of one who profoundly and from the heart believes in Christ as a living Person, in His present power, and His absolute claim upon mankind. The power of the Cross of Christ and His Resurrection from the dead are to Athanasius the greatest of facts, unparalleled in history, illimitable in their future consequences. 'The achievements of the Saviour,' he says, ' resulting from His becoming man, are of such a kind and nimiber that if one should wish to enumerate them, he may be compared to men who gaze at the expanse of the sea and wish to count its waves . . . ; to sum the matter up, behold how the Saviour's doctrine is everywhere increasing, while all idolatry and everything opposed to the faith of Christ is daily dwindling and losing power and falling ; and thus beholding, Avorship the Saviour, who is above all and mighty, even God the Word' (54, 55).
8. Not only on the highways of Church history does the figure of the living Christ stand out as the central object of Christian love and loyalty. Such a wonderful production as the Hymn of St. Patrick, with a quotation from which we will close this brief survey, illustrates the impression which the preaching of Christ produced upon the infant nations just emerging from barbarism. It belongs to the 5th or 6th cent., a time when the civiliza- tion and empire of Rome were failing, and men were clinging to Christ as the one power which could guide and set free their lives :
' Christ with me, Christ before me, Christ behind me, Christ within me, Christ beneath me, Christ above me, Christ on my right, Christ on my left, Christ in the fort, Christ in the chariot-seat, Christ on the poop.
Clirist in the heart of every man who thinks of me, Christ in the mouth of every man who speaks to me, Clirist in every eye that sees me, Christ in every ear that hears me.'
Literature. — The Apostolic Fathers, one volume edition, containing text, translations, etc., by Lightfoot and Harmer (Macmillanl& Co., 1891) ; ' The Apology of Aristides,' Texts and Studies, Cambridge, 1891 ; The Ante-Nicene Christian Library (T. & T. Clark) ; Smith-Wace, Dictionary of Christian Bio- graphy (Murray, 1877-1887 [the articles on 'Athanasius,' 'Origenes,' and ' Christology ' are especially useful]); Smith Cheetham, Dictionary of Christian Antiquities (1875-188U) ; Wace-Schaff, Select Library of Nicene and Fost-Nicene Fathers (Oxford and New York, 1890-1900), especially the volumes ' Eusebius,' ' Athanasius,' and ' The Seven (Ecumenical Coun- cils' ; Schaif, History of the Christian Church (T. & T. Clark) ; Bright, History of the Church, 313-1,51 (Parker & Co., 1888); Ruinart, Acta M arty rum (Ratishon, 1859); Newman, Ariansof the Fourth Century (Longmans & Co.) ; Bull, Works (edited by Burton, Oxford, 1846) ; Burn, Introd. to the Creeds (1899).
A, R. Whitham.
CHRIST IN THE MIDDLE AGES.— The Chris- tology of the Middle Ages was, of course, the out- growth of that of the earlier time, and each medi- ieval type can readily be traced to its source. The main lines of influence are : that of Augustine, working directly through the continued use of his writings, and indirectly through the personality and writings of Gregory the Great, Anselm of Canterbury, Bernard of Clairvaux, Alselard, Peter Lombard, Thomas Aquinas, etc. ; that of the Neo- Platonic pseudo-Dionysiusthe Areopagite, working directly through the continued use of his writings, and indirectly through the propagation of his modes of thought by Maximus the Confessor, Scotus Eri- gena, the German Mystics, etc. ; Adoptianism, which flourished in the immediately post-Apostolic (if not in the Apostolic) times, was vigorously propagated in Armenia, and perpetuated there by the Paulicians even down to the present time, had a vigorous de- velopment in Spam during the 8th and 9th cents., and affected much of the dissenting evangelical thought of the mediaeval time ; and the Gnostic- Manichaean modes of thought, perpetuated from the early time, and reappearing in the Catharistic sects. For the Greek Church the Christology of John of Damascus, who in the 8th cent, reduced to system the net results of the Christological con- troversies of the three preceding centuries, con- tinued to be normative during the Middle Ages, and little independent theorizing seems to have found place.