§ 154. THE AUGUSTmiA^" SYSTEM CONTINUED. S31
the body either at the moment of its generation, or afterwards This view is held by several Eastern theologians and by Jerome, who appeals to the unceasing creative activity of God (John V. 17). It required the assumption that the soul, which must proceed pure from the liaud of the Creator, becomes sinful by its connection with the naturally generated body. Pelagius and his followers were creationists.'
3. Tlie theory of P re-existence, which was originated by Plato and more fully developed by Origen, supposes that the soul, even before the origin of the body, existed and sinned in another world, and has been banished in the body as in 'a prison,^ to expiate that personal Adamic guilt, and by an ascetic process to be restored to its original state. This is one of the Origenistic heresies, w^liich were condemned under Justinian. Even Gregory of l^yssa, although, like N^eniesius and Cyril of Alexandria, he supposed the sonl to be created before the body, compares Origen's theory to the heathen myths ana fables. Origen himself allowed that the Bible does not directly teach the pre-existence of the soul, but maintained that several passages, such as the strife between Esau and Jacob in the womb, and the leaping of John the Baptist in the womb of Elizabeth at the salutation of Mary, imply it. The only truth in this theory is that eveiy human soul has from eternity existed in the thought and purpose of God.'
Augustine emphatically rejects the doctrine of pre-existence,* without considering that his own theory of a generic
' Jerome says, appealing to Jolin v. 17 ; Zech. xii. 1 ; Ps. xxxiii. 15 : " Quotidie Deus fabricatur animas, cujus velle fecisse est, et conditor esse non cessat." Pelar ^us, in his Confession of Faith, declares for the view that souls are made and given by God Himself.
' The au)!xa interpreted as o-TJ^a (sepulchre). Origen appeals to the groaning of the creation, Rom. viii. 19.
' Lately the theory of pre-existence has found in America an advocate in Dr. Edward Beecher, in his book: The Conflict of Ages, Boston, 1853. Woi flsworth Las given it a poetic garb in his Ode on Iramortahty :
" Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting: The so il that rises with us, our life's star, Hath had elsewhere its setting, And Cometh from afar." * De civit. Dei, xi. 23. Ad Oros. c. Priscill. et Grig. c. 8. In his earlier work. Do Ubcro arbitrio (about 395), he spoke more favorably of Pre-existentianism.
832 THIRD PEEIOD. A.D. 311-590
prc-existence and apostasy of all men in Adam is really liable to similar objectioiis. For he also hangs the whole fate of the human race on a transcendental act of freedom, lying beyond our temi)oraI consciousness; though, it is true, he places thia act in the beginning of earthly liistory, and ascribes it to the one general ancestor, while Origen transfers it into a previous world, und views it as an act of each individual soul.'
But between creationism and traducianism Augustine wavers, because the Scriptures do not expressly decide. He wishes to keep both the continuous creative activity of God and the organic union of body and soul.
Augustine regards this whole question as belonging to science and tlie schools, not to faith and the church, and makes a confession of ignorance which, in a man of his speculative genius, involves great self-denial. "Where the Scripture," he says, " renders no certain testimony, human inquiry must beware of decidmg one way or the other. If it were necessary to salvation to Jinow anything concerning it, Scripture would have said more." "
' Comp. Baur, Vorlesungen iiber die Dogmengeschichte, Bd. i. Th. ii. p. 31; " What essentially distinguishes the Augustinian system from that of Origen, consist* only [?] in this, that in place of the pretemporal fall of souls we have the Adamio apostasy, and that what in Origen bears yet a heathen impress, has in Augustine assumed a purely Old Testament [certainly, however, also a Paulino] form."
^ De peccatorum mer. et remiss. 1. ii. c. 36, § 59. lie still remained thus unde» cidcd in his Retractations, lib. i. cap. 1, ^ 3 (Opera, lom. i. f, 4), where he honestly acknowledges: "Quod attiuct ad ejus [animi] originera . . . ncc tunc sciebam, nee adhuc scio." lie frequently treats of this question, e. g., De anima et ejus origine; De Gcnesi ad litcram, x. 23; Epist. 190 ad Optatum; and Opus iuipcrf iv. 104 Comp. also Gangauf, L c. p. 248 flF. and John Iluber, Philosophic der Kirchenvater, p. 291 fif. Iluber gives the foUowiug terse presentation of the Augustinian doctrine: "In the problem of the origin of the soul Augustine arrived at no definite view. In his earlier writings he is as yet even unsettled as to the doctrine of pre-existenco (De lib. arbitr. i. 12, 24; ill. 20 and 21), but afterwards he rejects it must decidedly, especially as presented by Origen, and at the same time criticises ids wliole theory of the origin of the world (De civit. Dei, xi. 23). In like manner he declaies against the theory of emanation, according to whicli the soul has flowed out of tuid (Do Goncs. ad. lit. vii. 2, 3), is of Dne nature (Epist. 166 ad Hieron. § 3) and coeternal (De civ. Dei, X. 31). Between creationism and gencrationism, however, he can come to no decision, being kept in 8usi»euse not so much by scientific as by theological (ousider»» tions. As to generationism, he remembers Tertullian, and feara being compelled.