Introduction
What is the
right way of life? How does someone
convert to the right religion? How do we
choose between religions or philosophies of life? On what basis do we determine how to live
well? We might articulate the problems
faced by looking at a dialogue in one of Lucian’s writings in AD 2nd
century and offer some responses from Scripture.
The problems of choosing the
right way of life is raised in Lucian’s Hermotimus,
also known as The Rival Philosophies.[1] Hermotimus tells Lycinus that he has chosen
to follow the philosophical school of the Stoics. The Stoics set virtue alone as the goal to
pursue, whatever the challenges of life.
External circumstances, like wealth or social status, had nothing to
contribute to the good life, and the process of becoming virtuous was like
travelling to a far off city (cf. 2).
Lycinus presses Hermotimus
on his choice to follow Stoic philosophy—or to follow any philosophy, for that
matter. He presses him on the grounds
for choosing any way of life. The general question behind this dialogue is how
we, living in the particulars of finite existence and without certainty, can
make choices about absolute matters.
Thinking of life as a journey, how do we know where to travel? How do we know what life in the city of our destination
will be like? What road do we take? How shall we conduct ourselves on the
journey? He asks,
when
you first went in pursuit of philosophy, you found many gates wide open;
what induced you to pass the others by, and go in at the Stoic gate? Why did
you assume that that was the only true one, which would set you on the straight
road to Virtue, while the rest all opened on blind alleys? What was the test
you applied then? (15).
The dialogue investigates
answers to that question. I will present
a summary of the dialogue and enumerate Lycinus’s objections to Hermotimus’s
reasoning. Ultimately, the dialogue ends
with Lycinus convincing him that he has no good reason for following Stoicism
or any other philosophy. Our question
when reading this dialogue goes beyond the discussion itself: ‘How can we
defend a commitment to Christian faith?’
1.
Number of
Adherents
Perhaps we should choose the
faith that the majority does. Hermotimus
says,
every
one told me the Epicureans were sensual and self-indulgent, the Peripatetics
avaricious and contentious, the Platonists conceited and vain; about the
Stoics, on the contrary, many said they had fortitude and an open mind; he who
goes their way, I heard, was the true king and millionaire and wise man, alone
and all in one (16).
Lycinus objects. How accurately are our assumptions about the
number of followers? We might expand
this point, since we now have statisticians telling us how many adherents there
are to particular religions. Yet they
tell us that the numbers of adherents in one country or region varies
tremendously from another. Following the
majority in a region is really a matter of cultural expression, not rational
choice.
This was also a point Jesus emphasised. Also using the analogy of a journey, He said:
Enter by the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the way is
easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. 14 For the
gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it
are few (Matthew 7.13-14, ESV).
The majority
take an easy path, but the way to eternal life is arduous and therefore taken
by only a few. The growth of
Christianity in the Roman Empire during its first three centuries took place
with periodic persecutions, sometimes local and sometimes empire wide. When Christianity became acceptable under
Emperor Constantine in the early 4th century, Christians faced the
problem of half-hearted or cultural Christians whose faith was insincere and
mingled with unchristian beliefs and practices.
This problem continued in Protestant realms from the 16th
century, where state religions were established and people just streamed into
the established Church, whether Lutheran, Calvinist, or Anglican. One has to find the minority within these
majority Churches to find true believers.
2.
Personal Impressions
Returning to our dialogue, Hermotimus
replies that he has also made his own observations about the philosophical
schools:
I saw
the Stoics going about with dignity, decently dressed and groomed, ever with a
thoughtful air and a manly countenance, as far from effeminacy as from the
utter repulsive negligence of the Cynics, bearing themselves, in fact, like
moderate men; and every one admits that moderation is right (18).
Lycinus, of course,
dismisses Hermotimus’s weak reasoning. He
asks what blind men are to do if outward appearance is the criterion for choosing
a way of life (19). Moreover, he asks, ‘was it not from admiration of their spirit that
you joined them, expecting to have your own spirit purified?’ (20). If so, the character of the philosophers will
only be revealed over a long period of observation of what qualities emerge in
various contexts. Humans should have
been made with a window in the chest so that we can see inside.
Jesus’ main
opposition were the Pharisees and scribes, whom He accused of hypocrisy, show, and
an outward performance without a changed heart.
He says, ‘unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and
Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven’ (Matthew 5.20). He then explains that outward acts are
inadequate for the righteousness demanded in God’s Kingdom. What is needed is an inward righteousness of
the heart. Later, Jesus says, ‘For out
of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft,
false witness, slander’ (Matthew 15.19).
The Pharisees’ problem was not their advocating a life lived according
to the Law but their using legal wrangling to avoid living under its
regulations themselves, and this problem stemmed from unchanged hearts. We might state the issue for our purposes as
one where teachers of a good way of life might be dismissed because they do not
represent such a life in their own lives.
Such a problem
regularly appears in religious news outlets, when some pastor of a church large
enough to make the news is dismissed for immoral conduct. Similarly, some denominations have spent
decades in scandal for hiding clergy abuse of boys. Indeed, Jesus warns,
Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing but
inwardly are ravenous wolves. 16 You will recognize them by their
fruits. Are grapes gathered from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? 17 So,
every healthy tree bears good fruit, but the diseased tree bears bad fruit. 18 A
healthy tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a diseased tree bear good fruit. 19 Every
tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. 20 Thus you
will recognize them by their fruits (Matthew 7.15-20).
The
solution to this problem cannot be to ignore how people live out the philosophy
they teach but to call out hypocrites.
Jesus says, ‘The scribes and the Pharisees sit on Moses’ seat, 3 so do and
observe whatever they tell you, but not the works they do. For they preach, but
do not practice’ (Matthew 23.2). The harm
teachers do to others by their failures is very real, however. Jesus warned, ‘whoever causes one of these
little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a great millstone fastened around his neck and to be
drowned in the depth of the sea. 7 “Woe to the world for temptations to sin! For it is
necessary that temptations come, but woe to the one by whom the temptation
comes!’ (Matthew 18.6-7).
In our dialogue, the
opposite problem is identified by Lycinus.
The problem is that of following a philosophy simply upon one’s first
impressions of those practicing it:
whichever
of them [the philosophical schools] I try, there is sure to be a most
respectable person stationed just at the entrance, with a welcoming hand and an
exhortation to go his way; each of them says he is the only one who knows the
straight road; his rivals are all mistaken, have never been themselves, nor
learnt the way from competent guides (26).
The problem under discussion
is not only about first impressions but also about authorities. We give ourselves over to those claiming
authority when what we should do is evaluate their claims. They are servants of the philosophy or
religion, not persons invested with authority to represent it however they
wish.
This entire issue is the
current story of the current failings of mainline denominations that have
existed long enough to stand on the merit of their claims to authority. What they have done in the past half century
in the West, however, is actually change their belief systems and moral
convictions. The snake changes its skin,
but these denominations have kept their skin and changed what is inside. They stand as authorities in Western culture
over time and now as authorities for adopting the changing culture over against
Christian teaching. In this way, they
continue to claim authority.
3.
A guide who has already
been to the destination
Hermotimus remains
undaunted. He says (thirdly), ‘you cannot go wrong, if you trust those who have been
already’ (27). However, Lycinus quickly
points out that nobody has already been to the city and retuned to guide
others. We might say that nobody has
seen God or been to heaven and returned to show us the right way. Lycinus has in mind virtues. Where is the perfect man who might represent
to the rest of us how to live?
This question
gets to the essence of Christian faith, which claims that Jesus does represent
God the Father as a Son does His Father.
The point is made repeatedly in the Gospel of John:
In the beginning
was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.... 14 And the Word became flesh and
dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son4 from the
Father, full of grace and truth.... 18 No one has ever seen God; God the only Son,
who is at the Father’s side, he has made him known (John 1.1,
14, 18).
To answer Lycinus, John
would reply, ‘We Christians actually do have a “man from heaven” who clearly
and fully represents to us God Himself’.
Note that Christians do reduce Christianity to a selection of
philosophical precepts. Doctrine is
important, but it supports the relationship that Jesus established with Himself
and, through Him, to God the Father. We
believe in Him. The Gospel is Good News about Him.
Jesus is not only a guide but is Himself the ‘way, and the truth, and
the life. No one comes to the Father
except through me’ (John 14.6).
4.
The
Assumption of a Single Path
Lycinus adds yet
another challenge to Hermotimus: ‘my greatest difficulty of all is the absolute
certainty that the true road is one’ (27).
For this reason, he avers, one would really need to know the teachings
of all the schools and not only from a Stoic but from those actually teaching
their own philosophies (33-34). He
concludes, ‘as long as it is uncertain which is the true philosophic school, I
choose none; choice of one is insult to the rest’ (35).
Lycinus would
have sat noncommittally in Jesus’ audience.
Indeed, was this not yet another teacher claiming to have all the
answers? John adeptly weaves Jesu’s
feeding of the multitude with a teaching of Jesus that He—like the manna from
heaven in Israel’s wilderness journey—is
the bread of life. He insists that His
disciples eat Him—figuratively, of course (John 6). The multitude that was so enthusiastic about
Him then slips away, and Jesus asks His disciples whether they, too, will
leave. Peter replies, ‘Lord, to whom
shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, 69 and we have believed,
and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God’ (John 6.68-69). Jesus did not just have a teaching worth
consideration; He was the One to follow.
He did not just have words of life, He was the One who came to give
life. He was the Holy One of God. He said, ‘I am the bread of life; whoever comes
to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst’ (6.35;
cf. vv. 41, 48). He later says to His
disciples, ‘I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me’
(14.6).
Western culture
during the Enlightenment and Modernist period continued to believe in
universal, objective truth. The problem was
one of certainty, and this was pursued through science. Postmodernity has promulgated the subjective
alternative: why not pluralism and relativism?
Why not believe that there are many paths, even many destinations, and
no one way can claim to be the only way.
In fact, what works for one person might be his ‘truth’, for another,
‘her truth’. Thus, the acceptance of
subjective reality as reality and of diversity has led to the ethic of self-expression
of who you wish or feel yourself to be and of acceptance of whatever one so
claims.
Jesus answers these
claims. He claims that there is One God,
the Father, and that He is the only way to the Father. The Father is the objective end. Unlike Greek and Roman mythology, there are
not a multiplicity of gods representing different aspects of truth. Jesus is the subjective path to the
Father. One follows Him alone in faith. This might not make sense if we are speaking
of science or philosophies, where the main criterion for evaluation is reason. Religion, however, is a matter of devotion,
and the main criterion is faith. Faith,
for Christians, as already noted, is faith in Christ Jesus. This understanding of faith runs throughout
the Old Testament as the Israelites put their faith, hope, and trust in God
their Saviour. The New Testament draws
this faith in God around God’s saving action of sending His Son. Thus, John says, For God so loved the
world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not
perish but have eternal life’ (3.16). We
do not simply assert a single path to the Father; we also believe that there is
a single Saviour who has made a way to the Father through His death for us to
cleanse us of our sins. We are not
assessing teachers but following the one and only Saviour of our souls.
The Gospel of
John culminates with Jesus’ simple and direct assertion that He came from the
Father and into the world and that He was returning to the Father (16.28). The disciples’ reply, ‘Now we know that you
know all things and do not need anyone to question you; this is why we believe
that you came from God’ (16.30). This
concludes Jesus’ private ministry to His disciples (chapters 13-16). The conclusion to His public ministry
(chapters 2-12) ends similarly. Noting
that some did not believe in Jesus despite His many signs or miracles, John
records Jesus’ crying out:
Whoever believes in me, believes not in me but in him who sent me. 45 And whoever sees me sees him who sent me. 46 I have come into the world as light, so that whoever believes
in me may not remain in darkness. 47 If anyone hears my words and does not keep them, I do not
judge him; for I did not come to judge the world but to save the world. 48 The one who rejects me and does not receive my words has a
judge; the word that I have spoken will judge him on the last day. 49 For I have not spoken on my own authority, but the Father who
sent me has himself given me a commandment—what to say and what to speak. 50 And I know that his commandment is eternal life. What I say,
therefore, I say as the Father has told me (12.44b-50).
This brings
together the previous criterion for belief and this one. Jesus has already been to the destination: He
came from the Father and is returning to the Father. He alone can show the way.
5.
The
Certainty of Belief
Hermotimus
objects to Lycinus’ previous point, insisting that one can tell if some
teaching is true or not without examining alternative teachings, such as
arithmetic. We do not need to explore
alternative answers to a sum when we see that 2 plus 2 equals 4. Lycinus quickly points out that they are
speaking about disputed teachings,
not accepted facts, like arithmetic (36).
Foreboding Rene
Descartes and the advent of the European Enlightenment, Lycinus suggests that
one should ‘be sober and doubt all things’ (47). Prior to the Enlightenment, faith ruled in
the university and the Church in the State.
From Rene Descartes up to present times, the method of reason rather
than faith has been to doubt
everything as a step in attaining certainty,
not mere belief. Only accept what cannot
be doubted (foundationalism). The
scientific method replaced faith, and science replaced theology at the
university as the ‘queen of sciences’.
We might,
however, apply Lycinus’s own argument against him. The method of doubt only works for the
sciences. It might have some value in
assessing other things, but not absolutely.
Many things in life—and certainly in matters that are disputed, like
religion or philosophies of life—require faith.
Nobody can live life doubting everything and affirming only what cannot
be doubted. Descartes himself reasoned that,
not being able to doubt his own existence (cogito
ergo sum), he could move on to belief,
including belief in God. Perhaps we
might especially say that life is built not only on beliefs but on beliefs in
and through certain relationships. For
John’s Gospel, faith is not only based on Jesus’ many ‘signs’ but is especially
based on the disciples’ relationship with Him and His relationship with the
Father (chapter 17).
6.
The
Offensiveness of Truth
Lycinus manages
to offer one positive thought about the discernment of what is true. He says, ‘one thing I do know about it, and
that is that it is not pleasant to the ear; falsehood is far more esteemed; it
is prettier, and therefore pleasanter; while Truth, conscious of its purity,
blurts out downright remarks, and offends people’ (51). Also, pointing out someone’s errors or even
delusions about things will seem offensive.
Lycinus gives the example of pointing out to someone in love with a
statue that it is actually not real.
Jesus’ ministry
met with constant opposition from those who objected to His teaching and to Himself. Ultimately, the religious leaders, the crowd,
and the Roman authorities crucify Him.
Little could be more objectionable than claiming that someone so
rejected was right all along and, not only so, was to be worshipped. Many people, including scholars, in the 19th
century promulgated the idea that Jesus was a great moral teacher. Reading the Gospels as general truths, they
found no offense in Him, but neither did they submit to a higher affirmation of
worship. As Adolf von Harnack answered
in his little book published in 1900, What
is Christianity?, it was belief in the fatherhood of God, the brotherhood
of mankind, and the infinite worth of the human soul. Christianity was not even about faith in
Jesus, only this general fluff. The
Gospels portray a very different Jesus, one whose teachings were uncomfortable
and offensive, and one whose increasing offensiveness came with the greater
insistence not only to believe what was taught, the Kingdom of God, but also to
believe in Him. John’s Gospel especially
captures this by presenting the life of Christ as about Jesus Himself and not
primarily His ethical teaching. We might
suppose that, for Lycinus, Jesus’ offensiveness might have given him reason to
listen to Him.
7.
Sampling
Hermotimus
regathers himself and suggests an alternative to living and learning for long
periods within each philosophical school before making an informed choice. Perhaps looking at samples will suffice, he
proposes (54). Would a digest of
philosophical tenets suffice? Lycinus is
unpersuaded. One can determine from a
lion’s claw that this belongs to a lion only if one has a prior understanding
of lions and their claws. Furthermore,
one can determine from a taste of wine what the rest of the vineyard’s crop will
be because it is homogeneous. All that
the whole is, is represented in the part.
Philosophy—and we might add, religion—is not homogeneous (58-60). A philosophy is more like a collection of
assorted seeds. It is heterogeneous
(61). The one type of seed may be good,
but another sort of seed in the collection is not determined by it in the
least. Also, if one tastes a small amount
of a poison, one will not die. So, a
small sample of a philosophical school will not reveal the whole (62). With these arguments, Lycurgus rejects the
criterion of sampling to evaluate the veracity or desirability of a
philosophical school.
Precisely
because we are not speaking of a philosophy or of a religion in the sense of
its doctrines but of a relationship with Jesus Christ, we are challenged to
devote ourselves wholly to Him. Paul’s
statement in Philippians is along these lines, when he rejects a religion of
legal tenets establishing his own righteousness for the person of Jesus in whom
his righteousness is established:
Indeed, I count
everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my
Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as
rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ 9 and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my
own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the
righteousness from God that depends on faith—10 that I may know him and the power of his
resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his
death, 11 that
by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead (Philippians
3.8-11).
One who knows Jesus Christ cannot entertain the foolish
notion that there is another way to God.
Paul speaks of the alternative as that between light and darkness. What appears to be an early Christian hymn is
stated in Ephesians 5.14:
‘Awake, O sleeper,
and arise from
the dead,
and Christ will shine on you.’
John, too, says,
In him was life, and the life was the light of
men. 5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness
has not overcome it (1.4-5).
8.
Critical
Acumen and Assessments
Lycinus mentions
some further qualities needed to make a determination about philosophical
schools. One needs ‘a critical investigating
faculty, mental acumen, intellectual precision and independence equal to the
occasion’ (64). These analytical
qualities must be applied to an investigation of each school, and that is the
problem: we will never get through so thorough an investigation in a
lifetime. Moreover, we must be ready to
accept that all the philosophies are wrong and not just look for the best among
them (65). Lycinus, the quintessential
agnostic, does not elaborate on this point, though it is very important.
The concern to
present a critical explanation of Christianity for the public led several early
Christian authors to write ‘apologies’ or defenses of the Christian faith. At times, this involved a critique of
Graeco-Roman religion—something that was rather easy to do, it turned out. The contradictions and fantasies and the
moral turpitude of the gods themselves were easily exposed (Aristides’ Apology). Explanations of Christianity with respect to
other religions and Judaism were needed (Letter
to Diognetus). Answers to charges
against Christians and explanations of Christian beliefs and practices were
necessary (Justin’s First and Second Apology; Tertullian’s Apology). A critical engagement with Judaism seems to
have taken place, though with fewer documents left for us to assess (but see
Justin’s Dialogue with Trypho the Jew). Origen’s responses to someone rejecting
Christianity is also a clear and rational explanation of the faith (Contra Celsum). The religions of antiquity did not survive, and others in Europe
also succumbed to Christianity. This was
not, however, primarily due to rational argumentation, at least so far as E. R.
Dodds was concerned. Dodds suggested in
his Pagan and Christian in an Age of
Anxiety that Christianity excelled because it wielded a bigger stick (warned
of the eternal consequences of sin), that it offered a larger carrot (eternal
life with God), and especially that it practiced love in their
communities. This provided an
alternative to a culture wrapped in anxiety over powers at work in and about
people (magic, charms, the gods, fate).[2]
One should note
that the early Christians, like the Jews before them, did not associate God
with one of the gods in the polytheistic religions they knew. In the Old Testament, no Jew associated Yahweh
with the chief of the Canaanite gods, El.
‘El’ was also the word for ‘god’, so it is used in the Old Testament—although
the plural, Elohim, is far more prevalent.
(All deity exists in the one true God and in no other.) The Canaanite god, El, however, was husband
to Asherah, and chief of the other gods.
The God who revealed Himself in Sinai to the Jews as the only God was
not the Canaanite El, not one bit. Nor
did anybody associate the Christian God with Zeus or Jupiter, the chief of the
gods in the Greek or Roman religions, for example. Paul begins his speech in Athens by associating
the God of Christians with the Athenian altar ‘to an unknown god’ (Acts 17.23). The Bible attests to the total separation of
God from all the myths about gods in other religious systems.
Some context for
Paul’s statement to the Areopagus is enlightening. Cicero, preceding Paul by nearly a century,
says that there were a large number of sayings about who God is. He says that the Stoic Zeno gave conflicting
answers to who God is, and the great Stoic, Chrysippus, ‘has mustered up a numerous band of unknown God, and so unknown that we are not able to
form any idea about them, though our mind seems capable of framing any image to
itself in its thoughts (On the Nature of
the Gods XIV).[3] In Paul’s speech, he points people to Jesus’
resurrection and future role as judge of the world (Acts 17.30-31). This is always the Christian argument before
other religions: we do not share convictions about God in other religions but
point people to the historical Jesus’ death and resurrection. Before Jesus, people lived in ignorance,
groping to find God. Jesus has revealed
God, ending, as Paul says, the time of ignorance. Christian revelation is not in an idea on its
own but in the historical fact of Jesus’ death and resurrection. Belief comes as we interpret His death as a
sacrifice for our sins and His resurrection as the new life we receive in Him
(cf. Romans 6).
For our
purposes, the analytical qualities Lycinus mentions cannot be an objective,
academic assessment, as though faith could be put under a microscope. Lycinus has no intention of accepting that we
have the necessary analytical qualities to assess each philosophy in our
limited span of life. We know that what
can cut through such an analysis is something altogether different: God in
history, not in mythology. Paul says
that God is not far off from each person so that we cannot know Him but ‘in Him
we live and move and have our being’ (Acts 17.28, quoting to the Athenians from
a poem by Epimenides, a Cretan who had also lived in Athens in the 5th
c. BC). This close presence of God is
especially to be known in the historical Jesus Christ of whom Paul spoke. One must now answer what is believed about
Jesus. Is He from heaven, the very Son
on of God? Why did He die on the
cross? Was He resurrected from the dead? What did He say about where He would go and about
His return?
9.
Capable
Teachers
Yet another
obstacle emerges for Lycinus: some teachers of a philosophy may know their
subject better than others, and we somehow need to be able to find the better
ones before we ourselves are instructed (68).
The only way around this would be to go to all the teachers of a
particular philosophy, let alone to all the philosophies.
Christians have
a great advantage here. The teachers are
expected to be expositors of the Bible, and one can assess their teaching with
regard to their faithful exposition of the text that they claim is inspired by
God and without error. We do not merely
listen to their exposition of the faith as they understand or apply it. We can follow the text and see for ourselves whether
what a teacher says is so. We can see if
what is taught about the meaning of one text coheres with what is taught
throughout Scripture. Our learning can further
include listening to the teaching of the Church that is based on Scripture over
the centuries to see if the present teacher—a priest, bishop, or theologian—is
faithful to the text of Scripture. The
presence of false prophets and teachers misleading the people is noted
throughout the Old and New Testaments and, in this way, we learn to discern
heretical and true teaching.
On the one hand,
older Churches or denominations have all accumulated false teaching of one sort
or another. These may, however, be corrected
by attention to the Scriptures themselves—not by our adding something new to
Scripture. The false teachers either
twist the meaning of Scripture or attack Biblical authority (a point already
made by Tertullian, The Prescription
against Heresies). In churches and
denominations claiming to uphold Biblical authority, however, many sit in
ignorance because of their own Biblical illiteracy. Many, too, are attracted to ‘teachers’ in
churches where the music is engaging, the sense of youthful energy is inspiring,
and the minister tells interesting stories with a simple point about life. The congregation listens without learning and
is motivated through rhetoric, not through conviction from the Biblical text
fully explained. Such churches—and there
are now many—are akin to antiquity’s sophists, who were more interested in
clever and persuasive oratory than truth.
Additionally,
teachers should model what they teach. As Lycinus asks, ‘was it not from admiration
of their spirit that you joined them, expecting to have your own
spirit purified?’ (20). A misjudgement
has appeared recently in certain Protestant churches that the minister models
not the purity of the faith but the grace God gives to all sinners. A sinful minister is acceptable to a certain
degree. This has particularly come out
in our day around the issue of sexual orientation. Some are accepting ministers struggling with
sinful orientations as long as the person does not practice them through sinful
acts. Such a minister is accepted as an example
of God’s grace to us as sinners.
Scripture teaches otherwise: the minister should exemplify the pure life
of a believer.
More generally, the Church itself needs to exist as
an alternative community living against-the-grain of the world. It is not to be a community championing the
world’s message and ways. Like Israel
among the nations, the Church exists as a prophetic people calling the world to
repentance before God. It exists not as
a self-righteous people but as a saved and redeemed people telling others the
Gospel that delivers all from sin and returns them to God. We might ask, ‘Does the Church provide
capable teaching within and to those outside, or is it always in the news over
scandals that represent the world to itself?’
The New Testament authors repeatedly call the gathered communities of
the early Church to model the righteousness of and from Christ. The Church has the role to play of both
calling out the sin of the world and wooing those in the world to receive God’s
forgiveness and transformation in Christ.
It can only be a light to the world, a city on a hill, or the salt of
the earth (Matthew 5.13-16) as it represents through its own life the Kingdom of
God to the kingdoms of this world.
10.
The
Web of Belief: Consistency versus Veracity
Lycinus
addresses yet another matter facing anyone tasked with determining the veracity
of a philosophy. If, as one listens, one
allows certain initial claims that the teacher makes, the teacher will then
fill in more material that presents itself as consistent with them. He will move from basic claims to implications
and increasingly less certain or more obscure claims. A system of thought or a web of belief
emerges. One who has not challenged the
fundamental claims of the philosophy will then be caught in acknowledging the
inner consistency of the whole system of thought that the philosophical school
holds. Consistency will substitute for
veracity of objective claims (74-75).
We might apply
the problem to Roman Catholic teaching about purgatory. The Scriptures do not teach purgatory, a
place where people may be sent after death to purge their venal sins before
entering God’s eternal rest. However, once
one accepts this doctrine, one will be led to other, consistent teachings. One might further come to believe that the
saints have a surplus of good works and can help sinners in purgatory lacking
good works. One might then suggest the
need to pray for them and hold a mass for them.
Just so, we fill in beliefs that cohere, even though none of them are
taught in Scripture. We are caught in
the web of a system of belief, one that satisfies some of our longings and
removes some of our fears. Something
much stronger will need to come along to convert the person to a new system of
belief.
From Lycinus, we
see that we need to identify the fundamental beliefs and investigate them. As Christians, this so often comes down to interpreting
Scripture and understanding who Jesus is.
Yet our investigation of the claims we make about Jesus involves
relating Him to the Old Testament writings, understanding who Jesus was and
what He said and did, and listening to the testimonies of His disciples by
reading the New Testament. Our
hermeneutic is to line up the Old Testament, Jesus, and the New Testament, and
the authors and teachings in both Testaments.
In other words, the right web of belief is found in Scripture
itself. The Christian faith is first of
all a faith in Jesus Christ—a personal faith but one consistent with what
Scripture teaches about Him—and secondly a matter of interpreting Scripture with
Scripture to produce a Biblical theology.
Jesus is the fundamental belief around which the web of Christian faith
is constructed. Teaching about purgatory
undermines the salvific work of Christ and God’s grace as some other purgation
is needed to remove sin, some other’s prayers are needed, and some hope beyond
the cross is offered.[4]
11.
Practice
One might,
Lycinus continues, evaluate a philosophy as to whether it is practicable and
possible (76). This criticism applies to
Stoicism, which taught that external matters contributed nothing to internal
virtue:
The
next point you must help me with--whether you have ever met such a Stoic, such
a pattern of Stoicism, as to be unconscious of pain, untempted by pleasure,
free from wrath, superior to envy, contemptuous of wealth, and, in one word,
Happy; such should the example and model of the Virtuous life be; for any one
who falls short in the slightest degree, even though he is better than other
men at all points, is not complete, and in that case not yet Happy (76).
Stoics
themselves spoke of the difficulty of living according to their teaching, and
Lycinus simply says that nobody ever has.
The question for
us is really whether Christianity ‘works’, not only but including whether it is
practicable and possible. We not only
want to know that the Christian life is possible and a good life but also if
living it accomplishes a good end.
Christian news often includes the fall of ‘leaders’ in sin and shame, and
the Church is divided by heretical teachers misrepresenting the faith once for all
delivered to the saints. ‘For certain
people have crept in unnoticed who long ago were designated for this
condemnation, ungodly people, who pervert the grace of our God into sensuality
and deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ’ (Jude 4). Yet Christians point to Jesus, who alone is
holy and righteous, and only in Him are we made righteous. As Paul says, ‘For our sake he made him to be
sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God’
(2 Corinthians 5.21). We, therefore, are
not only forgiven but also made righteous—but only in Him. We seek to live and model the righteous life
as God’s power is at work in us (Ephesians 3.20).
12.
Theory
and Practice
Another problem
with philosophies, Lycinus continues, is that they end up in theory more than
in practice. The heralded philosopher is
the one who spends his life ‘conning over miserable sentences and
demonstrations and problems’ (79).
Little attention is given to the fruit of the philosophy, consisting in
action. One might imagine the professor
of philosophy or religion whose life is full of academic writing and lecturing
without much engagement with life.
For Christians,
we might note that the faith we study ought not to become a system of beliefs
that lead people to become ivory tower scholars discussing its tenets. I have
no problem at all with careful theological study and the crucial role—the very
practical role—of sound teaching. The problem
is to create an academy in which that suffices.
Even the study of practice is put into classrooms and subjected to some
sort of critical analysis. Christian
academics should follow the example of a Moses, the prophets, Jesus, Paul, and
the apostles. Their studies and teaching
should be alongside their actual living the Christian life and ministering to
others. Paul, the Church’s scholar, was
a missionary. We have too often modelled
study of the faith after the academy rather than seen it in the life of the
teacher. The problem is not just about
academics but also about preachers in churches.
Disciples or students should be learning from someone who exemplifies
the Christian faith well. As Jesus says,
we should be able to recognise false prophets (people professing to tell us
God’s truth or revelation) and true prophets by their fruits (Matthew 7.15-20).
Conclusion
The problem of
belief and conversion is not one that leads us to indecision. Through the challenges of Lycinus, we can see
the answers Christians might give to those uncertain about or struggling to come
to faith. This essay has identified
twelve of these challenges and responded with thoughts from Scripture. What ultimately makes all the difference,
however, is that Christianity is not simply a doctrinal system to be taught and
argued. It is first and foremost about a
person, Jesus Christ, and our relationship with Him. We believe in Him. Our Gospel is good news about how He has
fulfilled the Old Testament Scriptures in His incarnation, life among us,
death, resurrection, ascension to God’s right hand in heaven, and His promise
to come again. We therefore have the testimony of Scripture, not human philosophies. Our theology and ethics
build upon this narrative—no, upon our life in Him and He in us. Thus, we also have our own witness to the work of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit through the centuries among and within us that culminates in our own witness.
[1] The online translation used for this discussion is The Works of Lucian of Samosata, trans.
H. W. Fowler and F. G. Fowler (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1905); https://www.sacred-texts.com/cla/luc/wl2/wl205.htm
(accessed 24 December, 2025).
[2] E. R. Dodds, Pagan and
Christian in an Age of Anxiety: Some Aspects of Religious Experience from
Marcus Aurelius to Constantine (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
1991; orig. 1963).
[3] Cicero, On the Nature of the Gods, Divination,
Fate, The Republic, Laws, Etc.’ (Bohn’s Classical Library; London: Clowes
and Sons, n.d.).
[4] Roman Catholic teaching on purgatory includes references to a few
Scripture passages, none of which mention purgatory and the meaning of which, I
would argue, is simply twisted to provide a prooftext for a teaching that has
already been accepted on other, unmentioned, grounds. I would suggest that the teaching actually
comes from Graeco-Roman beliefs about life after death and punishment for
venial transgressions. As Plato tells the popular belief, there
are both a remedial punishment for some in the afterlife and an eternal
punishment for others who committed great sins (cf.
Plato, Gorgias 524d-525d).
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