Encyclopedia of sacred theology - pagina 672

648

THE INTERNAL CONFLICT

§ 102.

By

this,

character.

[Div. Ill

however, theology obtained an entirely diffeient Whereas in the first period, it had been chiefly

bent upon self-defence against the arch-enemy, that enemy was now vanquished, and thus the antithesis between regenerate and unregenerate human consciousness could no longer be the most conspicuous. When the school, at which Proklus flourished last, was closed at Athens, and the last supporters of classic tradition fled to Persia, there

was no more need

for

a further conflict about this deepest and most incisive antithAs an intellectual power. Paganism no longer stood. esis.

All intellectual power was now withdrawn within the walls of the Christian Church; consequently, the antitheses which to action

were to impel theology rise in the heart of that

could not but have itself.

Hence

it

tlieir

became a

own bosom.

conflict within its If the question

Church

is

raised whether the deepest significance of

not still stated b}^ the antithesis between nature between Humanism and Theism, the answer lies close at hand. It continued of course always the same antithesis, but with this difference, that now the anti-Christian power made its appearance dressed in a Christian and even an ecclesiastical garb. After persecution had ceased and the Christian religion had been duly inaugurated in its career of honor, the transition to Christianity became so colossal, especially among the upper classes, and so largely a matter of fashion, that there could scarcely be any more question of an actual transformaPeople were everywhere baptized, but as tion of spirits. baptized members they brought their pagan world-view with them into the Church. Two classes of Christians therefore

this conflict is

and

grace,

soon stood arrayed in a well-ordered line of battle over against each other those who were sincere, who were truly participants of the new principle of life, and were but waiting for :

the propitious

moment

in

which

into a proper world of thought

pseudo-Christians,

who from

;

work out this principle and on the other side the

to

their natural, unregenerate life-

principle reacted against the Cross, in order to maintain the

old world-view, conflict

now

exhibited in Christian form.

which compelled the Christian Church

to

It is this

awake from

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