Chapter
VI.—Effects of Baptism and of Chrism.
§ 1.
Baptism
. When we try
to ascertain the exact relation between Baptism and the Unction or
Chrism which immediately followed, we find that Cyril’s teaching
on the subject has been understood in very different senses. By
some he is thought to regard the Unction as being merely an accessory
rite of the one great Sacrament of Baptism; to others he seems to draw
a clear distinction between them, assigning to each its proper grace
and efficacy.
The former view is stated by the Oxford editor, Milles,
in his note on the words: “And in like manner to you also,
after you had come up from the pool of the sacred waters, there was
given an unction, a figure (
ἀντίτυπον
) of that with which Christ was anointed; and that is the Holy
Ghost
250
.” “It is evident,”
says Milles, “from his words here, that the Chrism of which Cyril
treats in this Lecture is not to be referred to the Unction which is
administered by the Romanists in Confirmation. For every one sees
that by Unction in this passage a ceremony of Baptism is
indicated. The ancients employed two Unctions in Baptism, the
first before the immersion in the water, of which he spoke in the
preceding Lecture; the second immediately upon ascending from the
water, of which he speaks in this Lecture.”
This opinion is elaborately discussed by the
Benedictine editor, Touttée,
Dissertatio
iii. c. 7, who
argues that the Unction described by Cyril is a Sacrament distinct from
Baptism, that it has for its proper grace the gift of the Holy Spirit,
and further that this gift is not conferred in Baptism. Of these
assertions the first and second appear to represent Cyril’s view
correctly: the last is an exaggeration and a mistake, the
tendency of which is to identify the Chrism of the Eastern Church with
that which is used in Confirmation by the Roman Church, and to exalt
the rite of Confirmation as a proper Sacrament distinct from Baptism,
and even superior to it. A view differing in some respects from
both of these has been recently put forward by a learned and devout
writer of our own Church, who has fully discussed the teaching of Cyril
and other Eastern Fathers, and gives the result of his investigation in
the following “Summary
251
:”
“For very many centuries the Christians of the East have never
been forced to define to themselves at all clearly the position of a
person baptized but unconfirmed. Their mode of administering
Confirmation (
Chrism
?) by the hands of the baptizing
Presbyter—though among the Greeks and some others with chrism
prepared by the Bishop—relieves them from the necessity which
weighs upon us Westerns, of teaching Christian children what their
status is between the two rites. Confirmation (
Chrism
?) is
for them, far more than it has been for a long while in the West, a
factor in Baptism. Only
a more or less conscious desire not to fall
behind Western teachers in honouring the perfecting Unction can have
led their later authorities to treat that Unction as a sacrament
numerically distinct from Baptism. To all the early doctors of
the East the two things are one, and Baptism culminates in the
Unction. The tendency among Oriental Christians was, not to
attribute to Baptism in our modern sense the gift of the Holy Ghost,
but rather to consider Baptism by itself as a bare rite, benefiting the
body alone, and dependent for its spiritual efficacy upon other
actions, after and before. Not that this tendency has its full
way. The Greek Fathers may be said certainly on the whole to
trace the forgiveness of sins, the preparatory cleansing, to the
baptismal Laver; the gift of the Holy Ghost, for the ordinary purposes
of Christian living, they trace, like S. Chrysostom, to that act which
comes “ immediately after Baptism, and before the
Mysteries.”
When we come to inquire how far these several
theories agree with the teaching of Cyril himself, we must in the
outset put aside altogether the name
Confirmation
: for as
applied to the Unction used in the Eastern Church it is only confusing
and misleading. In the early ages of the Church
Confirmation
was not known even by name. In the Latin
Church “neither Tertullian, Cyprian, Ambrose, Augustine, Jerome,
nor any of the Latin Fathers, makes mention of
Confirmation
in
this sense. Nor have the Greeks any word to answer to this Latin
term
252
.” So far, therefore, Milles
appears to be perfectly right in refusing to connect the Chrism of
which Cyril treats with the Unction used in Confirmation by the Roman
Church.
We may add that in Cyril’s account of Chrism it is
wholly unconnected with Confirmation, both in its symbolic reference
and in its outward form. Chrism, he says, is the antitype of the
Unction of Christ by the Holy Ghost at His Baptism: Confirmation
is universally admitted to have been a following of the Apostles in
their laying on of hands. But in that Apostolic rite there was no
unction, and in Chrism there was no such laying on of hands.
In several passages Cyril clearly distinguishes the
outward form of Baptism from the spiritual grace.
“If thy body be here, but not thy mind, it
profiteth thee nothing. Even Simon Magus once came to the
Laver: he was baptized, but was not enlightened; and though he
dipped his body in water, he enlightened not his heart with the
Spirit: his body went down and came up, but his soul was not
buried with Christ, nor raised with Him
253
.”
It is impossible here to regard “the
Spirit” as referring to the grace of Unction: for (1)
Baptism was not accompanied by Unction in the time of the Apostles, and
(2) we should thus make a false antithesis between the outward part of
the one rite (“he dipped his body in water”), and the
inward
part of the other. Here, therefore, Cyril
attributes enlightenment of the heart by the Spirit to Baptism apart
from Unction, and at the same time lays stress upon the difference
between the worthy and unworthy recipient of the outward
form.
The importance of this difference is further enforced
throughout the next two sections, and at the close of § 4 the
distinction between the outward sign and inward grace of Baptism,
strictly so called, is again asserted, “though the water will
receive thee, the Spirit will not accept thee.”
“Some might suppose,” it is said,
“from these words that Cyril thought of water and the Spirit as
the sign and the thing signified in Baptism respectively, and a passage
in a later Lecture upon the subject of the Sacrament (of Baptism) at
first confirms that impression
254
.”
To suppose that Cyril had any other thought in the
former passage, seems to me impossible for any ordinary reader, and the
later passage, not only at first, but more fully the longer it is
considered, confirms that impression beyond all doubt. The whole
quotation, including Cat. iii. §§ 3, 4, is too long to repeat
here, but may be read in its proper place.
It will be sufficient to give the passages
which are of chief importance in the question before us, according to
Canon Mason’s translation.
Cat. iii. § 3. “Do not attend to the
laver as mere water, but to the spiritual grace given along with the
water”…“the mere water, receiving the invocation of
the Holy Ghost, and of Christ, and of the Father, acquires a power of
sanctity. For since man is a two-fold being composed of soul and
body, the cleansing element also is two-fold, the incorporeal for the
incorporeal, the bodily for the body. And the water cleanses the
body, but the Spirit seals the soul, in order that having our hearts
sprinkled by the Spirit, and our bodies washed with pure water, we may
draw nigh to God. When, therefore, you are about to go down into
the water do not pay attention to the mere nature of the water, but
expect salvation by the operation of the Holy Ghost. For without
both it is impossible for thee to be perfected.”
No words could state more clearly the distinction
between the outward sign and the inward grace of Baptism, and the
absolute necessity for both. There is no possible reference to
Unction, but “the operation of the Holy Ghost” in cleansing
and sealing the soul is unmistakably connected with Baptism as
“the grace given with the water” (
μετὰ τοῦ
ὕδατος
), and below, as “the
seal by water” (
τὴν
δι᾽ ὕδατος
σφραγῖδα
), the
latter phrase shewing that Baptism by water is the
signum
efficax
of the grace in question.
Cyril then quotes our Lord’s words,
Except a man be born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter into
the kingdom of God
, and explains them thus: “On the one
hand he who is being baptized (
βαπτιζόμενος
)
with the water, but has not had the Spirit vouchsafed to him
(
καταξιωθείς
),
has not the grace in perfection: on the other hand, even if a man
be distinguished for virtue in his deeds, but does not receive the seal
bestowed by means of water (
τὴν
δι᾽ ὕδατος
σφραγῖδα
), he
shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven.” Canon Mason,
whose translation I have followed, finds here a reference both to
Baptism and to Unction as “the first baptismal act and the
second,” and in support of this interpretation gives a second and
more emphatic version: “He who is in course of being
baptized with the water, but has not yet had the Spirit vouchsafed to
him, has not the grace in perfection.” This introduction of
the word “
yet
,” in order to represent a distinction
between two separate acts, is not justified either by the reading of
the older editions (
οὐδὲ
τῷ ὕδατι
βαπτιζόμενος
μὴ
καταξιωθεὶς
δὲ τοῦ
Πνεύματος
), nor by
that of Codices Monac. Roe, Casaub. adopted by Reischl (
οὔτε ὁ
βεβαπτισμένος
κ.τ.λ
.), nor by the Benedictine text
(
οὔτε ὁ
βαπτιζόμενος
κ.τ.λ
.). The obvious meaning of the
passage, with either reading, is that “the man who in Baptism did
not receive the Holy Spirit, has not the grace (of Baptism)
complete.” The Benedictine Editor in his elaborate argument
for regarding Chrism as a distinct sacrament
255
”, does not even refer to this
passage.
A statement which is important in this connexion
is found in
Mystag
. ii. § 6: “Let no one then
suppose that Baptism is the grace of remission of sins only, or further
of adoption, as the Baptism of John conferred only remission of sins;
but as we know full well that it cleanses from sins and procures a gift
of the Holy Spirit, so also it is a counterpart (
ἀντίτυπον
) of the
sufferings of Christ.”
Here besides “the remission of sins, which
no man receiveth without the Holy Spirit
256
,” we find “a gift of the Holy
Ghost,” and the fellowship of Christ’s Passion distinctly
attributed to Baptism.
If the “adoption” mentioned at the beginning
of this passage were identical (as Touttée thinks) with the
“gift of the Holy Ghost,” it would by no means follow that
Cyril here means to include Unction in Baptism. For the grace
which beyond all others is exclusively attached to Baptism, and not to
Unction, is the new birth, and this is “the new birth into
freedom
and
adoption
257
.” In fact
Cyril’s teaching on this point is in strict accordance with that
of St. Paul in
Gal. iv.
4–6
, that we
first
receive the adoption of sons
(
υἱοθεσίαν
), and then “
because ye are sons, God sent forth the Spirit of
His Son into our hearts, crying, Abba, Father
.” So
again in
Rom. viii. 15,
16
, he says,
“
Ye received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba,
Father. The Spirit Himself beareth witness with our spirit that
we are the children of God
.” In both passages St. Paul
clearly distinguishes two things, “the adoption” itself,
and the witness of it by “the Spirit of adoption.”
Cf. Bengel on v. 4: “Prius
adoptionem
, deinde
Spiritum adoptionis
accepimus;” and on v. 6:
“
Filiorum statum
sequitur inhabitatio Spiritus Sancti, non
hanc ille.” The adoption itself belongs to Baptism strictly
so called, in which we are made children of God and joint heirs with
Christ (cf. Cat. iii. 15): the witness of the indwelling Spirit
of adoption is the special grace ascribed to Chrism in the Eastern
Church, and to Confirmation in the Western. There are many other
passages in which Cyril ascribes to Baptism itself, as distinct from
Chrism, a gift of the Spirit, such as the following: “But
He trieth the soul: He casteth not His pearls before the
swine: if thou dissemble, men will baptize thee now, but the
Spirit will not baptize thee
258
.”
“The Lord, preventing us according to His
loving-kindness, has granted repentance at Baptism, in order that we
may cast off the chief—nay, rather the whole burden of our sins,
and having received the seal by the Holy Ghost, may be made heirs of
eternal life
259
.”
Again, after speaking of “the invocation of
grace having sealed the soul,” he adds: “Having gone
down dead in sins, thou comest up quickened in righteousness. For
if thou hast been
united with the likeness of the Saviour’s
death
, thou shalt also be deemed worthy of His
Resurrection
260
.” The
benefits ascribed to Baptism in these several passages without any
allusion to Chrism, are brought together with rhetorical effect in the
Introductory Lecture, § 16: “Great is the Baptism that
lies before you; a ransom to captives, a remission of offences, a death
of sin, a new birth of the soul, a garment of light, a holy
indissoluble seal, a chariot to heaven, the delight of Paradise, a
welcome into the kingdom, the gift of adoption.”
From such language it is clear beyond question that in
Cyril of Jerusalem, not to speak of other Oriental Fathers, the
tendency is not “to consider Baptism by itself as a bare rite,
benefiting the body alone, and dependent for its spiritual efficacy
upon other actions after and before,” but as depending on the
power of the Holy Ghost, and the sincerity of repentance and faith in
man.
If further proof were needed, a glance at the Index
under the word “Baptism” will shew the extraordinary
richness, variety, and precision of Cyril’s teaching, as to the
gifts of the Holy Ghost conferred therein.
§ 2.
Chrism
. When
spiritual blessings so many and so great have been ascribed to Baptism,
in what light, it may be asked, does Cyril regard the Unction which
follows? Does he treat it as being merely an additional ceremony
subordinate to Baptism, or as having for its own proper grace some
special gift of the Holy Ghost? We find no answer to this
question in the earlier course of Lectures
261
. But that Chrism was not regarded by
Cyril as a mere accessory to Baptism, as Milles thought
262
, may be safely inferred from the fact that in
announcing the subjects of his Mystagogic Lectures, he mentions first
Baptism, then “the seal of the fellowship of the Holy
Ghost,” and then “the Mysteries at the altar of the New
Covenant
263
:” and
this inference is fully confirmed by his language elsewhere:
“Ye have heard enough of Baptism, and Chrism, and partaking of
the Body and Blood of Christ
264
.” A mere
additional
ceremony of
Baptism could not have been so independently placed between the two
sacraments, and, as it were, in the same rank with them.
The importance thus attached to Chrism is further shewn
in the fact that Cyril uses the very same language in reference to the
consecration of the ointment of Chrism and of the water of Baptism, and
of the Eucharistic elements. “The bread and wine of the
Eucharist before the Invocation of the Holy and Adorable Trinity are
simple (
λιτός
)
bread and wine, but after the Invocation the Bread becomes the Body and
the Wine the Blood of Christ
265
.” Regard
not the Laver as simple (
λιτῷ
) water, but rather regard
the spiritual grace that is given with the water
266
.” “The simple water having
received the Invocation of the Holy Ghost, and of Christ, and of the
Father, acquires a new power of holiness
267
.”
“But see thou suppose not this to be plain
(
ψιλόν
)
ointment. For as the Bread of the Eucharist, after the Invocation
of the Holy Ghost is no longer simple (
λιτός
) bread, but the Body of
Christ; so also this holy ointment is no longer plain (
ψιλόν
) ointment, nor, as one
might say, common, after Invocation, but Christ’s gift of grace
(
χάρισμα
), and is
made effectual to impart the Holy Ghost by the presence of His own
Godhead
268
.”
The spiritual benefits which Cyril ascribes to the
Unction are set forth in the same Lecture. “This holy thing
is a spiritual safeguard of the body, and salvation of the soul”
(§ 7): it sanctifies all the organs of sense:
“the body is anointed with the visible ointment, and the soul is
sanctified by the Holy and Life-giving Spirit” (§ 3).
After being anointed the Christian is now entitled to that name in its
fullest sense
269
; he is clothed with
the whole armour of the Holy Ghost, that he may stand against the power
of the adversary: he may say, “
I can do all things in
Christ who strengtheneth me
” (§ 4).
In regard to the supposed identity of Chrism and
Confirmation, it is important to notice carefully how Cyril speaks of
the laying on of hands in the only passage where he mentions
it
270
.
He first illustrates the freedom of the Spirit,
and His independence of human agency, by the gift of prophecy to the
seventy elders, including Eldad and Medad: he then refers to the
gift of the spirit of wisdom to Joshua by the laying on of Moses’
hands
271
, and adds, “Thou seest everywhere the
figure (
τύπον
) in the Old Testament, and
in the New the same. In Moses’ time the Spirit was given by
laying on of hands (
χειροθεσίᾳ
), and Peter gives the Spirit by laying on of hands
272
: and upon thee also, who art to be
baptized, the grace is about to come; but the manner
(
τὸ πῶς
) I
tell thee not, for I do not forestall the time.”
From this passage it has been inferred (i) that
Cyril alludes to a gift of the Spirit by laying on of hands in
immediate connexion with Baptism and Unction
273
, and
(2) that he refers this gift of the Spirit not to Baptism itself, but
to the laying on of hands, or to the Unction as a figure that answers
to it
274
.
(1) The first of these inferences is opposed
to the fact that Cyril neither mentions the laying on of hands as part
of the actual ceremonial in Baptism or Unction, nor as the analogous
rite in the old Testament, but on the contrary expressly says
275
that the symbol (
τὸ
σύμβολον
) of this
holy Chrism in the Old Testament lies in the consecration of Aaron to
be High Priest, when Moses, “after the washing in water anointed
him, and he was called ‘
anointed
,’ evidently from
this figurative unction (
τοῦ
χρίσματος
δηλαδὴ τοῦ
τυπικοῦ
).”
(2) In support of the second inference the
argument offered is as follows: “That the Spirit was to
come upon them in the course of their Baptism is here again clearly
stated; but that Cyril did not intend them to suppose that Baptism
itself would convey the gift is equally clear. Again and again in
earlier Lectures, as well as in the words actually before us, Cyril has
taught them to expect the gift in Baptism; if therefore the immersion
itself were to be the means of
receiving it,
he has already told them
his secret
. Yet now he says that he will not tell them
‘how’ they are to receive it. That remains for a
future occasion
276
.” The
mistake, as I venture to consider it, lies in the words which I have
marked with italics. For of the mysteries which were to be
concealed from the unbaptized (
ἀμύητοι
) the first was
the manner of administering Baptism
itself, and the second, the
unction of Chrism; and in the preceding Lectures Cyril has no more told
the secret of the one than of the other. “Baptism, the
Eucharist, and the oil of Chrism, were things that the uninitiated
(
ἀμύητοι
) were not
allowed to look upon
277
.”
“We bless,” says S. Basil
278
, “both the water of Baptism and the oil
of the Chrism, and moreover the baptized (
βαπτιζόμενον
)
himself. From what written commands? Is it not from a
secret (
σιωπωμένης
)
and mystical tradition? Again, the very anointing with the oil,
what word of Scripture taught that? And the dipping the man
thrice, whence came it? And all the other accompaniments of
Baptism, the renunciation of Satan and his angels, from what Scripture
came they? Come they not from this unpublished and secret
teaching, which our fathers guarded in a silence with which no prying
curiosity might meddle, having been well taught to preserve the
sanctity of the mysteries by silence? For how could it have been
right to publish in writing the doctrine of these mysteries, which the
unbaptized are not even allowed to look upon?”
As these secret ceremonies of Baptism and Unction are
revealed by Cyril only in the Mystagogic Lectures, the supposed reason
for saying, that in Cat. xvi. 26, the promised gift of the Spirit
refers not to Baptism but only to Unction, at once falls to the
ground.
The true state of the case is well expressed by
Bingham
279
, “Though the ancients acquainted the
Catechumens with the doctrine of Baptism so far as to make them
understand the spiritual nature and design of it, yet they never
admitted them to the sight of the actual ceremony, nor so much as to
hear any plain discourse about the manner of its administration, till
they were fitted and prepared for the actual reception of
it,”—or rather, till they actually received it.
There is in fact no reason to exalt the benefits
of Unction, or Confirmation, by robbing Baptism of its proper
grace. “It was this Unction, as the completion of Baptism,
to which they ascribed the power of making every Christian in
some sense partaker of a royal priesthood. To it they also
ascribed the noble effects of confirming the soul with the strength of
all spiritual graces on God’s part, as well as the confirmation
of the profession and covenant made on man’s part
280
.” We may well be satisfied that
the doctrine of the early Church has been so fully retained in
essential points in our own Office of Confirmation, recalling as it
does by the ratification of the baptismal vows the immediate connexion
of the ancient Unction with Baptism, and in its Prayers invoking the
same gifts of the Holy Spirit,—“Strengthen them, we beseech
Thee, O Lord, with the Holy Ghost the Comforter, and daily increase in
them Thy manifold gifts of grace; the spirit of wisdom and
understanding; the spirit of counsel and ghostly strength; the spirit
of knowledge and true godliness, and fill them, O Lord, with the spirit
of Thy holy fear, now and for ever.
Amen.”
250
Mystag
. iii.
§ 1.
251
A. J. Mason, D.D.,
The Relation of Confirmation to Baptism
, p. 389. Though I
find myself compelled to differ widely from my friend Canon Mason in
the interpretation of Cyril’s teaching on this subject, I cannot
refrain from expressing my sincere admiration of the tone and purpose
of his treatise, and of the learning and research which it
exhibits.
252
Suicer,
Thesaurus
,
Χρίσμα
.
253
Procat
. §
2.
254
Mason,
ubi
supr
., p. 337.
255
Dissert
. iii. c.
8.
256
Hooker,
E.P
.V. lxvi. § 6.
257
Cat. i. 2.
258
Ib. xvii. § 36.
259
Ib. iv. 37.
260
Ib. iii. § 12.
261
Upon the supposed
allusion to Chrism in Cat. xvi. § 26, see below, p. xxxiv.
262
Note on
Mystag
. iii. § 1.
263
Cat. xviii. §
33.
264
Mystag
. v. §
1.
265
Mystag
. i. §
7.
266
Cat. iii. § 3.
267
Ibidem
.
268
Mystag
. iii.
3.
269
Ib. iii. § 1.
270
Cat. xvi. §§
25, 26.
271
Deut. xxxiv. 9
.
272
Acts viii. 17
.
273
Touttée.
274
Mason, p. 341, with
note.
275
Mystag
. iii.
6.
276
Mason, p. 341.
277
Basil,
apud
Bingham, X. 5, § 4.
278
De Spiritu S
. c.
xxvii.
279
Ant
. X. v. §
4.
280
Bingh. XII. iii.
§ 3. Cf.
Apost. Const
. III. c. 17. “This
Baptism therefore is into the death of Jesus: the water is
instead of the burial, and the oil instead of the Holy Ghost; the seal
instead of the Cross;
the ointment is the confirmation of the
Confession
.” VII. 22: “that the anointing
with oil may be the participation of the Holy Spirit, and the water the
symbol of the death, and the ointment the seal of the
covenants.”