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HISTORY, LIME AND DEITY
By the same author:
Time and Mankind
The Fall ofJerusalem and the Christian Church
Man and his Destiny in the Great Religions
Creation Legends of the Ancient Near East
‘Fy } re
The Last Judgement

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New York, Fletcher Fund, 1933.)
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History, Time and Deity
A HISTORICAL AND COMPARATIVE
STUDY OF IHE CONCEPTION OF TIME IN
RELIGIOUS THOUGHT AND PRACTICE
tis
ae containing the Forwood Lectures in the Philosophy
and History of Religion, delivered in the University
of Liverpool, 1964
by
S. G. F. BRANDON
MrAs.e D:D;
Professor of Comparative Religion
in the University ofManchester
MANCHESTER UNIVERSITY PRESS
BARNES & NOBLE, INC., NEW YORK

© 1965'S. G, F. BRANDON
All rights reserved

MANCHESTER UNIVERSITY PRESS
316-324 OXFORD ROAD
MANCHESTER 13, ENGLAND
WESeAP
Barnes & NOBLE, INC.
105 Fifth Avenue, New York 3
First published 1965
Printed in Great Britain by Butler & Tanner Ltd, Frome and London
Preface
as invitation to give the Forwood Lectures in the Philosophy

and History of Religion in the University of Liverpool pro-
vided the opportunity to deal with a subject that had long
interested me, and of the importance of which I had become in-
creasingly aware. In 1951, ina volume entitled Time and Mankind,
I had considered certain aspects of man’s reaction to the pheno-
mena of temporal change. Then, by making a survey of the ideas
of human nature and destiny, as they have found expression in the
great religions, for my Wilde Lectures in Natural and Compara-
tive Religion at Oxford in 1954-7,! I was given further insight
into the fundamental character of man’s experience of Time.
This growing conviction, that awareness of Time held the key to
understanding many puzzling aspects of human thought and
action, was further confirmed when I learned that an international
symposium on Time was being planned and was myself invited
to contribute to it.
The study, which I now publish here, secks to show how, from
man’s consciousness of Time, there has stemmed a complex of
imagery, of ritual practice, religious belief and philosophical
speculation, which represents man’s urgent and unceasing quest
for security from Time’s menace. I have entitled this study History,
Time and Deity, with conscious reference to the magisterial work,
Space, Time and Deity, of that great Manchester philosopher,
Samuel Alexander. My study, however, does not aspire to deal
with metaphysics; it essays the humbler task of tracing out and
describing the chief religious reactions of mankind to the prob-
lem of Time. Those reactions have indeed been both varied and
complicated; but, ifa common pattern is to be discerned in them,
it is surely one in which Time links the problem of the meaning
of History with that of Deity.
1 Published as Man and his Destiny in the Great Religions (Manchester
University Press, 1962).
Vv
vi PREFACE
Some three decades ago, a great seminal thinker, A. N. White-

head, wrote: ‘Ihazard the prophecy that that religion will conquer
which can render clear to popular understanding some eternal
greatness incarnate in the passage of temporal fact.’* There is
profound insight in this statement. The following pages will,
however, show that ‘the passage of temporal fact’ has presented
an abiding challenge to man from the very dawn of human cul-
ture, and his attempts to meet that challenge have been varied,
and sometimes very strange. That no solution has been found and
universally accepted is not surprising; for to solve the problem of
Time would be to understand ourselves and the purpose of our
being. But, if the hope of such transcendental apprehension must
be eschewed, it is surely valuable to know something of how man-
kind has faced the challenge of Time and sought to explain its
enigma.
Once more I have to thank my friend and colleague, the Rev.

D. Howard Smith for his kindness in reading the typescript of a
book and improving it by many helpful suggestions. Again also
I record my deep gratitude to Miss Linda Shepherd for the
devoted and efficient manner in which she has interpreted and
typed a difficult manuscript, and helped me in preparing the
bibliography and indices.
I would take this opportunity of expressing my appreciation of
the honour which the Council of the University of Liverpool
conferred in appointing me to give the Forwood Lectures during
the session 1963-4, and I recall with pleasure the kind hospitality
which was shown to me by members of the academic staff when
I visited the University to give the Lectures. To Professor H. W.
Fairman of Liverpool University I am particularly indebted for
the unique photograph that appears as Plate X in this volume.
My gratitude is due also to Mr. S. Roberts, Deputy Librarian,
and Mr. G. A. Webb of the Arts Library, Manchester University,
for undertaking the reproduction of certain photographs, and to
the skill and kind cooperation of Miss E. A. Lowcock of the
Department of Geography in the University I owe the line draw-
1 Adventures of Ideas (Cambridge, 1933), p. 41.
PREFACE Vii
ings. I am grateful also to the Manchester University Press for

undertaking the publication of this volume, and particularly am I
indebted to its Secretary, Mr. T. L. Jones, and to Mrs. J. M.
Sutcliffe, and to other members of the staff for much practical
help.
S. G. F. BRANDON
University of Manchester,
1964.
Acknowledgments
Iam indebted to the following publishers for permission to quote

from the books listed:
George Allen & Unwin, The Principal Upanisads, by S.
Radhakrishnan; Cambridge University Press, The Presocratic
Philosophers, by G. S. Kirk andJ.E. Raven; The Clarendon Press,
Zurvan. A Zoroastrian Dilemma, by R. C. Zaehner;J.M. Dent &
Sons, Later Greek Religion, by E. Bevan; Harvard University
Press, Aristotle’s Problemata, translated by W. S. Hett, and
Plutarch’s Moralia, translated by F. C. Babbitt, both in the Loeb
Classical Library; Princeton University Press, Ancient Near Eastern
Texts, edited by J. B. Pritchard; and Routledge & Kegan Paul,
A History of Buddhist Thought, by E. J. Thomas.
Vili
Contents
Page
Preface
Acknowledgments vill
Abbreviations X1
I The Problem: Five Views of Time
II Salvation by Ritual Perpetuation of the Past 13
III Time as Deity 25
IV Time as the “Sorrowful Weary Wheel’, and as Illusion 65
V History as the Revelation of Divine Purpose 106
VI History as a Two-Phased Plan in a Divine Teleology 148
Epilogue 206
Bibliography 211
Indices
Sources 227
Modern Authors 230
Names and Subjects 236
Illustrations
Author and publishers are indebted to the individuals and institutions who have
given permission to reproduce the illustrations. Their names appear below.
PLATES
‘The Last Judgment’ (H. Van Eyck)

(The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York,
Fletcher Fund, 1933) frontispiece
facing page
I Transformation into Osiris (Staatliche Museen, Berlin) 30
II Siva (Nataraja) performing the cosmic dance
(Victoria and Albert Museum, Crown copyright) 31
III The destructive and all-devouring character of Time
depicted by the goddess Kali (India Museum, London) 36
IV The Mithraic conception of Time as Zurvan-Ahriman
(Vatican Museum; photo, Alinari, Florence) 37
V Phanes, a bas-relief from Modena 48
VI Aeternitas, a bas-relief from the column of Antoninus Pius
(L. Curtius, ‘Das Antike Rom’, Verlag Anton Schroll, Vienna) 49
VII ‘The Dance of Death’ (after Holbein) 62
VIII ‘The Knight, Death and the Devil’ (Diirer)
(The Trustees of the British Museum) 63
IX ‘The Exposure of Luxury’ (Bronzino)
(The Trustees, the National Gallery, London) 68
X Seti I worshipping cartouches of earlier pharaohs
(photo. Professor H. W. Fairman) 69
XI A Buddhist conception of metamorphosis
(J. Needham, ‘Science and Civilisation in China’,
vol. 2, Cambridge University Press) 100
XII The Wheel of Becoming
(Journal of the Asiatic Society’, Bengal, vol. lxi) Io
XII Christian sarcophagus illustrating the Triumph of the Cross
(Museo Cristiano Lateranese, Rome; photo. Alinari, Florence) 200
XIV An early Christian representation of the Heilsgeschichte
(Museo Nationale, Syracuse) 201
FIGURES
page
1 The “Dancing Sorcerer’ (Trois Fréres cave, Ariége) 16
2 Jaldabaéth SI
3 Heh (from Tomb of Tut-Ankh-Amon) 57
Abbreviations
A.N.E.T. Ancient Near Eastern Texts relating to the Old Testament, ed. J. B.
Pritchard, Princeton University Press, 2nd edition, 1955.
A.S.A.E. Annales du Service des Antiquités de !Egypte, Cairo.
B-G Bhagavad-Gita.
Bilderatlas Bilderatlas zur Religionsgeschichte, hrg. H. Haas, Leipzig/Erlangen,
1924-30.
BJ.R.L. Bulletin of the John Rylands Library, Manchester.
B.S.O.A.S. Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, London.
C.A.H. Cambridge Ancient History.
C.M.H. Cambridge Mediaeval History.
ELL. Encyclopaedia of Islam, new edition, Leiden (from 1960).
E.R.E. Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics, ed. J. Hastings, 12 vols. and
Index vol., Edinburgh, 1908-26.
ET. English translation.
Gry. Geschichte des jtidischen Volkes in Zeitalter Jesu Christi, by E.
Schiirer, 3 Bande, Leipzig, 1898-1901.
H.G.R. Histoire générale des Religions, ed. M. Gorce et R. Mortier, 5 tomes,
Paris, 1947-52.
Ho idee History of Religions, Chicago University Press.
H.Th.R. Harvard Theological Review.
LA.A.M. The Intellectual Adventure of Ancient Man, by H. & H. A. Frank-
fort, J. A. Wilson, T. Jacobsen, and W. A. Irwin, Chicago
University Press, 1946.
EEC. The International Critical Commentary, ed. S. R. Driver, A.
Plummer, and G. A. Briggs.
ILH.A.N.E. The Idea of History in the Ancient Near East, ed. R. C. Dentan,
Yale University Press, 1955.
OSs: Journal of Cuneiform Studies.
J.NE.S. Journal of Near Eastern Studies, University of Chicago Press.
pss Journal of Semitic Studies, Manchester University Press.
Kleine Pauly Der Kleine Pauly Lexikon der Antike, Stuttgart (from 1962).
L.R-G. Lehrbuch der Religionsgeschichte (Chantepie de la Saussaye, hrg.
A. Bertholet u. Edv. Lehmann), 4 Aufl., 2 Bande, Tiibingen,
1925.
N.T.S. New Testament Studies, Cambridge.
O.C.D. Oxford Classical Dictionary, Oxford, 1949.
P.W. A. Pauly, G. Wissowa, u. W. Kroll, Real-Encyclopadie d. klas-
sischen Altertumswissenschaft.
xi
Xi ABBREVIATIONS
Pyr. Pyramid Texts.

Reallexikon Reallexikon der dgyptischen Religionsgeschichte, by H. Bonnet,
Berlin, 1952.
RAC, Reallexikon fiir Antike und Christentum, hrg. T. Klauser, Bande
I-V (continuing), 1950-62, Stuttgart.
R-G.L. Religionsgeschichtliches Lesebuch, hrg. A. Bertholet, Tiibingen,
1908. ee
R.G.G. Die Religion in Geschichte und Gegenwart, Aufl. hrg. K. Galling,
Bande I-VI (1957-62), Tiibingen.
R.H.P.R. Revue d’histoire et philosophie religieuse, Strasbourg.
RiALR. Revue de Vhistoire des religions, Paris.
RESive American Revised Standard Version of the Bible.
Seba Sacred Books of the East.
Worterbuch Worterbuch der dgyptischen Sprache, hrg. A. Erman u. H. Grapow.
Bdble Zeitschrift fiir Assyriologie.
ideal, Zeitschrift fiir dgyptische Sprache und Altertumskunde.
Z.N.T.W. Zeitschrift fir die neuctestamentliche Wissenschaft.
CHAPTER ONE
The Problem: Five Views of Time
N that majestic vision which concludes the Book of the Revela-

tions, and which closes also the New Testament itself, the
quintessence of Christianity is set forth in the divine words which
the prophet then hears and records: ‘And he that sitteth on the
throne said, Behold, I make all things new. And he saith, Write:
for these words are faithful and true. And he said unto me, They
are come to pass. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning
and the end.’! Thus the Christian Bible, which begins with the
statement, ‘In the beginning God created the heaven and the
earth’, concludes by proclaiming God as the end of the cosmic
process, and as the initiator of a new order. In other words, the
whole history of the world, from its beginning to its end, is con-
ceived as dependent upon God, who is antecedent to it and who
supplants it by a new form of his creation.
In such a conception, the cosmic process, which is commonly
regarded as manifesting itself in the passage of Time, is seen as the
field in which God operates, either directly or through agents, for
the ultimate achievement of His purpose. Viewed in this way,
Time is invested with an inspiring significance for mankind, since
the divine purpose is also envisaged as being essentially connected
with human destiny in both its corporate and its individual con-
text. Accordingly, the Christian evaluation of Time is teleo-
logical; it is succinctly characterized in the words of the well-
known hymn: “God is working His purpose out, as year succeeds
1 Rev, xxi. 5-6. ‘the Alpha and the Omega’ may be a Greek rendering of a
corresponding Hebrew expression, denoted by the first and last letters of the
alphabet & and n. Cf. R. H. Charles, The Revelation of St John, 1, p. 20, cf. Il,
p. 205 on *J6o0 xawa nod ndyta. Cf. E. Lohmeyer in R.A.C., I, 1-4; O. Cull-
mann, Christus und die Zeit, pp. 122-5. See also H. Leisegang in The Mysteries,
pp- 228-9; H. Sasse in R.A.C., I, 197-8, on Aion as dmotoc got xai Hy xai
gorau: see also below, pp. 30, n. I, 58, n. 4, 61.
I
2 HISTORY, TIME AND DEITY
to year.’ It is an estimate that finds its raison d’étre in a philosophy

of history, and one that justifies the description of Christianity, in
relation to other faiths, as an historical religion—although, as we
shall see, the exact connotation of ‘historical’ here is often mis-
understood or confused.
It has been well to start our survey with this brief commentary
on the Christian evaluation of Time, because it concerns an in-
terpretation of human nature and destiny with which most of us
are, in varying degrees, familiar. The reference also has the virtue
of introducing us to the fundamental significance that the idea of
Time, without further definition, has in the scheme of one of the
world’s great religions. This significance, however, although
peculiar to Christianity in the teleological aspect that it has
assumed therein, constitutes a basic factor in all religions—indeed,
it may even be described as the basic factor, or rather, the very
source, of the religious intuitions and aspirations of our race.
Because of its fundamental, or primordial character, man’s re-
action to his awareness of Time has been single and constant in
its primary impetus; but the forms in which that awareness has
found expression and man has sought solution of the problems he
has sensed, have been various, being conditioned by many differ-
ing psychological and cultural factors. In order to appreciate
something of this variety of response, and to form some estimate
of the proportions of the problem of evaluating Time as a factor
in religion, it will be useful briefly to cite four other examples
that are representative of the main attitudes towards Time that
have found expression in religion.
The Bhagavadgita, or the ‘Song of the Lord’, is, beyond com-

pare, the supreme expression of the religious experience and
aspiration of Hinduism, and its influence upon Indian faith and
action has been incalculable. Its theme is that of the individual’s
duty in the state of life to which he has been born through the un-
ceasing process of sarisara, i.e. the transmigration of souls. This
1 Cf. R. Garbe in E.R.E., Il, pp. $35b-538b;J.Gonda, Die Religionen Indiens,
I, p. 267; R. C. Zachner, Hinduism, pp. 13-14; S. Radhakrishnan, La Bhagavad-
Gita, pp. 15-18.
FIVE VIEWS OF TIME 3
theme is set forth in the form of a dialogue between the prince

Arjuna and his charioteer, who is in reality the great god Krishna
Vasudeva. The occasion is the eve of a battle, when Arjuna hesi-
tates to commence the action, being appalled by the prospect of
the carnage that must result from so doing. In the course of the
long dialogue that follows in which the subject of human duty is
discussed, Arjuna becomes aware of the divine character of his
companion. On realizing this, he entreats Vasudeva to show him
his true self. The request is granted: there follows a theophany, in
which the deity is revealed in his cosmic activity as both creator
and destroyer. The vision reaches its climax when Vasudeva
declares to the affrighted Arjuna: ‘Know I am Time, that makes
the worlds to perish, when ripe, and bring on them destruction.
The contrast here with the Christian evaluation of Time is vir-
tually absolute. Instead of Time as the field in which God’s bene-
ficent purpose majestically reveals itself; Indian thought has here
identified God with the obliterating force of Time. That two so
completely different conceptions of Time should have been
reached in the religions concerned surely constitutes a problem
worthy of our deepest consideration, and it is likely to be one that
will also involve much complex investigation. But the issue
appears even more complicated when it is viewed in the light of
the other evaluations of Time which follow.
In the so-called Book of the Dead, which the Egyptians of the
New Kingdom period (1580-1080 B.c.) were wont to place in the
tombs to enable the dead to make their way safely to the next
world,? there occurs a statement which embodies the essence of
the mortuary cultus which centred around that most ancient form
of the god who dies and rises again to life, namely, Osiris.*
The ritual of this cultus was designed to assimilate the deceased
with Osiris, thereby to secure his resurrection.’ In the passage
1 XI, 32. See below, chap. 3.

2 Cf. H. Bonnet, Reallexikon, pp. 824a-828 (“Totenbuch’).
3 Cf. Bonnet, pp. 568a-576a; H. Kees, Totenglauben und Jenseitsvorstellungen
der alten Aegypter, pp. 132-59.
4 Cf. S. G. F. Brandon, Man and his Destiny in the Great Religions, pp. 35-9,
in The Saviour God, pp. 18-28. See below, chap. 2.
concerned, the deceased, who has been thus ritually assimilated,

is represented as exclaiming, ‘I am Yesterday, Today and To-
morrow.’! In other words, we have here evidence that in ancient
Egypt men aspired, through the Osirian ritual, to achieve a post-
mortem existence that would merge them into the very being of
Time itself, manifest in its threefold aspect of past, present and
future. Again we are confronted, in a religious context, with a
distinctive evaluation of Time, and of man’s relation to it, that
merits investigation.
Next, let us turn to an estimate of Time which, strangely,
finds its most eloquent expression in Hebrew Wisdom literature,
although it does not there represent the tradition of Hebrew
thought, but rather an outlook typical of the thought of both
Greece and India.? It is embodied in the complaint of Ecclesiastes
or the ‘Preacher’, namely, that, “That which hath been is that
which shall be; and that which hath been done is that which shall
be done: and there is no new thing under the sun. Is there a thing
whereof men say, See this is new? it hath been already, in the ages
which were before us.’ Here we encounter what is aptly known
as the cyclic view of Time, according to which the temporal pro-
cess is regarded as moving in cycles, usually with a preconceived
pattern, so that the same order of events perpetually repeats itself.
As we shall see, the philosophies of life deduced from such a view
have been various, and the form it has taken in Asia has power-
fully affected, and still does affect, the Weltanschauung of a large
part of the human race. Again we have an evaluation of Time
that demands the attention of any who seeks to understand the
basic intuitions that underlie the great cultural traditions of
mankind.
As our fifth example of a significant tradition of reaction to the
experience of Time, let us consider some words attributed to the
Buddha. In the discourse concerned, the Buddha is describing the
Nirvana-state, which is the goal of the Buddhist way of life. He
1 ink sfdw3 bkg (cap. lxiv. 2, Papyrus of Nebensi, in E. A. W. Budge, The Book
of the Dead, Text, I, p. 177). See below, p. 24.
> Cf. R. H. Pfeiffer, Intro. Old Test., pp. 739-40. See chap. 4.
3 Ecclesiastes i. 9-10.
does so by drawing a characteristic distinction between that state

and the state of existence in this world: ‘There, monks, I say there
is neither coming nor going, nor staying nor passing away, nor
arising; without support or going on or basis is it. This is the end
of pain. There is an unborn, an unbecome, an unmade, an un-
compounded; if there were not, there would not be an escape
from the born, the become, the made, the compounded.” In
this passage, the desired Nirvana-state is depicted as the opposite
to a state of being conditioned by the mode of existence in Time
—it is a state without beginning, without development, it is sui
generis, and, thus, independent of temporary environmental cir-
cumstance or constitutive factors. In other words, the desired
form of existence (and it is desired, because it is true) is atemporal
or outside Time. So here we meet yet another evaluation, and one
that is tantamount to a repudiation of Time as being essentially
evil, and, in a way, illusory, because it disguises the reality of true
existence.
In these examples we see the significance of Time interpreted in

five very different ways; but we see also that in each instance
Time has constituted a factor of basic concern. According to the
Christian interpretation, Time is the medium through which the
divine purpose has found expression; in the Hindu view Time is
personified in the highest form of deity; the ancient Egyptian
sought, through Osiris, to embody in himself the three aspects of
Time; those who adopted the cyclic view saw life as a dreary
repetitive process; in terms of the Buddhist estimate, existence in
Time is essentially illusory, for true being is atemporal.
That consciousness, or experience, of Time has produced such
a variety of interpretation concerning its meaning is truly notable,
and it surely calls for explanation. Since awareness of Time is
common to all human beings, why should it have provoked so
deeply differing evaluations of itself? But the very formulation of
this question inevitably raises another, and one of even more
fundamental import—why has awareness of Time so powerfully
1 Udana, viii. 1-3, trans, E. J. Thomas, The History of Buddhist Thought,
p- 129 (Routledge and Kegan Paul). See below, pp. 101-5.
affected mankind that it has thus found expression in its religions

and philosophies of life?
Attempts to define the nature of Time, and of man’s experience
of it, have been many. Generally it has been agreed that Time is
one of the two basic dimensions of the phenomenal world, as it is
presented to, and apprehended by, the human mind. The other
dimension is Space, and the co-essentiality of these two dimensions
is such that the world of our experience has been termed the
‘space-time continuum’.! But, apart from the scientific and philo-
sophical problems which our perception of Time sets us, for the
ordinary man or woman Time inevitably raises certain deeply
disturbing questions of a psychological or emotional kind. Saint
Augustine of Hippo has proved a notable witness of this reaction
in a classic passage of his Confessions. Seeking to relate the idea of
divine eternity with that of creation, he found himself confronted
with the enigma of Time: “What then is time? Ifno one asks me,
I know: if I wish to explain it to one that asketh, I know not: yet
I say boldly, that I know, that if nothing passed away, time past
were not; and if nothing were coming, a time to come were not;
and if nothing were, time present were not. Those two times,
then, past and to come, how are they, seeing the past now is not,
and that to come is not yet? But the present, should it always be
the present, and never pass into time past, verily it should not be
time, but eternity.”® However, despite this lively appreciation
of the problem constituted by the threefold aspect of Time, this
great seminal Christian thinker failed here to perceive the real
significance of man’s consciousness of Time.* His failure is per-
haps symptomatic of a certain insensitivity that seems to charac-
terize Christian thought about Time. This situation is probably
"Cf. A. S. Eddington, The Nature ofthe Physical World, pp. 60-2;J.A. Gunn,
The Problem of Time, pp. 252-370; B. Russell, Human Knowledge, pp. 213-14,
284-94, 305-9; Lord Brain, “Some reflections on brain and mind’, in Brain,
vol. 86, pp. 390-S.
2 Confessions XI. 17 (trans. E. B. Pusey).
° At the very beginning of his Confessions he seems to catch a glimpse of it in
his words: ‘for Thou madest us for Thyself, and our heart is restless, until it
repose in Thee’; however, his theological conviction quickly determines the
direction of his thoughts,
due to that peculiar evaluation of Time which, as we have briefly

seen and must investigate at length later, forms the very raison
d’étre of the Christian scheme of salvation—indeed Augustine’s
lengthy discussion of the nature of Time is motivated by his desire
to justify the conception of an eternal God, whose very act of
creation initiates the temporal process.1
Augustine’s very notable preoccupation with the problem of
Time, together with his failure to grasp its deeper implications
owing to the specific theological issue with which he was con-
cerned, provides a necessary reminder that we are involved here
with a question that cannot be effectively dealt with by an im-
mediate interrogation of the evidence documenting the various
interpretations which we have noted. Clearly we must look for
some cause which lies at a deeper level in human nature, and such
that it has supplied the common impetus to the mental and emo-
tional reactions that have inspired those interpretations.
A clue to identifying such a cause would seem to be forth-
coming from consideration of the fact that human consciousness
essentially connotes awareness of the three temporal categories of
past, present and future. The ‘here-now’, the present moment of
experience, is a kind of razor-edge division between what we have
just experienced and what we are next to experience. Except in
the rarest moments of the complete absorption of our attention
in the so-called present moment, our consciousness spans the past,
the present, and the future. It does so, of course, with varying
degrees of intensity and range of reference. For example, at any
given moment we are conscious of our immediate past—indeed
the very process of thinking, speaking and listening to the speech
of others, necessitates recollection of what is already past in order
to comprehend the logic of the process as a whole. Yet the
degree to which we recollect the past, necessarily varies with the
occasion: both our present emotional tone and action may some-
times be powerfully affected by memory that reaches far back
into the past. So essential indeed is memory to each one that we
1Cf. G. Quispel in Man and Time, pp. 96-107; F. H. Brabant, Time and
Eternity in Christian Thought, pp. 45-62: see also L. S. Stebbing in Philosophy
and History, pp. 107, 115-16.
should not be the particular persons we are without it—complete

lack of memory does in fact mean a virtual loss of personal
identity. Very similar is the essentiality of our nexus with the
future. In a manner that defies analysis, our present or ‘here-
now’ consciousness is compounded of anticipation of our con-
tinuing to exist. To take a simple-minded illustration: as I now
begin to write this sentence, I do so in the expectation that I shall
finish it and that, in its completed form, it will record the thought
now in my mind. But this very short-termed expectation, assum-
ing a future of less than a minute, is really part of a longer-term
expectation, as indeed inspires almost all our actions. Thus, in
composing this study, I envisage a series of future situations: e.g.
completing this present chapter and relating it to the next, which
exists now only as an idea in my mind; then there is, further off in
the future, the finishing of the work as a whole; still further off is
the moment when I shall see it in its printed form; beyond that I
foresee the reading of it in various places by various people, and
I am tempted to anticipate what they will think of it. This rather
trite, and egotistic, illustration serves to show how one’s present
consciousness implicates the anticipation of a future of varying
range. It has also another usefulness, in that it exhibits the essential
connection between the conception of purpose and of the future
—my present actions have their explanation, and I hope their justi-
fication, not in the needs of my situation here and now, butinterms
of an aim that can only be achieved at some time in the future.
We see, then, on even this cursory examination, that human
consciousness connotes awareness of the three temporal categories
of past, present and future; moreover, conscious action in most of
its forms is teleological, since it is planned to achieve an end that is
situated not in the “here-now’ but in the future. Such purposeful
action, in any other than its simplest forms, characterizes homo
sapiens. The ability to conceive an end and perform it undoubtedly
lies in the nature of the human mind, and the possession of this
ability is surely the cause of mankind’s success in the struggle for
existence against other forms of life. The exercise of this ability
involves drawing upon the memory of past experiences, to guide
present action in planning for future situations.
Now, this familiar process will be found, on closer examina-

tion, to contain a factor of the highest significance for us, in our
endeavour to understand the part that Time has played in religion.
It takes the form of a sense of insecurity that consciousness of
Time evokes. Time is experienced as change: the phenomena,
presented to us through our senses, alter, and the alteration may
affect us in various ways, to our good or our ill. The logic of this
experience gradually teaches each person that his situation is never
secure; that it is ever subject to change. He finds this knowledge
disturbing, especially since it tends to affect him more in terms of
its menace of ill than its promise of good. Instinctively he craves
for the continuance of that which he knows, fearing from his
memory of the past that the future is more likely to bring sorrow
than joy. This sense of insecurity is basic to human nature and its
effect is profound. It prevents us, except for the briefest moment,
from immersing ourselves completely in enjoyment of present
experience; it causes us also ever to be anticipating future con-
tingencies. Indeed, the more rational we endeavour to be in the
conduct of our affairs, the more likely we are to be sensitive to the
menace of the future.
In the evolution of our species this fundamental sense of in-
security, which stems from our awareness of Time, has inspired
the disposition to control the future by planning ahead to cope
with its anticipated contingencies. It has indeed supplied the
impetus to that unceasing endeavour to win future security, by
employing present talents and economic resources, which has
resulted in the great and complex structure of our modern civi-
lization. ‘Planning’, as we so well know, is now the accepted key-
word to command attention and effective response in our society,
and we are prepared to tax our resources now in the interests of
some relatively far-off future contingency, be it of a military or
an economic or an educational kind. But what we thus do, with
all our scientifically based techniques and long-term policies, is
fundamentally in response to the same urge that caused our
palaeolithic ancestors to expend their time and energy in fashion-
ing a stone-axe, or drawing a magical representation of an animal,
to ensure success in a future hunt to provide food. In other words,
Io HISTORY, TIME AND DEITY
we may justly sce the original cause of civilization in man’s quest

for security which his awareness of Time prompts within him.
Man’s consciousness of the change that Time brings has, how-
ever, had other consequences than those which have found ex-
pression in his civilizations. In the planning, which has produced
those civilizations, the concern has been to control the future in
relation to his physical needs, various as these may be. But Time
bears an even greater threat to the individual person than that of
causing change in his environmental conditions: it teaches him
that he is mortal.
There is much reason for thinking that, within certain limits,
the child recapitulates some of the basic experiences of mankind
in the course of the development of the human mind. It is,
accordingly, significant that, during the childhood of most per-
sons, the discovery is made that living beings eventually die. The
discovery may come in a variety of ways, and in a modern
society it is usually accompanied by some explanation from an
adult, concerned to lessen the shock that the new knowledge
might have on the young mind.1 However that may be, the child
then learns a fact which he will quickly see as having a personal
relevance for himself. His mind, being already sufficiently
developed to grasp something of the logic of Time, will cause
him to conclude that what thus happens to others will one day
happen to himself. To the normal healthy child this discovery
does not usually cause any serious shock, and its first impact is
soon forgotten. But the knowledge of the fact, and what it signi-
fies, is never forgotten; indeed it steadily grows in significance
with the passing of the years. For that knowledge is definitive,
and it has an inescapable personal reference. It decisively sets a
term to the individual’s outlook; it limits his personal future,
terminating it with the prospect of a grim experience.
Awareness of Time, accordingly, involves awareness of mor-
tality. This means that Time not only threatens man with vicissi-
tudes of fortune in his social or economic situation, thereby
causing him to seek, as we have seen, to render himself secure
from such change as may be adverse. It also menaces him with
1 Cf. S. Anthony, The Child’s Discovery of Death, passim.
FIVE VIEWS OF TIME If
the very disintegration of himself—a menace, too, that he knows

will certainly be fulfilled, whether its event comes soon or late.
Consequently, his sense of Time fills him with a profound fore-
boding of ill to his very self, and it stirs within him the instinct to
escape, to find some abiding security from a destiny so sure and
so dreadful.
To achieve such security from the mysterious process that
brings death, either through accident, disease or the decay of age,
man has found himself confronted with a problem far more pro-
found and baffling than those with which he is faced in guard-
ing against contingencies that threaten his material well-being.
To meet such future dangers as war, flood or famine, practical
measures can be taken of such an‘ obvious kind that, in their
general pattern, they will be the same at all times and in all places,
differing only in form and efficiency according to the ability and
resources of those who employ them. But, in seeking to cope with
the menace of death, man is faced with many imponderable
issues that have called forth from him many differing attempts at
solution. Thus, we may notice that he has sometimes even failed
to recognize the necessity of death: there are legends about an
elixir of perpetual youth, and certain practices such as the Taoists’
search for the medicine of immortality attest the existence of
belief that the event of death could actually be held off perpetually
or immunity to it obtained.1 However, such belief has been com-
paratively rare, and it is obvious that the brute reality of ex-
perience has universally had a logic which the great majority of
mankind has recognized. Consequently, the problem of death,
which Time forces on men, has mainly resolved itself into two
distinct issues, namely, to hold off its event for as long as is pos-
sible, and, when it has to be encountered, to command some form
of salvation from its terrors.
1 B.g. Gilgamesh’s quest for the plant named ‘the old man becomes young
as the man (in his prime)’ in the Epic of Gilgamesh, Tab. XI, 266-95. ‘From the
beginning Taoist thought was captivated by the idea that it was possible to
achieve a material immortality’,J.Needham, Science and Civilization in China,
II, p. 139, see also n. d, and pp. 140-54. Cf. H. Maspero, Le Taoisme, pp. 83-4,
85 ff.
To delay death, mankind has resorted to various means of two

distinctive kinds. There have been the practical measures, of
either a scientific or magical nature, designed to provide safe-
guards against what have been thought to be the immediate
causes or occasions of death. Then, in addition to such practical
precautions which human ingenuity has devised, resort has also
been made to supernatural agencies, conceived either as gods or
divine heroes, who have been besought for long life or for pro-
tection against accidents or forces that might bring death. How-
ever, valuable and sought after as they may be, all such measures
can only be of an interim character, and man knows that he has to
face ultimately the onset of death.
It is in facing this ultimate challenge, which Time embodies to
personal existence, that mankind’s reaction has been so various in
its expression, while being single in its purpose. That purpose, as
we have already noted, has been to win security in some post-
mortem form. But in the conception of the form, in which such
security might be had, and in devising the means of its attain-
ment, the human imagination has clearly been conditioned by
diverse factors that have stemmed from specific cultural situations.
We have already seen something of the complexity of such
situations in the five attitudes to Time which we briefly noticed;
it will now be our task to investigate these attitudes more
thoroughly in an attempt to understand the factors which have
operated in their production and given them their distinctive
characters.
1Cf. H. Plessner, ‘Uber die Beziehung der Zeit zum Tode’, in Eranos-
Jahrbuch (1951), p. 371; Brandon, Man and his Destiny, pp. 6-7, 374-5, 384-5.
According to M. Eliade (Images and Symbols, p. 90), ‘man of the archaic societies
and the mysticisms attaching to the great historic religions’ strives both against
‘memory and Time’, It is strange that he does not recognize that the prospect of
death is the essential factor in the menace of Time. Perhaps the issue has never
been put more concisely and more eloquently than by W. B. Yeats:
Nor dread, nor hope attend
A dying animal;
A man awaits his end
Dreading and hoping all.
CHAPTER TWO
Salvation by Ritual Perpetuation

of the Past
Wee E observed above that there is reason for thinking that, in

some ways, the child recapitulates certain of the basic
experiences of mankind in the course of its evolution, and that in
this connection the child’s discovery of death is particularly
significant. We may, accordingly, expect that when the human
mind reached that stage of development-at which consciousness
of Time, and the teleological disposition dependent thereon, had
become sufficiently effective, the menace of death would have
been felt and the consequent urge to escape would have asserted
itself! When this stage was attained we cannot determine; but it
is significant that, according to the archaeological record, the im-
mediate precursor of homo sapiens, i.e. the so-called Neanderthal
Man, buried his dead, possibly providing for what was thought
to be their post-mortem needs.? As soon as evidence is found of
homo sapiens, in the Upper Palaeolithic era (c. 35,000 B.C.), it is
obvious that the practice of ritual burial is already an established
custom.? Now, since the burial and tendance of the dead have
never been practised by any species other than that of man, it is
reasonable to suppose that already at the dawn of human culture,
as it is known archaeologically, death had assumed such signi-
ficance for man that he thus expended his energy and resources in
caring for those who had died.‘ If death was so significant for
1Cf. S. G. F. Brandon, ‘The Origin of Religion’, in the Hibbert Journal,
LVII (1959), Man and his Destiny, pp. 6-7.
2 Cf. T. Mainage, Les religions de la Préhistoire: I’Age paléolithique, pp. 165-6;
E. O. James, Prehistoric Religion, pp. 21-3; J. Maringer, Vorgeschichtliche
Religion, pp. 71-88; G. Clark, World Prehistory, pp. 43-4.
3 Cf. Maringer, pp. 78-9, 118-22; Mainage, pp. 167, 171-2, 188-9; R.
Pittioni, Die urgeschichtlichen Grundlagen der europdischen Kultur, pp. 41-4;
Clark, pp. 57-8. 4 Cf, Brandon, Man and his Destiny, pp. 8-9.
13
I4 HISTORY, TIME AND DEITY
him, we may next ask whether the funerary customs of Palaeo-

lithic man afford any indication of his reaction to it, particularly
by way of seeking security from its dread consequences?
Palaeolithic funerary customs generally indicate a simple-
minded belief that the dead in some way continued to exist,
presumably in the grave, where they were’ equipped with the
ornaments and implements they had needed while alive. There
is, however, some evidence to show that this primitive belief, ina
kind of natural continuance of existence after death, was not per-
haps accepted in certain instances as sufficient in itself, and that it
had to be reinforced by special action. Burials have been found in
which the body had been coloured with a red pigment. The
general consensus of expert opinion about such a practice is that
it was magical in intent; that, red being the colour of the life-
substance of blood and the hue of physical vitality, it was thought,
by the application of the pigment, thus to benefit the dead person
on the principle of ‘contagious magic’, namely, that the virtue of
a substance may be transmitted by contact. If this interpretation
be sound, we may have here our earliest example of an attempt
to prevent, or reverse, the anticipated consequences of death, i.e.
physical disintegration. In other words, we may have evidence in
such a practice that, already in the Palaeolithic period, there
existed the idea that Time’s menace of personal extinction could
be met by means of a magical technique.”
Such a possibility (it clearly cannot be rated higher), that an
attempt was made by magical means to halt or reverse the process
of death, is of considerable significance. For, if it could be sub-
stantiated, it would provide a kind of Palaeolithic prototype to a
basic constituent of a reaction to Time’s menace with which we
shall be concerned in this chapter. As we have noted, the red pig-
ment, besides representing the life-substance of blood, gave the
1 Cf. Mainage, pp. 172-6, 188; P. Wernert in H.G.R., I, p- 65; James, p. 28,
Origins of Sacrifice, pp. 27-34; H. Breuil-R. Lantier, Les Hommes de la Pierre
Ancienne, p. 307; V. G. Childe, Progress and Archaeology, p. 8; J. Maringer,
The Gods of Prehistoric Man, p. 51. On the principle of ‘contagious magic’ see
also A. H. Gardiner in E.R.E., VIII, p- 265b.
2 Cf. Brandon, pp. 12-13.
RITUAL PERPETUATION OF THE PAST eS
pallid corpse the hue of life; in other words, an element of

assimilation was involved, i.e. the dead was made like the living
in appearance in order to be like him in vitality. With the possible
evidence of this funerary practice we must now set that of another
Palaeolithic custom, which also seems to adumbrate an aspect of
that reaction to which reference has just been made.
Among the scanty memorials of Palaeolithic culture the repre-
sentation of animals, either in linear or plastic form, is most
notable. This now well-known cave-art is generally recognized
as motivated by magical purpose: animals were often depicted as
transfixed with lances or pregnant, in order to facilitate the success
of a hunt or promote fertility, thus ensuring the future of the
community’s food supply.1 Now, such depiction necessarily im-
plies some conception of Time—the artist who drew an animal
incapacitated by weapons, must in his drawing have utilized his
memory of past hunting incidents, in the belief that the representa-
tion which he now made would be able to influence a future
occasion. His recollection of the past here would, however,
doubtlessly have been of a general nature: in other words, he
would not have recalled some specific instance of a successful hunt,
with which he thus sought to condition the future, but rather
depicted a generalized memory of a number of successful occa-
sions. This apparent manipulation of Time, however, has not
quite the significance for us as that implicit in another, and a very
different, product of Palaeolithic art. This is the picture of the so-
called ‘Dancing Sorcerer’ that adorns the wall of one of the inner-
most recesses of the cave of the Trois Fréres in the département
of Ariége (France). It is a representation of what appears to be a
man disguised by the antlers of a stag and the skin of an animal.?
This strange figure has naturally excited much speculation, and it
1 Cf, Werert in H.G.R., I, p. 93; Breuil-Lantier, p. 318; V. G. Childe,
Man Makes Himself, pp. 31-3; Pittioni, pp. 61-3; Maringer, The Gods of
Prehistoric Man, pp. 77-8; James, Prehistoric Religion, pp. 174-6. For parallels
from the hunting customs of modern savages, cf, J. Finegan, The Archeology of
World Religions, pp. 38-40; Ad. E. Jensen, Mythos und Kult bei Naturvolken,
pp- 281-3; S. Giedion, The Eternal Present, pp. 2-3, 88-9.
2C£ H. Breuil, Quatre Cents Siécles d’Art pariétal, pp. 152, 160-3, 164-6,
168-9, 172-3, 176-7; Giedion, pp. 499-505. See Fig. 1.
Fic. 1
The “Dancing Sorcerer’
(Cave of the Trois Fréres, Ariége)
RITUAL PERPETUATION OF THE PAST I7
has been variously explained as the representation of a masked

dancer or as the image of a god—a kind of ‘Lord of the beasts’.
Whatever may be the likelihood of the latter explanation being
the right interpretation, it may be accepted as most probable that
the practice did exist, in these Palaeolithic communities, of
magical dances, performed by men dressed as animals, who
mimed the actions of an animal in order to gain power over it.2
Such a practice is indeed understandable in terms of the primitive
logic that we may reasonably expect to have operated in the
minds of such early peoples; but what is not so easily intelligible
is the fact of the depiction of such a dance in what was surely a
sacred cave. Why, it may be argued, if dances of this kind could
be arranged whenever needed, did the Palacolithic artist go to the
immense labour of making this representation of such a dance?
In seeking an answer, we can be quite certain that the picture must
have been designed to meet some deeply felt need in the com-
munity; moreover, in terms of the other forms of cave-art, its
purpose would undoubtedly have been ofa magical nature. Now,
since the magical intention of the paintings of the animals was
proleptic, in that they were designed to effect a future hunting
occasion, it is reasonable to suppose that the representation of the
‘Dancing Sorcerer’ was also intended to have some future efficacy.
Further, however it may have been conceived, that efficacy would
surely have been the same as that which such a dance was believed
to generate. Accordingly, the picture was designed to achieve in
the future what the actual dance was also intended to achieve in
the future. Such a reduplication of intention must certainly be
regarded as strange, especially in view of the immense trouble in-
volved in making the picture where it is. There would seem to be
only one possible explanation of it, and it is one of the greatest
interest to us from the point of view of our subject. It is that those
who were responsible for the making of this picture of the
‘Dancing Sorcerer’ had been impelled to do so, because for some
1 Cf. Breuil, p. 176; Breuil-Lantier, pp. 325-8; James, pp. 173, 232; Maringer,
pp. 100-8; Brandon, Man and his Destiny, pp. 18-19, 23.
2 Cf. Maringer, pp. 100-6; James, pp. 148-9. See also J. Harrison, Ancient
Art and Ritual, pp. 40-8; C. Sachs, Histoire de la Danse, pp. 49-51.
18 HST OR, ULE SAINDe DIET Tey,
reason they had felt that the actual performance of the dance was
not sufficient to achieve their purpose. What that reason was
seems fairly apparent: they were concerned about the conserva-
tion of the magical efficacy of the dance, after its performance
was ended, so that it would be available to affect the future situa-
tion to which it was directed. In other words, they were con-
cerned with the problem of conserving, or perpetuating, the
imagined potency of an action of temporary duration. The solu-
tion, upon which they hit, was intelligible in terms of their magic
—the image of the ‘Dancing Sorcerer’, in the secret recesses of
their sacred cave, would perpetuate, or keep always as a present
reality, the efficacy of the dance which might have been dissipated
once the actual dance had ended. If this interpretation be sound,
we have, then, our earliest example of an attempt to conserve the
imagined virtue of a past event by magical means—in this in-
stance, in the form of pictorial representation.
It has been necessary to discuss at some length these two possible
expressions of Palaeolithic reaction to the challenge of Time,
because they appear to adumbrate an attitude of the greatest im-
portance for both the history and psychology of religion. Tenta-
tive though our conclusions must be in view of the nature of the
evidence, such apparent concern about Time, both in seeking
security from the consequences of death and in safeguarding the
supposed virtue of a past event, will serve to give some insight
into the intuitions that underlie the attempt to defeat Time by a
ritual technique which we have now to consider.
The Pyramid Texts of ancient Egypt are unique not only for
their being the earliest religious writings which we possess, but
also because they witness to the existence of a specific faith and
1 Cf. Brandon, Time and Mankind, pp. 17-18, Man and his Destiny, pp. 19,
24-5, in Numen, VI, pp. 112-15. A. Laming (Lascaux, pp. 160-1, 191-2) has
recognized the problem that such a representation constitutes, but does not
seem to appreciate the time factor involved; she interprets such masked figures
as representing ‘mythical beings who were perhaps connected in some way
with the history of the ancestors of the group’. Cf. G.-H. Luquet, L’ Art et la
Religion des Hommes fossiles, Paris, 1926, p. 229, ‘La magie dans l’art paléo-
lithique’, Journal de Psychologie, 1931, pp. 390-427.
RITUAL PERPETUATION OF THE PAST 19
ritual practice, concerning post-mortem security, of a truly remark-

able kind. These Texts were inscribed on the interior walls of
certain royal pyramids during the period 2425-2300 B.c.; it is
evident, however, that the traditions which they incorporate are
often much older in origin and may well date back into the fourth
millennium B.c.1 The purpose of the Texts was that of enabling
the dead pharaohs to obtain a glorious and eternal existence after
death. Death is clearly envisaged as a terrible event or condition
that has befallen them, and that threatens them with everlasting
destruction, unless its dread effects can be held off. The ways in
which security is sought, are various, and they undoubtedly
derive from various traditions or represent different modes of
psychological reaction to the grim menace.? Certain of these
ways have a significance for our subject, and we may briefly
notice them before passing on to that one which will require a
more extended consideration. They are distinguished by a com-
mon element, in that they all take the form of achieving the king’s
eternal well-being by associating him with something regarded as
being eternal by its nature—indeed they seem to reflect the atti-
tude of mind adumbrated in the Palaeolithic use of ‘contagious’
magic to revitalize the dead. Thus, some Texts are designed to
secure a place for the dead king, or his ba, in the boat of the sun-
god, so that for evermore he would be safe with this supreme
deity on his unceasing journey across the sky;? or, he is to join the
company of the circumpolar stars, which never disappeared from
the night-sky, partaking thus of an eternal order, unaffected by
1 Cf, Bonnet, Reallexikon, pp. 620b-623a; I. E. S. Edwards, The Pyramids of
Egypt, pp. 151-4; S. A. B. Mercer, The Pyramid Texts, I, pp. 1-7.
2 Cf. Kees, Totenglauben, pp. 59-973 Brandon, Man and his Destiny, pp. 34 ff.
On the attitude of the ancient Egyptians to death see also generally C. E.
Sander-Hansen, Der Begriff des Todes bei den Aegyptern; J. Zandee, Death as an
Enemy according to Ancient Egyptian Conceptions; Brandon, “The Personification
of Death in Some Ancient Religions’, in B.J.R.L., 43 (1961).
3 E.g. Pyr. 366c, 367b. It is significant that, in the Middle Kingdom Story of
Sinuhe, it is said of the deceased pharaoh Amenemmes I: Shrj.fr p.t hnm m itn
ntr ht 3bh m inj Sw (“He flew to heaven and was united with the sun’s disk; the
flesh of the god was merged in him who made him’). Cf. A. H. Gardiner, Notes
on the Story of Sinuhe, pp. 121-2, 168; K. Sethe, Aegyptische Lesestiicke, p. 3(5)-
Time’s decay.t Another means of salvation, inspired by a similar

motive, was that of identifying the deceased monarch with some
god, which meant associating him also with a number of other
related deities, with the intent that this divine connection would
render him immune from decay and death.? Such forms of salva-
tion were evidently based upon a primitive belief in the power of
magical utterance, since, so far as we have evidence, it would
seem that the transaction depended entirely on the solemn
assertion of such an association or identification, without the
accompanying performance of a specific ritual action.®
We come now to consider a mode of obtaining security from
the disintegrating effects of death, and from the ultimate extinc-
tion of personal being that is involved therein, by the employment
of a ritual technique, inspired by an intent to perpetuate the efhi-
cacy of some past event, such as seems to be adumbrated in the
figure of the so-called “Dancing Sorcerer’. In this remarkable
creation of Palaeolithic art, as we have seen, it appeared reasonable
to discern an attempt to overcome the effacing flux of Time by
conserving, in a linear representation, the supposed virtue of the
act thus recorded. In the Egyptian practice, which the Pyramid
Texts attest, linear representation appears to be replaced by a
specific ritual action, which can be re-enacted whenever required;
but the raison d’étre of the transaction is the same, namely, to
make available for present use what was believed to be the efficacy
of what had once happened in the past.
The past event, which is thus recurrently perpetuated in the
Egyptian ritual, was of a very distinctive character. It consisted in
the resurrection, or revivification, after death, of a divine hero,
Osiris. The legend, in which this event was related, is never form-
ally stated in the Pyramid Texts, nor indeed in later Egyptian
? Pyr. 656c. Cf. H. Frankfort, Ancient Egyptian Religion, pp. 100, 103, 106-8.
* Pyr. 135a-135C, 7034-705, 167a-179a. See also Pyr. 397a-412a. Cf. Brandon
in The Saviour God, p. 19.
® Belief in the efficacy of spoken Egyptian in the Hellenistic period is clearly
shownin the Hermetic writings: xai ydg attd tio pwritc nowy xal 1) tév
Aiyuntioy [7x] Gvoudtay év éavty Exe thy évégyeray tov Aeyouevdy .
nuets dé od Adyows yowusOa, GAAA Povais peotais tHv zoywr (XVI, 2; ed.
A. D. Nock and A.-J. Festugiére, II, pp. 232-3).
documents. The reason for this omission is obvious, namely, that

the legend was so well known that reference only to specific
details was necessary in the libretto that accompanied the various
acts of the complex ritual, to which the legend provided the
rationale.
This ritual, which was performed on behalf of the deceased
person, re-presented or re-enacted the sequence of actions which,
it was believed, had originally led to the revivification of the dead
Osiris. Indeed, throughout the whole performance, the essen-
tiality of the historical reference is constantly emphasized in the
libretto. Thus, in the following passages, the ritual situation is
being clearly conceived realistically in terms of the original situa-
tion, i.e. the death of Osiris, and the discovery of his corpse by his
wife, Isis, and her sister, Nephthys: ‘Recite: the Great One (i.e.
Osiris) has fallen on his side. He moves himself, he who is in
Ndi.t’? .. . ‘Isis comes and Nephthys; the one from the right, the
other from the left . . . They find Osiris, as his brother Set laid
him low in Ndi.t.’* According to the legend, the dead body of
Osiris had been saved from the corruption of death by the minis-
trations of Isis and Nephthys, and the god Anubis. What they had
then done on behalf of Osiris was ritually re-enacted in the process
of embalmment, whereby the body of the deceased, for whom the
ritual was being performed, was rendered safe from the physical
decomposition consequent on death. Accordingly, the assurance
is given: (Isis and Nephthys) ‘prevent thee from perishing .. .
they prevent thy putrefaction from flowing on the earth...”
‘Isis brings a libation to thee, Nephthys cleanses thee; thy two
great sisters restore thy flesh, they reunite thy members, they
cause thy two eyes to appear in thy face.’
‘1Cf, Brandon, Man and his Destiny, pp. 35-7, and the references to the
relevant literature there given.
2 Pyr, 721a-b (cf. K. Sethe, Die altaegyptischen Pyramidentexten, 1, p. 395).
It is significant that the place where Osiris was killed (by Set) is specifically
named; Ndi.t was located in historical times near Abydos: cf. Bonnet, Real-
lexikon, p. 508b; Mercer, II, p. 120.
8 Pyr, 1255c-1256b. Cf. G. Thausing, Der Auferstehungsgedanken in aegypti-
schen religiosen Texten, p. 116, n. 3, 45 Brandon in The Saviour God, p. 21.
4 Pyr. 1257d. 5 Pyr. 1981a-c.
Cc
The ritual of embalmment, which thus repeats what was once

done to preserve the body of Osiris, ensures that the deceased will
not suffer the disintegration of death. Throughout the transaction,
he is ritually identified with Osiris, even to the extent of having
‘Osiris’ attached to his own personal name.! This identification,
or assimilation, does indeed provide the raison d’étre of the whole
of this mortuary ritual, and it is seen in its very quintessence
in the crucial invocation, addressed to the great state-god, Atum,
to restore the dead one to life. This critical episode is best illu-
strated from the funeral liturgy of king Unas: ‘Recite: O Atum,
it is thy son—this one here, Osiris, whom thou hast caused to live
(and) to remain in life. He liveth (and) this Unas (also) liveth; he
(ic. Osiris) dieth not, (and) this Unas (also) dieth not. He
(Osiris) nhp not; this Unas (also) nhp not. (If) he (Osiris) nhp; this
Unas (also) nhp.’? This invocation is finally reinforced by one
addressed directly to Osiris himself, in which the resurrected hero
is reminded of the deceased king’s identification with him, and of
what it must necessarily entail: “Thy (i.e. Osiris’) body is the body
of this Unas. Thy flesh is the flesh of this Unas. Thy bones are the
bones of this Unas. (If) thou walkest, this Unas walks; (if) this
Unas walks, thou walkest.’$
We see, then, that, in the practice of this mortuary ritual, it was
believed that the efficacy of a past event, namely, the resurrection
of Osiris, could be perpetuated by repeated ritual re-enactment,
and, by the process of ritual assimilation, its benefit could be
1 As, for example, in Pyr. 1256c, where the deceased pharaoh Pepi is des-
ignated ‘Osiris Pepi’.
2 Pyr. 167a-d (cf. Sethe, I, pp. 93-4). Erman-Grapow (WB, Il, p. 283) give
nhp as ‘Verbum (neben ‘leben’ und ‘nicht sterben’)’. Mercer, I, p. 63, translates
the word as ‘judged’ or ‘judges’, without explanation (see also II, p. 88).
L. Speleers (Les Textes des Pyramides égyptiennes, 1, p. 16) renders it as “engendre’.
Unas was the last king of the fifth dynasty. In his important study entitled “Das
Auferstehungsritual der Unaspyramide’, in A.S.A.E., LI, pp. 363-4,J.Spiegel
takes this crucial passage as referring to the ba of the deceased king; for reasons
against taking the reference as being exclusively to the ba see Brandon in The
Saviour God, pp. 24-5, in Numen, VI (1959), p. 117, n. 17. The question of the
relation between the position of the texts and the layout of the pyramids, which
Spiegel studies, is a very important, but probably an intrinsically insoluble, one.
3 Pyr. 193a-c. Cf. Mercer, II, pp. 90-2.
acquired by the deceased person, for whom the rites were per-
formed. The event concerned naturally appears to be of a
mythical kind, although some eminent scholars have thought
that Osiris may have been an historical person who lived in the
predynastic period.1 However that may be, it is evident that the
Egyptians believed that the death and resurrection of Osiris had
actually happened long ago in their land; for them the sacred
history comprised a number of well-defined episodes, which they
conceived of in a very realistic manner, as both their ritual and
pictorial representation of them clearly shows.? Whatever may
have been the origin of the belief, we see from the evidence of the
Pyramid Texts that, by the middle of the third millennium s.c.,
the Egyptians were convinced that the revivification, which
Osiris had once achieved, was not something long past and gone;
instead they thought of it as a kind of precedent, which, by being
ritually re-enacted, could effect or sanction a similar revivifica-
tion of one of their dead kings. And, we may also note here, by a
gradual democratization of the royal mortuary ritual, the oppor-
tunity of such a revivification became available in time to all who
could afford to be buried in accordance to the basic requirements
of the Osirian obsequies.*
The revivification, which this ritual was thought to achieve,
was, of course, of a post-mortem character. This is clear from the
legend of Osiris; for the hero, on his resurrection, does not return
to resume his former life on earth, but becomes the divine lord of
1Cf. K. Sethe, Urgeschichte und dlteste Religion der Agypter, 94; A. Moret,
Le Nil et la Civilisation égyptienne, pp. 91-2, 98-9, 105-10; J. Vandier, La
religion égyptienne, pp. 44-6; Kees, Totenglauben, pp. 141, 147;J.Cerny, Ancient
Egyptian Religion, p. 35; Bonnet, Reallexikon, pp. 570b-571a; A. H. Gardiner,
Egypt of the Pharaohs, pp. 424-6.
2‘Bine Fille von Texten legt Zeugnis davon ab, dass die Aegypter den
Osiris und sein Schicksal als geschichtliche Gestalt gesehen und geglaubt haben.
Wer Mythus und Kultform des Osiris mit dem vergleicht, was in der alten
Mittelmeerwelt von Sterbenden und auferstehenden Géttern iiberliefert ist,
empfindet die Ebene der Geschichte als die besondere Basis des Osiris. Politische
Dinge sind erzihlt, politische Termini pragen die Kultsprache im Osirisdienst’,
S. Morenz, Die Zauberflote, p. 74; see also his Aegyptische Religion, p. 200. Cf.
R. Anthes in Mythologies of the Ancient World, p. 69.
3 Cf, Brandon in The Saviour God, pp. 25-8. See Plate i.
the duat or realm of the dead. The post-mortem life, which the
Egyptians in turn hoped to attain by the careful performance of
the Osirian rites, was a very complex form of existence. Owing
to their conception of human nature as being essentially a psycho-
physical organism, the preservation of the material body was re-
garded as a basic necessity for life after, as-before, death.1 This
estimate caused them to seek to arrest the physical corruption
consequent on dying by both the chemical means of mummifica-
tion and the magical potency of re-enacting what had been done
to preserve the body of Osiris. By such means, which also in-
cluded the ceremony of “Opening the Mouth’, whereby the pre-
served but inanimate body was re-endowed with the ability to
see, breathe and take nourishment, it was hoped that the body
would dwell for ever in its ‘eternal house’, the tomb, safe from
the disintegrating process of Time.? But ritual assimilation to
Osiris meant more than this; it involved a state of transcendence -
that placed the deceased far beyond the vicissitudes of temporal
existence. By virtue of being made one with Osiris, he was also
safe from the depredations of Time by becoming, as we have
seen, in a very real sense, Time itself: ‘I am Yesterday, Today,
and Tomorrow.”
We see, accordingly, that in ancient Egypt the belief arose,
having its roots probably far back in the fourth millennium 8.c.,
that man could render himself secure from death and its dread
consequences by the practice of a ritual technique. The trans-
1 Cf. Brandon, Man and his Destiny, pp. 39, 45-8.
2 Cf. The Saviour God, pp. 21-3.
3 See above, p. 4 and below, p. 30, n. 1. In his valuable study of the
Egyptian idea of fate, Morenz (Aegyptische Religion, pp. 74-84) has shown how
essentially fate was connected with Time: ‘Schicksal ist nach aegyptischer
Auffassung demnach primar Setzung der Lebenszeit, damit aber auch der
Todesstunde und der Todesart’ (p. 75). The word for time (tr) was generally
used with the personal suffix, e.g. tr.f (‘his time’), and it had much of the
meaning of the Greek xaigag (“Was zunachst Personen anlangt, so kann von
einem Gott und auch von einem Mensch gesagt werden, er sei “‘in seiner Zeit” ’,
p. 80). Since the greater gods were regarded as determining the length of the
individual’s span of life, to be oneself Time in its threefold aspect, would be
tantamount to determining the duration of one’s own existence. Cf. Zandee,
Death as an Enemy, p. 70 (A.5.q.); C. J. Bleeker in Numen, II (1955), pp. 40-6.
action concerned, moreover, did not only put the person beyond
the effects of Time; it also involved the assumption that Time
itself could be so manipulated that the efficacy of a long past event
could be perpetuated in such a way that countless individuals, gen-
eration after generation, could participate in its supposed virtue.
In the religion of ancient Egypt, accordingly, we see an expression

of man’s reaction to the challenge of Time which we may fairly
define as the ‘ritual perpetuation of the past’. We have noted a
possible adumbration of the idea that underlies it in Palaeolithic
art; but in the Egyptian practice we find it employed to achieve
personal security from the anticipated consequences of death. The
principle involved, namely, of conserving or re-creating, by
ritual enactment, the supposed virtue of a past event, finds ex-
pression in many religions, and it may thus be taken as represent-
ing a mode of reaction that is natural to the human mind. Some
examples may be cited by way of further illustration of its opera-
tion. In the rites of the Eleusinian mysteries, it would appear that
the mystae drank the kykeon and wandered about with lighted
torches in order to enter into mystic communion with the goddess
Demeter by representing incidents of her original quest for her
lost daughter, Persephone.? The Hebrew festival of the Passover
and the Unleavened Bread perpetuates the memory of Yahweh’s
deliverance of Israel from the Egyptian bondage, thus fostering a
sense of participation in the divine destiny of the chosen people.*
The sculptured image of Mithra slaying the Bull, which formed
the focus of the Mithraic sanctuaries, represented to the initiates
the primordial act of sacrifice performed by their god.* The
1In seeking to show that primitive peoples tried to abolish ‘temps profane’
by periodic rituals of renewal, M. Eliade (Le Mythe de I’Eternal Retour, pp.
64-5) unfortunately does not notice the evidence of the Osirian mortuary
ritual.
2 Cf. G. E. Mylonas, Eleusis and the Eleusinian Mysteries, pp. 261-72; Brandon,
Time and Mankind, pp. 121-3.
3 Cf. Brandon, Time and Mankind, pp. 74-5. See below, pp. 112-13, 130.
4Cf. Fr. Cumont, The Mysteries ofMithra, pp. 210-21;J.Leipoldt in Bilder-
atlas zur Religionsgeschichte, 15. Lieferung, pp. vi-xiii, Abb. 7, 13-19; Brandon,
Man and his Destiny, pp. 297-8.
Muharram ceremonies of the Shi‘ite Muslims, which dramatically

portray the martyrdom of Husain, clearly evoke a sense of com-
munion on=the part of the’ spectators with the martyr in his
sufferings, thereby inspiring a sense of salvation.
These various manifestations of the ‘ritual perpetuation of the
past’, however, seem to be more of a commemorative nature, in
that they are calculated to affect the respective devotees by re-
calling vividly some crucial event of the sacred past. But there
remains for our consideration another instance of this ritual per-
petuation of a past event which affords a most striking parallel
to the Osirian rite, since it also is designed to involve the devotee
in the very event which is thus ritually re-presented.
It is the Christian rite of baptism as it was first defined by the
Apostle Paul. His definition of what the performance of the rite
effected is surprising in the light of what seems to have been the
use of baptism previously in both Jewish and Jewish-Christian
circles. In such circles, ritual lustrations had a purificatory signifi-
cance of an ethical kind, being administered after confession of
past sins and a profession of penitence and resolve to live a better
life.2 In a notable passage in his Epistle to the Romans,’ Paul, how-
ever, enunciates a completely new interpretation of the practice,
and it is one that has fundamentally conditioned subsequent
Christian doctrine concerning the rite.
It is not clear from Paul’s statement in the Roman Epistle
whether he was propounding this interpretation for the first time.
Its difference from what went before is so great that it would seem
that the Apostle must then have been reminding his readers of
what they already knew.* However that may be, he now presents
1 Cf. J. Robson in the Hibbert Journal, vol. liv (1955-6), pp. 267-74.
2 Cf. E. Dinkler in R.G.G. (3. Aufl., 1962), VI, pp. 6292-630. Note the
significance also of I Cor. vi. 11.
3 vi. 3-0.
4 Whether the words 7 ayvoeire of vi. 3 implies, as Dinkler thinks (p. 631),
a ‘vorpaulinisch-hellenistische Tradition’ is doubtful. It would seem more likely
that Paul here, as in other places, perceives suddenly a deeper significance in an
existent custom; cf. W. Sanday and A. C. Headlam, The Epistle to the Romans,
p. 156 in loco; G. Wagner, Das religionsgeschichtliche Problem von Rémer, 6 ’
I-II, p. 292.
baptism as a ritual of mystical assimilation whereby the neophyte

is united with Christ, the divine saviour, in both his death and
resurrection. Paul asks his readers, perhaps rhetorically, ‘Or are ye
ignorant that all we who were baptized into Christ Jesus were
baptized into his death?’ And he continues: ‘We were buried
therefore with him through baptism into death: that like as
Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father,
so we also might walk in newness of life. For if we are become
united (odupotor) with him by the likeness (t@ duousparte) of his
death, we shall be also by the likeness of his resurrection; knowing
this, that our old man was crucified with him (cvvesteavedin),
that the body of sin might be done away, that we should no
longer be in bondage to sin; for he that hath died is justified from
sin. But if we died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live
with him (cv{ijcoper ait); knowing that Christ being raised
from the dead dieth no more; death no more hath dominion
over Him.’!
—_
This is a truly remarkable statement, both for the history of
Christian doctrine and for the subject of our special concern here.
It means that Paul saw baptism as ritually re-presenting the death
_ and resurrection of Christ, which were events of the past, and that
this ritual action had the effect of assimilating the neophyte, for
whom it was performed, with Christ in both his death and resur-
rection. In other words, he taught that baptism perpetuated what
he held to be the saving efficacy of these two events, which were
1‘Die Taufe ist nicht so sehr Initiationsakt und Abwaschung der Siinden,
sondern Aktualisierung des ein fiir allemal (6, 10: épdza£) geschchenen Heils-
ereignisses, sie bedeutet ein Mitsterben mit Christus, eine Gewissheit der
kommenden Auferstehung und den sofortigen Beginn eines neuen Lebens’,
Dinkler, op. cit., p. 631a. Cf. M. Goguel, L’Eglise primitive, pp. 321-4; K. Lake
in E.R.E., Il, pp. 381b-382a; M. Eliade, Traité d’Histoire des Religions, pp.
174-5; Brandon, Time and Mankind, pp. 169, 180-1, in Numen, VI, pp. 125-6,
in The Saviour God, pp. 29-33; H. J. Schoeps, Paulus, pp. 54, 112-14. Wagner,
p. 293, concerned to reject any idea of an Osirian parallel here, overlooks the
practical fact that the actual death and resurrection of the saviour could no
more be represented by ritual action in the Osirian mortuary rites than in those
of Christian baptism; he also neglects to notice the testimony of the recited
formulae concerning the meaning of the symbolic acts of assimilation.
located in a specific place and time in the past. Although with

Paul, and in subsequent Christian practice, personal faith and re-
pentance of sin were regarded:as essential concomitants to a valid
baptism, the rite, however, was clearly conceived as the sine qua
_ non of salvation)In the Early Church this belief inspired an
elaboration of the baptismal ritual, in which the nudity of the
neophyte had an essential significance.?
The parallel, which Paul’s doctrine of baptism constitutes, to
the motif which underlay the Osirian mortuary ritual is striking.
That the Apostle consciously derived his view from the Egyptian
practice appears most unlikely, whatever may have been the en-
vironmental influences that unconsciously affected his conceptual
thought. However, phenomenologically the parallel is of the
highest significance from our point of view. For it indicates that
some two thousand or more years after the Egyptians had first
sought to achieve post-mortem security by ritually re-enacting
what they believed to have been a unique act of salvation in the
remote past, Paul was inspired to resort to similar means to
implement his soteriology. In each instance, salvation is achieved
by the ritual assimilation of the devotee to the saviour-god in the
crucial event that secured his resurrection. In the Egyptian trans-
action, however, the devotee, being already dead, sought a post-
mortem resurrection, whereas in baptism the Christian neophyte
was still living; but, the purpose in each case is essentially the same,
because the Christian anticipates his physical death by mystically
dying in order to commence a new and eternal life in Christ.
Christianity, possibly also under the inspiration of Paul, is
1 E.g. Mk. xvi. 16: 6 motedoas wai Bantiobeic owbrjoetat (see also Ju. iii. 5).
Cf. J. F. Bethune~Baker, Intro. to the Early History ofChristian Doctrine, pp. 23-4.
* Cf. M. Werner, Die Entstehung des christlichen Dogmas, pp. 420-21 (E.T.),
The Formation of Christian Dogma, pp. 177-9; L. Duchesne, Christian Worship,
pp. 308-16. See also H. Rahner in The Mysteries, pp. 387-401.
3 Wagner, pp. 98-145, 272-4, has provided a long and valuable study of the
issue; but it would seem that his preoccupation with the ‘mystery-cult’ aspect
of the matter has caused him to overlook the fact that the ancient mortuary
assimilation of the deceased with Osiris continued on into the Christian era and
could have been known to Paul: see Brandon in The Saviour God, pp. 27-8,
32-3, 36, n. 49. The significance of Plate i is also to be noted here.
characterized by the practice of another notable instance of the

ritual perpetuation of the past, designed to achieve personal in-
corporation into the divine saviour. In the celebration of the
Lord’s Supper or the Eucharist, in the classic forms of the liturgy,
what is termed the anemnesis constitutes the crucial moment of
the ritual process. Reference is then made to the historic Last
Supper of Jesus with his disciples, and his words, concerning the
significance of his broken body and poured-out blood, are
solemnly recited, thus making clear that the sacred actions on that
fateful night are now being ritually re-enacted. This declaration
of intention is reinforced by the accompanying manual acts of
the celebrant, which also symbolize the death of Christ.2 The
action of the rite is completed by the subsequent offering of the
Eucharistic Sacrifice, whereby the historical death of Jesus, in-
terpreted as an all sufficient act of propitiation for human sin, is
ritually re-presented to God the Father.? The consuming of the
sacramental body and blood of Christ, which follows, incorpor-
ates those who partake into the divine saviour, in his life-giving
sacrifice.* Accordingly, in this, the central act of Christian worship,
the saving efficacy of an event that took place outside the walls
of Jerusalem in about the year A.D. 29, is ritually perpetuated,
so that it is made daily available to the faithful who join in its per-
formance. Indeed, the whole action of the rite is to make con-
stantly and ubiquitously present an act that is definitely located
in space and time.
In Christianity this reaction to the challenge of Time, exemplified

1 Cf. I Cor. xi. 23-7 (Mk. xiv. 22-4). Cf. H. Lietzmann, An die Korinther I,
Il, pp. 58-61; E. O. James, Christian Myth and Ritual, pp. 127-8; Duchesne,
pp- 61, 181; Brandon, Time and Mankind, pp. 169, 177, 180-1, 183, in Numen,
VI, pp. 126-8. See below, p. 159.
2Cf. E. O. James, Origins of Sacrifice, pp. 181-2; Duchesne, pp. 62, 85,
184-6, 218-22.
8 Cf. J. H. Srawley in E.R.E., V, pp. 560b-563; James, Origins of Sacrifice,
pp. 178-83; Nature and Function of Priesthood, pp. 167-71; W. Spens in Essays
Catholic and Critical, pp. 430-9.
4Cf, James, Christian Myth and Ritual, pp. 144-52; Bethune-Baker, Early
History of Christian Doctrine, pp. 26-32, 397 ff.
30 HISTORY, LIME AND DELLEY
in the rituals of Baptism and the Eucharist, is invested with an

ennobling solemnity, and it is interpreted by an impressive theo-
logy; but morphologically it is virtually identical with the Osirian
mortuary ritual. A like motive inspires each, namely, to render
the participant eternally secure in some desired mode of existence.t
In both, this purpose is achieved by assuming that the time-
process can be so manipulated that the efficacy of a past event can
be perpetuated or reproduced so as to be available whenever
desired. For its practical implementation, resort is made in both
to ritual representation of what are regarded as the essential
moments of the episode concerned. Such practice ultimately rests
on a very primitive mode of thinking: it implies trust in the
validity of the principle that like begets like—that imitative
action, carefully regulated and properly intentioned, will re-
produce that which it imitates, thus defeating or transcending the
all too obvious logic of Time.
1Jt is significant that, as the Osirian devotee sought a post-mortem state of
being in which he would himself incorporate Yesterday, Today and To-
morrow, the Jesus, with whom the Christian sought to be united, was ac-
claimed: "Inoots Xouotds éyOéco xal orueoor 6 adtoc xal cic tove aidvac (Ep.
Heb. xiii. 8). “Vollends aber ist Christus, der das géttliche Offenbarungswort
selber, der Mittler allen géttlichen Handelns ist, so eng mit der unendlichen,
gottlichen Zeit verbunden, dass der Verfasser des Hebrierbriefs sein Wesen
geradezu in zeitlichen Terminis ausdriicken kann’, Cullmann, Christus und die
Zeit, p. 43. It may be noted that the passage concerned reads in the two papyri
translated by T. G. Allen (The Egyptian Book of the Dead, pp. 137, 139): ‘Iam
yesterday, and I know the dawn of tomorrow, (being) in charge of its birth on
another occasion’. In this concept the Egyptians found a solution which other
peoples later were to utilize—‘Die Schwierigkeit, den Begriff der Ewigkeit
festzuhalten, zeigt sich ferner darin, dass er in eine zweigliedrige, Sfters noch
dreigliedrige Formel zerlegt wird: Zev jv, Zede ot, Zedc éooetar, & peydhe
Zevc¢, oder der Inschrift auf dem Isisbild in Sais: éyé eius nav tO yeyovds
xai dv xal éoduevor’, M. P. Nilsson, Geschichte der griechischen Religion, II?, p.
504. See below, p. 58, n. 4. See also M. Eliade, Images and Symbols, p. 158. Itis also
to be noted that in the Kausitaki-Brahmana Upanisad, I, 2, release from samsara
(i.e. transmigration of souls) is obtained by one who can claim identity with
Time itself.
Prate I. Transformation into Osiris
In this scene, painted on a mummy shroud of the Roman period, an
attempt is made to depict the effect of the Osirian mortuary ritual. The
central figure represents the deceased, whom the jackal-headed god
Anubis directs towards the mummiform figure of Osiris, with whom
he is ritually assimilated.
Prate II. Siva (Nataraja) performing the cosmic dance
Bronze. C6la; circa 11th century. See p. 35.
(Victoria and Albert Museum, Crown copyright.)
CHAPTER THREE
Time as Deity
WEG have already noted, in our brief introductory survey of

distinctive attitudes towards Time, that in the Bhagavad-
Gita, one of the foundational documents of Hinduism, the highest
form of deity, in its destructive réle, was equated with Time. This
great poem, which probably dates from the third or fourth cen-
tury B.C., is concerned to present Vishnu, in his form of Vasudeva,
as the supreme god;? but, in revealing the divinity as “Time, that
makes the worlds to perish, when ripe, and bring on them des-
truction’, a long-established and widely held tradition of Indian
religious thought was being invoked. It is significant, also, that the
revelation of this aspect of the divine nature constitutes the climax
to a theophany in which the cosmic activity of the deity, as both
creator and destroyer, is described.”
This implicit deification of Time would appear to have its roots
far back in the Indian cultural past. Indeed, as we shall also see
from other evidence, there is reason for thinking that the concept
derives from the Aryan tradition that finds expression in the Rig-
Veda, the depository of India’s most ancient thought. Before we
consider its origins and its other manifestations in Indian thought
and iconography, we must, however, look again at the idea as it
occurs in the classic theophany of the Bhagavad-Gita. Vishnu had
been revealing to Arjuna the multiplicity and complexity of his
being as the creator and sustainer of the world; even in this re-
hearsal of his beneficence mention is made, briefly in two places,
of another side of his nature—I am the immortal and also death’
... ‘Iam death that seizes all, the origin of all that shall be’.*
1Cf, S. Dasgupta, History of Indian Philosophy, Il, pp. 535-44. On the date
of the Gita see Dasgupta, II, pp. 549-52; A. A. Macdonell, History of Sanskrit
Literature, pp. 283-9; S. Radhakrishnan, La Bhagavad-Gitd, pp. 18-20;J.Gonda,
Die Religionen Indiens, I, p. 267; R. C. Zaehner, Hinduism, p. 122.
2 B-G, IX-XI. 4. 3°B=G, 1X, 10, X23.
31
After this revelation, Arjuna is aware that he has not yet seen the
full reality of God, and he asks: ‘I desire to see thy form divine, O
supreme One.’ He is appalledby what he then sees and cries for
succour: ‘Thy mouths with many dreadful fangs beholding, Like
to Time’s universal conflagration, I know the quarters not, I find
no shelter, Be gracious, Lord of gods, the world’s protection.’
The terrified Arjuna beholds all forms of being passing swiftly to
their destruction in the awful mouths of Vishnu, and then the god
speaks in explanation: ‘Know I am Time, that makes the worlds
to perish, When ripe, and come to bring on them destruction.”
Thus, in the theophany that constitutes the climax of this great
spiritual epic, deity, in its supreme form, is represented as ambi-
valent: it is the force that manifests itself in the universe, as both
creating and destroying, and, in its destructive function, it is
identified with Time. Since this conception is strange and dis-
concerting to those educated in a religious tradition which repre-
sents deity as essentially the beneficent creator, it will be well to
seek a deeper understanding of the intentions that underlie the
Indian view.
Pre-eminent among the many deities which the Aryan invaders
of northern India worshipped, during the second millennium
B.C., was Varuna, whose name suggests some original connection
with the heavens and who was regarded as the universal lord.*
This divinity, who has been the subject of much recent research,
appears to have been of an ambivalent nature. This twofold aspect
he exhibits either through himself or he shares it with Mitra, who
was so closely associated with him as to constitute a kind of twin
1 B-G, XI. 25, trans. E. J. Thomas, The Song of the Lord, p. 85; cf. Radha-
krishnan, pp. 289-90; F. Edgerton, The Bhagavad Gita, I.
2 B-G, XI. 32, trans. E. J. Thomas, op. cit., p. 86; cf. Edgerton, I, p. 113.
See the comment of Radhakrishnan: ‘L’Etre Supréme assume la responsabilité
a la fois de la création et de la destruction. La Gitd ne soutient pas la doctrine
familiére que, Dieu étant responsable de tout ce qui est bien, la responsabilité
de tout ce qui est mal repose sur Satan. Si Dieu est responsable de l’existence
mortelle, Il l’est aussi de tout ce qu’elle implique: vie et création, angoisse et
mort’ (p. 292). Cf. Dasgupta, II, p. 528; Edgerton, II, p. sr.
3 Cf. C. Eliot, Hinduism and Buddhism, 1, pp. 60-2; A. L. Basham, The
Wonder that was India, pp. 236-8; Zachner, Hinduism, pp. 35-42.
TIME AS DEITY 33
or double. Thus, while Mitra is benevolent, Varuna is regarded as

morose and terrible;! he is, moreover, associated saith Yama
(death).? This ambivalence manifests itself significantly in con-
nection with what is perhaps the most notable of Varuna’s attri-
butes. It is he who is the guardian of the fundamental order of the
universe (rta), which may also be identified with truth.? Yet, in
this rdle, he is feared as one who catches men in ‘fetters’, which
signify death. The idea implicit here is undoubtedly that of
Varuna’s being the controller of that basic order of things in
which the existence of all inheres and through which its duration
in each instance is determined. Thus Varuna is besought in one
hymn:
Let not my thread, while I weave song, be severed, nor my work’s
sum, before the time, be shattered.®
In the light of subsequent evidence, an instance of which we have
already noticed, it is significant also that this ancient Aryan deity
was deemed to comprehend Time, knowing what was to come to
pass. In the concept of rta, moreover, we appear to have an antici-
pation of what later becomes a fundamental idea of both Hinduism
and Buddhism, namely, dharma. The term is used with a great
range of application, and its variety of meaning has some re-
markable nuances: of particular concern to us is its connoting an
endless causal past of all that exists, including mankind, all of
which ‘is in bondage to the fetters of Time’, which is ever turning
on itself again as a revolving wheel.®
Varuna did not retain the exalted position, assigned to him in
1Cf, G. Dumézil, Mitra-Varuna, pp. 83-5; L. Renou, Religions of Ancient
India, pp. 20-1; Gonda, I, pp. 73-5; Zaehner, Dawn and Twilight of Zoroastrian-
ism, pp. 66-8.
2 Cf, Zaehner, Dawn and Twilight, p. 133; Gonda, I, p. 227.
3 Cf. Zaehner, Hinduism, pp. 39-40; Gonda, I, pp. 77-9.
4 Cf, Zachner, Hinduism, pp. 41-2, 116; Gonda, I, pp. 226, 227; M. Eliade,
Images and Symbols, pp. 92-103.
5 Rig-Veda, Il, 28, 5, in Hindu Scriptures (ed. N. Macnicol), p. 16. Cf.
Atharvaveda, IV, 16, 6-9, in R.-G.L., (K. Geldner), p. 110.
6 Cf, Zachner, Hinduism, pp. 42-3, and chap. V; E. Conze, Buddhist Thought
in India, pp. 92-4.
the Rig-Veda, in the pantheon of the subsequent Hinduism; how-

ever, something of his réle as the arbiter of destiny, in a close
association with Time, was taken by other gods, and in due course
it becomes a major factor in the Indian concept of deity. Accord-
ingly, in the Svetasvatara Upanisad, Rudra, who in the Rig-Veda
personifies the destructive powers of nature, is exalted as the
supreme deity, and is significantly associated with the process of
cosmic creation and destruction which existence in Time entails.
Thus he is described as the power that, ‘after creating all worlds,
withdraws them at the end of time’. He turns the “‘Brahma-wheel’
of the cosmic process, for he is the ‘author of time’ (kalakaro); but
he also transcends (empirical) Time.? In the later Maitrt Upanisad
this distinction is given a more philosophical presentation by in-
voking the concept of Brahman, the impersonal principle of
reality: “There are, verily, two forms of Brahman, time and the
timeless, (kalas cakalas). That which is prior to the sun is the time-
less, without parts. But that which begins with (has a beginning
from) the sun is time, which has parts. From the year, verily, are
these creatures produced. By the year, verily, after having been
produced they grow. In the year they disappear. Therefore, the
year, verily, is Praja-pati, is time, is food, is the abode of Brahman,
is the self. For thus has it been said: “Time cooks (ripens) all things,
indeed, is the great self. He who knows in what time is cooked, he
is the knower of the Veda.” ’? In subsequent speculation about
the nature of reality, Indian thinkers sought to reconcile or har-
monize its various aspects in terms of the concept of Tri-mirti
(‘Triple form’), according to which the gods, Brahma, Siva, and
Vishnu severally represented the principles of creation, destruction
1 Svetasvatara Upanisad, Il, 2, in The Principal Upanisads (tr. and ed. S.
Radhakrishnan), p. 725. On Rudra cf. S. Konow in L.R-G., II, pp. 29-30,
64-5; Zaehner, Hinduism, pp. 42-5, 106-8.
2 Svet. Upan., VI, 1 (ed. Radhakrishnan, p- 743). See VI, 5: ‘He is the
beginning, the source of the causes which unite (the soul with the body). He
is to be seen as beyond the three kinds of time’ (trikdlad), i.e. past, present and
future, Radhakrishnan, p. 744. Cf. VI, 16: ‘He is the eternal among the eternals’
(nityo nityanam), Radhakrishnan, p. 747.
3 Maitri Upan., VI, 15 (trans. S. Radhakrishnan, p. 828). Cf. Zaehner,
Hinduism, pp. 72, 96; P. Deussen, Philosophy of the Upanishads, pp. 153-4.
TIME AS DEITY 35
and preservation.! The attempt, however, appears to have been

something of an intellectual tour de force that never succeeded in
catching the imagination of the peoples of India, whose experience
of the teeming but destructive power of nature demanded a more
vivid imagery.” This they found in the various manifestations of
Siva, as Rudra came later to be more commonly known as he
gradually acquired the chief place, with Vishnu, in the pantheon
of Hinduism.
In Siva, the ambivalence of deity, according to Indian notions,
is seen in its most impressive form. On the one hand, Siva per-
sonifies the dynamic persistence of life, in all its teeming abun-
dance and complexity of form—it is symbolized in the lingam, the
mighty generative organ of the god.* On the other, Siva is also
Bhairava, ‘the terrible destroyer’, who haunts cemeteries and
places of cremation, and appears wearing serpents about his head
and a necklace of skulls. He is also, significantly, Maha-Kala
(‘Great Time’), and Kala-Rudra (all-devouring Time);* in the
caves of Elephanta he is represented with a terrible symbolism—
in one of his many hands he holds a human figure; in another,
a sword or sacrificial axe; in a third, a basin of blood; in a fourth,
a sacrificial bell; with two others he extinguishes the sun. In a
series of South Indian bronzes, which date from the tenth and
twelfth centuries a.D., Siva is shown as Nataraja (King of
Dancers’). In this réle, he performs the cosmic dance, symbolizing
1See Maitri Upan., V: note the statement in V.2, where, inter alia, it is
said of the supreme deity tvam yamas, i.e. ‘Thou art Yama’ (the god of
death).
2 Cf, Eliot, II, pp. 164-5; Konow in L. R.-G., Il, p. 66; Gonda, I, p. 354;
Basham, pp. 310-11.
3‘Er (Siva) ist der grosse Zeugungsgott, auf dessen Linga (der anfanglich
naiy-realistisch dargestellte, spater nicht-obszéne und stilisierte Phallus) sich bis
heute ein grosser Teil des Siva-Kultes konzentriert, weil der Gott in diesem
Stein lebt’, Gonda, I, p. 256. Cf. H. Zimmer, Myths and Symbols in Indian Art
and Civilisation, pp. 126, 128-30.
4 Cf, Gonda, I, p. 256; Eliot, II, p. 145; J. Dowson, Classical Dictionary of
Hindu Mythology, pp. 45, 298.
5 Cf, Dowson, p. 193; Zimmer, pp. 135, 155.
6 Cf, Zimmer, pp. 148-51, 155; Gonda, I, p. 261.
the energy of the universe, perpetually creating, sustaining and

destroying the forms in which it manifests itself
This deification of Time in the person of Siva has produced an
even stranger imagery, and yet one that, for all its repulsiveness, is
of the greatest significance for our subject. It originated appar-
ently out of speculation about the name of Siva, which led to
the hypostatization of his activating energy (Sakti) as a goddess.”
Although the factor of ambivalence is present also in this hypo-
statization, concern, however, has been concentrated upon the
erimmer destructive aspect. This has resulted most notably in the
idea of the goddess Kali, who personifies Time, kali being the
feminine form of the Sanscrit word kala (‘Time’).? This goddess
is of horrific mien: her colour is black, she wears a chaplet of
severed heads, and her many hands hold symbols of her nature—
the exterminating sword, scissors that cut short the thread of life,
the lotus of eternal generation. She is often represented as tramp-
ling on the corpse-like body of Siva, her lord from whom she has
emanated— She is black with death and her tongue is out to lick
up the world; her teeth are hideous fangs. Her body is lithe and
beautiful, her breasts are big with milk. Paradoxical and grue-
some, she is today the most cherished and widespread of the
personalizations of Indian cult.’ 4
The religion of India thus reveals, from the beginning of its
cultural tradition, a notable predisposition to see the universe as
the manifestation of a force, ambivalent in character according to
man’s evaluation. The creation of life, in all its diverse forms, was
seen realistically as involving a corresponding destruction of those
living forms, so that the rhythm of existence might be maintained.
The process, as viewed in terms of unceasing birth, growth, decay
and death, was the dharma of the empirical world, and all were
1Cf. Zimmer, pp. 151-7; Basham, pp. 375-6; A. Gaur in Sources orientales,
VI, pp. 317-18. See Plate ii.
2 Cf. Zaehner, Hinduism, pp. 112-15; Gonda, I, pp. 182, 258-9; Konow,
R.-G.L., Il, p. 175; Zimmer, pp. 139-40.
* Cf. Zimmer, pp. 211-12; M. Eliade, Images and Symbols, pp. 64-5.
tZimmer, p. 215. Cf. Dowson, pp. 86-7; Zaehner, Hinduism, pp. 191-2. See
Plate i.
‘poriod usopour -yydt4 tary Amquss yIgI-WLI “erIpuy You 42]
TEM Ssoppos oy} sv poyotdop outry, Jo Joyovrey SuLMoaop-][e pur sAnonTSop IY], TI] ILVId
Prate IV. The Mithraic conception of Time as
Zurvan-Ahriman
The all-devouring nature of Time is symbolised by the lion’s head.

Time’s sovereignty is indicated by the sceptre and the sphere on
which the deity stands. The wings denote the swift flight of Time,
and the signs of the zodiac on the body the deity’s association with
fate. The entwined serpent probably represents the tortuous course
of the sun’s ecliptic.
TIME AS DEITY Si.
implicated in it. And so, since the process in its destructive aspect
was the more emotionally impressive, Time was regarded as so
intrinsically a factor of the divine energy that it was cither equated
with the supreme deity or separately hypostatized as in the form
of Kali. In whatever way it was envisaged, it represented a
realistic estimate of man’s experience of the universe about him.
That the destructive aspect of Siva, or the cult of Kali, has in fact
tended to dominate the popular mind is psychologically under-
standable, since the phenomena of decay and death have their
inevitable personal significance. However, realistic though the
Indian assessment of life has been, the universal menace of Time
has not been accepted with a sense of hopeless resignation. The
instinct for personal preservation has operated even here to cause
men to seek for some form of ultimate salvation. In its more
popular forms, this instinct has found expression in bhakti, i.e. a
fervent passionate devotion to a saviour, usually Vishnu or Siva
in one of their many manifestations.1 At a deeper intellectual
level, moksa or salvation has been sought in terms of a highly
metaphysical interpretation of reality, which has involved an
evaluation of Time which we shall have to consider at length
later, for it represents another facet of man’s attitude to its
challenge.?
We have noted that the Aryan invaders of northern India, in the

second millennium 8.c., worshipped in Varuna a deity of ambi-
valent character, who was identified or associated with rta, the
basic law of the cosmos, from which the later Indian concept of
dharma was probably derived. It is possible that Varuna may
represent the Rig-Vedic version of an ancient high-god of the
Aryan, or Indo-European, peoples, because there are traces of a
1 Cf, Zaehner, Hinduism, chap. vi.

2 See chap. IV. It may be noted that Time (kala) first appears in the Atharva-
veda, xix, 53, as akin to Destiny. Later Kala is sometimes identified with Yama,
the god and judge of the dead, or as an associate of Mrtyu (death). Cf. J. Jolly
in E.R.E., V, p. 790a; Dowson, p. 140: ‘Anderswo ist Kala, die unerbittlich
iiber allem Geschehen waltende Zeit, jene Macht, die Wirkungen des Karmans
ausldst (Ram. 3, 29, 8; 6, 111, 25f.)’, Gonda, I, p. 234, see also p. 280.
D
similar deity in the religion of the ancient Iranians, who were also
of Aryan race. The issue is of some concern for us, since there is
reason for thinking that such.a high-god may have personified
Time.! In view of the fact of the uncertainty that still invests
expert opinion on the problem involved here, our purpose will
be best served by noticing first a piece of evidence that does con-
stitute a sure and an illuminating datum. According to a Greek
scholar, Eudemus of Rhodes, a disciple of Aristotle, “both the
Magi and the whole Aryan race . . . call by the name “Space”
(téxov) or Time (yodvor) that which forms an intelligible and in-
tegrated whole, and from which a good god (dv dyafdv) and
an evil daemon (daiuova xaxdy) were separated out (SiaxgiOfjvat),
or, as some say, light and darkness before these. Both parties, how-
ever, postulate, after the differentiation of undifferentiated nature,
a duality of the superior elements (zy ditty ovotoiyian téyv
Koeittérvtwy), the one being governed by Oromasdes and the
other by Areimanios’.?
Eudemus here is referring to the beliefs of the Iranians or Per-
sians. We may conclude, therefore, that, by the fourth century
B.C., information had reached the Greek world to the effect that
the well-known deities of Persian dualism, Ohrmazd (Oromasdes)
and Ahriman (Areimanios) had been derived from an ‘intelligible
and integrated whole (t6 voter dxay xai 16 Hyvwpévor), equated
with Space or Time.* This statement, very puzzling as it is in
1Cf. G. Widengren, Hochgottglauben im alten Iran, pp. 266-310; in Numen
I (1954), pp. 21-2, 40-1, II (1955), p. 91; Mani und der Manichaismus, p. 28.
See also R. C. Zachner, Zurvan, a Zoroastrian Dilemma, pp. 20, 88; U. Bianchi,
Zaman i Ohrmazd, p. 15-16; J. Duchesne-Guillemin, The Western Response to
Zoroaster, pp. 58, 61; Symbolik des Parsismus, pp. 36-40; H. Sasse in R.A.C., I,
194-5; Brandon, Man and his Destiny in the Great Religions, pp. 261-2.
2 Cited by Damascius (Dubitationes et solutiones de Principiis, c. 125 bis; in
J. Bidez et Fr. Cumont, Les Mages hellénisés, Il, pp. 69(15)-70; Zaehner,
Zurvan, p. 447; c£. Dawn and Twilight, p. 182.
3 Bidez-Cumont, I, p. 66, explain the remarkable fact that no other Greek
or Latin author, until the end of the fourth century a.p., mentions the rdle of
Time in Persian religion, as due to the concept’s being the belief of a dissentient
minority: cf. Zaehner, Zurvan, pp. 20, 49. Bianchi, p. 101, suspects the integrity
of Damascius’s report of Eudemus: “Evidentemente, Damascio, che non
riproduce il testo di Eudemo, ma lo interpreta e lo espone liberamente, ha
TIME AS DEITY 39
itself, both illuminates and is illuminated by information that we

have of much later date from Iranian or closely related sources.
What appears to be the earliest indication in the native docu-
ments, which have been preserved to us, of a deification of Time
in Iran occurs in the Vidévdat, which, though forming part of the
later Avesta, clearly incorporates much earlier traditions. The
passage concerned reads: ‘(The soul) of the wicked and righteous
alike proceeds along the paths created by Zurvan (Time) to the
Cinvat bridge created by Mazdah (Ohrmazd).’! The very brevity
of the reference to Zurvan in connection with these paths, i.e.
zrvo-data: “created by Zurvan’, surely attests the fact that both
the deity and his post-mortem significance were so well known as
to require no further elucidation, which in turn indicates a long
established tradition concerning him. How far back into the past
this tradition might have extended, we have no certain evidence,
but we may notice that on the Nuzi tablets, which date from the
twelfth century B.c., forms of the name Zurvan have been found.?
From the passage of the Vidévdat just cited, it would further be
reasonable to infer that the statement that the dead proceed along
the paths created by Zurvan also implies that the deity was so
closely connected with death as to be virtually the god of death.
According to another document of about the same period, we
learn that there were two Zurvans, who were differentiated in a
very significant manner. The one was the Infinite Zurvan (Zurvan
akarana), the other was the Zurvan ‘who for a long time follows
his own law’ (dareghd-chvadhdta) or, as often denominated, ‘Zur-
van of the long Dominion’. The Iranians thus distinguished two
dato una interpretazione neoplatonica al contesto, nell’intenzione di mostrare
che presso i Persiani si sentiva la necessita di porre prima della dualita una unita,
dalla quale Ja dualita proveniva.’
1 Videvdat, 19. 29, in Zaehner, Zurvan, p. 275 (A.1), cf. pp. 87, 203-4. ‘Il
cammino creato da Zurvan cioé I’esito della vita mortale—di ogni vita mortale
—concerne indifferenziatamente tutti, mentre la retribuzione dipende dai
meriti’, Biancho, p. 245, see also pp. 101-2. On the Cinvat Bridge, cf. Brandon,
pp- 268-71.
2Cf, Zachner, Zurvan, pp. 20, 88, Dawn and Twilight, p. 182; Duchesne-
Guillemin, Zoroastre, pp. 95-6, Western Response, pp. 58-61, 79; Symbolik des
Parsismus, pp. 36-40, P.W., 1 586.
kinds of Time: that which had no bounds, and that of a limited,

though long, duration.! In later speculation the Zurvan daregho-
chvadhata was.derived from the Infinite Zurvan, and its dominion
was set at twelve thousand years. It was this Finite Time, which
was conceived as dominating the world of men: ‘through Time
must the decision be made. By Time are houses overturned—
doom is through Time—and things graven shattered. From it no
single mortal man escapes, not though he fly above, nor though he
dig a pit below and dwell therein, not though he hid beneath a
well of cold waters.”? Time is the Lord of Destiny, who brings
old age, decay and death to men. Time’s destructive touch is
vividly described in a Pahlavi text: “As to him whose eye Time
has sewn up, his back is seized upon and will never rise again;
pain comes upon his heart so that it beats no more; his hand is
broken so that it grows no more, and his foot is broken so that it
walks no more. The stars came upon him, and he goes not out
another time: fate came upon him, and he cannot drive it off.’
Although it is thus evident that Time, personified as Zurvan,
was a well-established tradition of Iranian religious thought, the
extant documents only attest an apparent cult of Zurvan from
about the Sassanian period (A.D. 226). The movement then must,
however, have had its roots further back in the past, and it seems
to have sprung from a deep theological concern. It would amount
to too great a digression from our theme to deal fully with this
issue here; but since it has been treated adequately elsewhere, a
summary statement will now suflice.*
1Cf. Zaehner, Zurvan, pp. 57,87, Dawn and Twilight, pp. 236-7,in B.S.O.A.S.,
XVII/2 (1955), p. 243; H. Sasse in R.A.C., I, 193; H. Corbin in Man and Time,
pp: 117, 123-4; Duchesne-Guillemin, Symbolik, p. 37; Biancho, pp. 99-100.
2 Bundahisn (Greater), I, 25, trans. Zaehner, Zurvan, pp. 239, 315; cf. PP- 57;
95, 96-100, 106.
3In Zaehner, Zurvan, pp. 240-1, 398-9, in B.S.O.A.S., XVII/2 (1955),
p- 233. According to Biancho, pp. 99-100, the fact that, in the later Avesta, ‘il
tempo sia invocato insieme ad altri esseri quali lo spazio (celeste) e Vayu...
conferma la connessione essenziale dell’idea di tempo con l’idea di creazione, di
“ambiente” nel quale i progressi del mondo della creazione “hanno luogo” ’.
4 See Zaehner, Dawn and Twilight, chaps. 8-11. Cf. Biancho, chaps. VI-X;
I. Gershevitch inJ.N.E.S., xxiii (1964), pp. 12-13, 32-3.
TIME AS DEITY 4I
Zarathustra, who founded the religion that goes under his

name, proclaimed Ahura Mazdah (the ‘Wise Lord’) as both the
supreme god and the creator of the two opposing principles or
forces, operative in the universe as creative and destructive, good
and evil, light and darkness: these two cosmic principles he per-
sonified respectively as the Spenta Mainyu (‘Bounteous Spirit’)
and the Angra Mainyu (‘Evil’ or ‘Destructive Spirit’). In process
of time it would appear that Ahura Mazdah himself became iden-
tified with the Spenta Mainyu, and this identification in turn came
to produce for the more reflective of the Iranians a theological
problem of considerable gravity. For Zarathustra had also des-
cribed these two opposing spirits as twins, thereby implying a
common origin. Some thinkers were, accordingly, led to seek for
an explanation of the common origin, as they saw it, of Ahura
Mazdah (or Ohrmazd) and the Angra Mainyu, now known as
Ahriman. They seem to have found a solution by making the
ancient god Zurvan the progenitor of the two deities who per-
sonified the conflicting forces of the universe. Whether such a
solution had some already existing sanction in a myth that has not
survived, or whether it represents a measure of metaphysical
reflection, cannot be determined. There is some evidence of a
philosophical appreciation of the primal nature of Time: ‘it is
obvious, that, with the exception of Time, all other things have
been created. For Time no limit is apparent, and no height can be
seen nor deep perceived, and it (Time) has always existed and
will always exist. No one with intelligence says: “Time, whence
comes it?” or “This power, when was it not?’’ And there was
none who could (originally) have named it creator, in the sense
that is, that it (Time) had not yet brought forth the creation. Then
it created fire and water, and, when these had intermixed, came
forth Ohrmazd. Time is both Creator and the Lord of the
creation which it created.’! The evidence for some corresponding
myth is problematical, since it has reached us only in the accounts
of Christian and Muslim writers, which are unlikely to be without
some kind of distortion due to polemical motive. However that
1 Translated from a late Persian writing entitled Rivdyat, given in Widengren,
Hochgottglaube, p. 274. Cf. Zaehner, Zurvan, p. 410(8), see also p. 409.
may be, what is recorded. is of considerable significance. It is

related that Zurvan desired to have a son who would create the
universe. To this end he offered sacrifice during the course of a
thousand years. But before this period had ended, Zurvan was
assailed by doubt as to the efficacy of the sacrifices which he
offered. The momentary doubt had a fatal consequence; for it
caused the conception of another son who was to be Ahriman.
Accordingly, when the time was fulfilled, two sons were born:
Ohrmazd, radiant with light; Ahriman, foul and dark. And so the
dualism of the world originated, since Ohrmazd created that
which was good and beautiful, while from Ahriman came forth
all that was ill in nature and conduct.!
Such is the main outline of the Zurvanite myth as it has been
preserved to us. Whether it was a wholly artificial composition
may be doubted. For it must surely be considered improbable that
some contemporary Iranian theologian should deliberately have
invented a story which had the effect of making Ohrmazd, the
supreme deity of Zoroastrianism, into a creature of Zurvan and
coeval with the hated Ahriman. Indeed, it seems necessary to
assume that some precedent must have suggested and sanctioned
such a conception, and it would seem likely that it was to some
prototype of the myth that Eudemus refers in the passage which
we earlier noticed. Something of the antiquity of the myth may
also perhaps be attested by the seeming emphasis upon sacrifice,
for in Indo-Iranian tradition sacrifice could have a cosmogonic
significance.?
It would appear, therefore, that in ancient Iran there was a
deeply rooted predisposition both to personify Time and to see it as
the ultimate factor of the universe. But in their evaluation of
Time, it would also seem that the Iranians were impressed by the
apparent ambivalence of its nature or operation. Regarding it as
the original source or cause of the universe, they also recognized
that Time brought old age, decay and death, to all things. Accord-
1 See the texts relating to the Zurvanite myth given by Zaehner, Zurvan,
pp- 419-37; cf. Dawn and Twilight, pp. 212-13, 227-8.
* Cf. Biancho, pp. 222-35; Duchesne-Guillemin, Western Response, p. 58,
Symbolik, pp. 38-9, M. Molé in Sources orientales, 1, pp. 301, 303-4.
TIME AS DEITY 43
ingly, perhaps owing to that proclivity towards a dualistic

Weltanschauung that seems to characterize Indo-Iranian thinking,
two aspects or forms of Time were distinguished and personified.
Infinite Time (Zurvan akarana) was conceived as ultimate reality,
and it finds expression in all that is good, true and beautiful. In
various theological essays of the Sassanian period, orthodox
thinkers sought to refute what they considered to be the heresy of
Zurvanism, by identifying Ohrmazd with Infinite Time or by
making it the chief ally or agent of Ohrmazd against Ahriman.
The other form of Time they denominated ‘Time of the long
Dominion’ (Zurvan dareghd-chvadhata), assigning it a long but
limited period of activity. This was Time the Destroyer, and all
living beings were subject to its inexorable decree that they grow
old and finally die.
This distinctively Iranian conception of two forms of Time was
destined to be carried outside the land of its origin and to be dis-
seminated throughout the world of Graeco-Roman culture by the
cult of Mithra. The various stages of the movement westwards
still remain obscure; but it would seem very probable that some-
where en route the cult absorbed certain concepts of Mesopotamian
astralism, particularly concerning the relationship of Time to
astral phenomena.? However that may be, for our subject it is
important to note that there is evidence that in Mithraism the des-
tructive aspect of Time was identified with Ahriman, the personi-
fication of the principle of evil in Zoroastrianism.
This evidence has a strange and impressive form. In many
Mithraic sanctuaries, there have been found statues of a lion-
headed monster of otherwise anthropomorphic appearance.* The
1Cf. Zachner, Zurvan, pp. 341-3, Dawn and Twilight, pp. 209-10. According
to Biancho (p. 100), ‘L’idea di un tempo infinito come “‘ambiente”’ o situazione
nella quale Ja divinita esiste, affrontata simmetricamente dal maligno che abita
in basso, nelle tenebre, sembra dunque piuttosto il frutto della speculazione
successiva, che, come si é detto, ha elaborato tale formula radicalizzando in
senso cosmologico un dualismo che in origine era molto meno sistematico ¢
assoluto.”
2 Cf, Cumont, The Mysteries of Mithra, pp. 9-11, 119-25; Bidez-Cumont, I,
PP- 34-6, 63-S. ;
3. Cf Cumont, Textes et Monuments figurés relatifs aux Mysteres de Mithra, 1,
aspect of most of these images is horrific, the hideous nature of the
lion’s head being accentuated by the coils of a large serpent about
the monster’s body. That the figure is meant to be symbolic is
evident from the keys and staff in its hands, the emblem of a
thunderbolt on its breast, and the wings that sprout from its
shoulders. These features are usually interpreted as indicating the
attributes of power through sovereignty over fate or destiny. A
clue to the mystery, which these images constituted from about
the beginning of the eighteenth century when the first one was
found, was originally provided by the Danish archaeologist Zoéga.
He suggested that the figure represented Time, and he identified it
with the Greek conception of Aidn.? A more accurate interpreta-
tion was made later by the great Belgian authority on Mithraism,
Franz Cumont, when he recognized the figure as depicting
Zurvan akarana; for the symbolism obviously had a temporal sig-
nificance, and Zurvan was the Iranian personification of Time.*
However, in view of the fact that the symbolism of these images
indicates that Time in its cosmic aspect is here conceived, while
the lion’s mask suggests “Time that devours all’, it would seem
that Cumont was not quite right in his interpretation: for the
attributes are those of Zurvan dareghd-chvadhata rather than of
Zurvan akarana. In other words, it appears that it was “Time
p- 74, n. 2 and 3; M. J. Vermaseren, Corpus Inscriptionum et Monumentorum
Religionis Mithriacae, figs, 29a, b, 35, 36, 186, 89, 90, 109, 116(?), 125, 144, 152,
153, 156, 157, 188, 197, 210, 211, 227, 230; R. Pettazzoni, Essays on the History of
Religions, pls. vi-ix, xii. The statues appear to have stood outside the adyton,
cf. Duchesne-Guillemin in Numen, II, p. 191. See Plate iv.
1 Cf. Cumont, Mysteries, pp. 105-9; Pettazzoni, p. 181.
2 Cf Pettazzoni, pp. 182-3.
3 ‘Tl n’y a qu'une seule divinité perse dont il puisse étre le représentant, savoir
Zervan Akarana, le Temps infini que, dés l’epoque des Achéménides, une secte
des mages plagait 4 l’origine des choses et dont seraient nés A la fois Ormuzd et
Ahriman’, Textes et Monuments, I, p. 78, cf. p. 301. Cf. Cumont, Les religions
orientales dans le paganisme romain, pp. 140, 277, n. 46; H. Gressmann, Die
orientalischen Religionen im hellenistisch-romischen Zeitalter, pp. 146-7; C.A.H.,
XII, p. 118 (A. Christensen), p. 430 (A. D. Nock). On the nature of the imagery
there is an interesting note in Bidez~-Cumont, I, pp. 66, n. 2: ‘Pour les Iraniens
aussi, le Temps n’est pas une entité abstracte; c’est un étre mythique, dont la
forme matérielle est le firmament étoilé’; cf. p. 71.
TIME AS DEITY 45
of the long Dominion’ that found a place, in some way, in

Mithraism.1
That this aspect of Time should have played an apparently im-
portant rdle in Mithraism is surprising, secing that the central
figure of the cult, Mithra, is always represented in heroic form,
performing the sacrifice that gives new life and vitality.2 A key to
the mystery is provided perhaps by the Greek writer, Plutarch,
who, in referring to Persian dualism, says that the Persians gave
Mithra the title of ‘Mediator’ (6Meaitnc), because he was midway
(uéoov S augoiv) between Oromazes (Ohrmazd) and Areimanios
(Ahriman). He also adds that votive offerings (edxraia) and
thank-offerings (yagsot7jova) were made to Ohrmazd, while the
offerings to Ahriman he describes as ‘averting and mourning’
(axotedxaa xal oxv0emmd).? Now, in view of the archaeological
evidence that, in the mithraea, Ahriman was venerated in the
guise of Zurvan,‘ and, since it is evident that this Zurvan was
Zurvan dareghd-chvadhata, some insight is afforded into the logic
of Mithraic theology. It would, accordingly, appear that, in
Mithraism, Ahriman was identified with “Time of the long
1Cf Zaehner, Zurvan, pp. viti-ix, in B.S.O.A.S., XVII/2 (1955), pp-

237-43, Dawn, pp. 129-30; Duchesne-Guillemin, Ormazd et Ahriman, pp. 126-8,
in Numen, IL (1955), pp- 190-5, in La Nouvelle Clio, X (1960), p. 6, Symbolik,
pp- 86-9. These writers show that, in Mithraism, Zurvan dareghd-chvadhata was
identified with Ahriman, or was the form in which he was visualized. Hence,
whereas the symbolism of the figure emphasizes its temporal aspect, Ahriman
(Arimanius) only is named in the relevant inscriptions. Cf. Brandon, Man and
his Destiny, pp. 291 ff. It is curious that M. J. Vermaseren (Mithras: the Secret
God), in discussing these images (pp. 116-28), does not notice the two forms of
Zurvan.
2 Cf Cumont, I, Textes et Monuments, I, 186-7, Mysteries, pp. 132-7; Zaehner,
Dawn, pp. 125-6; Brandon, pp. 296-7.
3 De Iside et Osiride, 46. Cf. Bidez-Cumont, II, pp. 70-4; Zaehner, Zurvan,
pp. 13-14.
4See the references in n. 1 above. See also the significant observation of
Duchesne-Guillemin (Symbolik, p. 88): “Der Schluss lautet, dass Arimanius des
Mithraskults zwar sicher grausam ist, doch nicht mehr den teuflischen. Charakter
hat, den er im dualistischen System der iranischen Religion besass. Die Wid-
mungen bezeichnen ihn unzweideutig als Gott: nicht mehr als Damon, einzig
als Gott—als Gott der Unterwelt—hat er in den Mysterien weitergelebt.’
Dominion’, i.e. with the Time that brings old age, decay and
death to all men, because in this world all are subject to his law.
Therefore, his rule here must be acknowledged, and his grim
humour propitiated. Above and beyond him, Ohrmazd stood as
Infinite Time (Zurvan akarana), and between the two Mithra
mediated. How Mithra fulfilled this réle is not certain; but, by
virtue of his being the mediator between two forms of Time, and
because his slaying of the Cosmic Bull was thought to win new
life and vitality, it would seem that in some way he gave the
assurance of new life or immortality to his initiates, who, apart
from his grace, were subject to Time the Destroyer. Eternal
security would, in turn, be found in communion with Ohrmazd,
who was Infinite Time. However, as the mediator or saviour in a
soteriological cult often comes to command the greater emotional
response from the faithful, so it was in Mithraism—Mithra pre-
dominated, and not Ohrmazd, in his rather remote rédle of
Zurvan. akarana.
The dissemination of the Iranian conception of Time, in its two-

fold form of personification, in the world of Graeco-Roman cul-
ture can be reasonably assigned to the spread of Mithraism. There
is, however, reason for thinking that the conception was also in-
fluential in various directions outside the cult of Mithra. Early
Greek cosmological speculation provides a particular problem in
this connection. Thus, Hesiod in his Theogony, after describing
the creation of the main constituents of the universe, tells how
1 According to Duchesne-Guillemin (in Numen, II [1955], p. 194): “Le daiva
Ahriman ainsi, dans les mystéres de Mithra, avoir été le maitre du cosmos. Les
hommes vertueux devaient donc aspirer 4 étre délivrés de son empire. Com-
ment?—Grace au sacrifice du taureau.’ In subsequent publications (La Nouvelle
Clio, X [1960], No. 3, p. 8, Symbolik, p. 88), Duchesne-Guillemin, impressed
by the argument of J. Gershevitch (The Avestan Hymn to Mithra, pp. 62-7),
that Ahriman killed the primordial bull, thinks that réle of ‘Stiertéter’ was later
transferred to Mithra, because he was the ‘Spender des Lebens’. Cf. Zaehner,
Dawn, pp. 127-30; Brandon, pp. 297-8. Bidez-Cumont, II, p. 74, thought
that the title wectryns meant that Mithra came to be regarded as ‘le Médiateur
entre le Dieu supréme et les hommes’; when they wrote, attention had not been
given to the significance of the two forms of Zurvan. For Ohrmazd
as ‘Infinite Time’ see Zaehner, Zurvan, p. 312, cf. pp. 231-2, 234.
TIME AS DEITY ANG)
Earth, the universal genetrix, brought forth Kronos.1 The simi-

larity of the name Kronos (Kodvec) to Chronos (Xodvoc), i.e.
Time, is very striking. However, although Kronos is personified
and depicted as devouring his children (an act which later mytho-
graphers interpreted as symbolizing Time’s devouring of all that
he has made), Hesiod nowhere identifies him with Time. The fact
is the more curious, since, in his account of the origin of things,
the poet does not tell how Time came into being. That Hesiod’s
silence about the subject does not indicate that the early Greeks
were not interested in the significance of Time is amply attested
by other evidence. For example, it is reported of Pherecydes of
Syros (c. 550 B.c.), that he had said that ‘Zas always existed, and
Chronos and Chthonie, as the three first principles . . . and
Chronos made out of his own seed fire and wind [or breath] and
water...’ Here Time (Chronos) is not only presented as one of
the primordial agents in the creation of the world, but it is per-
sonified in a very realistic manner. Pindar (518-438 B.c.) refers to
Time as ‘the father of all’,? while Anaximander (c. 550 B.C.) is said
to have taught that, ‘the source of coming-to-be for existing things
is that into which destruction, too, happens, “according to neces-
sity (xata& to yoedyv); for they pay penalty and retribution for
their injustice according to the assessment of Time’. (xatd
tv tod Xodvov taéw).4
The degree of personification in these conceptions of Time is
admittedly rather vague, and from them no clear image of Time
emergés. This is not the case, however, when we turn to Orphism,
that strange movement, of which the origin and nature still remain
1 Theogony, 137-8: tovds dé él’ dmhdtatog yéveto Kodvog ayxvdopyrne,
dewédratog maidwv: Cf. Brandon, Creation Legends of the Ancient Near East, pp.
168, 187.
2 Damascius, de principiis, 124 bis: Degexddng 5é 6 Xbguog Zdvra, mév civan
dei xai Xodvov xai XOoviay tag teeic modtos aeyds . . . Tov dé XQdvor novjoat
éx tod ydvov Eavtod nig nai mvedpa xai bdwe (in G. S. Kirk and J. E. Raven,
The Presocratic Philosophers, p. 55). Cf. Brandon, Creation Legends, pp. 186-7;
W. Jaeger, Theology of the Early Greek Philosophers, p. 68.
3 Ol. 2, 17: Xodvos 6 ndvtwr natio.
4 Simplicius, Phys. 24, 17 (text and trans. in Kirk-Raven, p. 117, see also
pp- 105-7). Cf. Jaeger, pp. 34-6; L. Robin, La Pensée grecque, pp. 52-3.
an unsolved problem of the history of Greek religion. According to

the account of Orphic cosmogony given by a second-century
Christian apologist, ‘water was the origin for the totality of things,
according to him [Orpheus]; and from water slime was estab-
lished, and from both of them was generated a living creature
(c@ov), a snake with a lion’s head growing on to it, and in the
middle of them the face of a god, Heracles and Chronos by name’
—the account goes on to tell how this primal being made the
cosmic egg, from which Heaven (Ouranos) and Earth (Gé) were
produced.! The imagery here is sufficiently concrete; the mon-
strous form, which is distinctly indicated, is so reminiscent of the
representations of Zurvan daregho-chvadhata in the mithraea that it
would seem that Iranian influence must be assumed. But, if such
a derivation be regarded as certain, it does not appear that in
Orphism any emphasis was placed upon the significance of “Time
of the long Dominion’, as it was in Persian religion, and, as it
would seem, in Writes also.2 We may note, however, that
there is some evidence of the syncretism of Orphic and Mithraic
theology in at least one representation of Phanes, a key figure of
Orphic mythology. A bas-relief, dating from the second century
A.D. and now in Modena, shows Phanes as a nude male figure,
standing on an inverted cone from which flames shoot forth, with
a similar object above his head—these cones undoubtedly repre-
sent two sections of the cosmic egg from which the personification
of light emerged at the beginning, according to Orphic cosmo-
gony. The figure of Phanes, however, is entwined about with a
serpent, and is winged; the feet, moreover, are not human but
bestial in form. On the breast the heads of a ram, a lion and a goat
1 Athenagoras, pro Christianis 18 (text and trans. in Kirk-Raven, p. 42).
* According to Kirk-Raven, p. 39, ‘Its (the figure’s) oriental derivation in the
Orphic accounts is indicated by its concrete shape as a multi-headed winged
snake.’ These scholars think that the figure may derive from the ‘Iranian hypos-
tatization Zvran Akarana (unending time)’; they make no reference to Zvran
daregho-chvadhata, which obviously affords the closer parallel—this is so also
with W. K. C. Guthrie, Orpheus and Greek Religion, pp. 81, 85-91. Cf. M. P.
Nilsson, Geschichte der griechischen Religion, II, pp. soo-1. Cf. ee
Guillemin, Western Response, pp. 78-9; H. Schwabl, ‘Weltschépfung’,
P.W., 39-45; Brandon, Creation Legends, pp. 187, n. I, 203-7.
Prate V. Phanes
A bas-relief from Modena (c. 2nd century A.pD.), in which the Orphic deity
is invested with much of the symbolism of the Mithraic Time-god.
@Vid
LA V Jolfot-seq sunjoidop
9} sisooyode
jo oy qosoduro SnUTUOJUY
‘snid pue sty OFM. vUulsney
oy, yer19durtoTdnoo
d1v duI0g
0} usAvoy
Aq oyy posutmIInSIZ
JO ‘sveUIOIOY
TIME AS DEITY 49
appear; the emblem of a thunder-bolt is held in the right hand

and a long regal staff in the left. Except for the fact that the head is
that of a man and not of a lion, the figure at once recalls the
Mithraic images of Zurvan. Thesimilarity of iconography is re-
inforced by an emphasis upon the symbolism of Time; for, in an
oval band about the figure of Phanes, the signs of the Zodiac are
represented in high relief, while in the corners outside the band
the four winds are depicted.1
The syncretism of concept expressed in this Modena sculpture
points the way to the rich fusion of ideas and imagery found in
that strange complex of faith and practice, current in the Graeco-
Roman world, which is known as Gnosticism. For the basic
Gnostic problem, namely, to account for the involvement of
spirit with matter, was solved not only by positing a primordial
descent of some spiritual entity from its transcendental abode and
its imprisonment in the physical world, but also by explaining the
origin and nature of this world. To this end both Iranian and
Jewish tradition were laid under contribution, or, conversely, in-
spired the main lines along which a solution was constructed.’
Accordingly, this world, in which mankind finds its lot cast, was
interpreted as the creation of a demiurge of lower status than God,
and generally regarded as hostile to him. Since this daemonic
creator was lord of the world which he had made, men were sub-
ject to him and his laws determined their destiny, unless by ini-
tiation into the true gnosis they acquired the means of escape from
his dominion. This dualistic Weltanschauung, comprising a higher
and a lower world, each with its own lord, is so very reminiscent
of Iranian dualism that it is not surprising to find that, in some
Gnostic documents, the ‘prince of this world’ is clearly identified
with Zurvan dareghd-chvadhata, i.e. “Time of the long Dominion’,
as was also done in Mithraism. Thus, in the recently discovered
1 Cf. Guthrie, pp. 254-5; Pettazzoni, pp. 186-7; R. Eisler, Orpheus the Fisher,
plate iv, also p. 6; Nilsson, I, p. 500, n. 4. See Plate v.
2 Cf. G. Quispel, Gnosis als Weltreligion, pp. 7-8; R. McL. Wilson, The
Gnostic Problem, pp. 188-92; C. Colpe in R.G.G.%, II, 1651; R. M. Grant,
Gnosticism and Early Christianity, pp. 46-51; Duchesne-Guillemin, Western
Response, pp. 86-101.
Apocryphon ofJohn, it is related that Sophia (ic. Wisdom) gave

birth to a monstrous being, which had the form of a serpent and a
lion; its name was Jaldabaéth.1 In turn this Jaldabadth creates a
number of beings, including the seven planets to rule the heavens.”
He is also described as proclaiming that he was the sole lord of
the universe.? Later, it is related that he took counsel with his
daemonic assistants, and ‘they caused Heimarmené (Destiny) to
come into being, and they bound the gods of the heavens, the
angels, daemons, and men by means of measure, epochs and
times, so that all came within (Heimarmené’s) fetter, who is lord
over all’.¢ On certain Gnostic gems Jaldabaéth is depicted with
the head of an ass or pig, and he is closely associated with another
Gnostic being, Ja6, who is portrayed as the demiurge, with the
head of a cock and with serpents constituting his lower limbs.®
This symbolism is so close to that employed in the Mithraic repre-
1°... Sie (Sophia) sah es aber in ihrer Erwigung, dass es vom Geprige eines
anderen Aussehens geworden war, da es von Schlangen-und Léwen-Aussehen
wat’ (Apocryphon ofJohn, 37.18-38.1), trans. W. C. Till in Evangelien aus dem
Nilsand (by W. C. van Unnik, p. 195, cf. p. 86). With the mention ofthe name
Jaldabaéth (38.13-14), this being is also called the ‘first archon’. The meaning
or derivation of ‘Jaldabadth’ remains obscure. According to Hilgenfeld
(Ketzergeschichte des Urchristenums, pp. 238, 243), it derived from nIn2 x79,
‘offspring of chaos’. J. Doresse (The Secret Books of the Egyptian Gnostics, pp.
174-5) cites a Coptic text that translates the name as ‘the child who traverses
places’, which he interprets as a gloss on the name of Samael, the Jewish ‘angel
of death’. H.-C. Puech cites Ibn an- Nadim’s account of the teaching of Mani,
in which Satan is described as having a lion’s head, and a serpent’s body; he is
winged, and has the tail of a great fish and four feet like those of creeping
animals (in Satan, p. 140, cf. his Le Manichéisme, p. 75). Itis perhaps not without
significance that the hostile Pharisee at the beginning of the Apocryphon ofJohn
is named “Arimanios’; see Till’s note 1 on p. 214.
2 Apocryphon ofJohn 39.6-42.10 (in op. cit., pp. 196-7).
3 ‘Ich bin ein eifersiichtiger Gott; ausser mir gibt es keinen’, 44.14-15 (in
Op. cit., p. 198).
4 72.3-10 (in op. cit., p. 198, cf. pp. 88-9). Cf. Puech in Man and Time, pp.
71-2; Bidez-Cumont, II, p. 244, n. 3; J. Zandee in Numen, X1 (1964), p. 29.
5 Doresse, pp. 162, n. 30, 166. See Fig. 2.
* Doresse, pp. 93-4, ill. 4; E. A. W. Budge, The Mummy, pp. 331-2, plate
xxiv; Grant, pp. 48-57. See also on the “Abraxas-Kosmogonie’ R. Reitzen-
stein, Die hellenistischen Mysterienreligionen, pp. 216-20, 359-60.
TIME AS DEITY Si
Fig. 2
Jaldabaéth
(fom an engraved
Gnostic gem)
sentation of “Time of the long Dominion’ that there can be little

ground for doubting that the Gnostics associated the creator and
ruler of this world with Time, conceived as a malevolent and des-
tructive force. This inference is actually confirmed by the Christian
writer Irenaeus in his account of the doctrine of the Marcosians,
who were the disciples of a distinguished Gnostic teacher, Valen-
tinus: ‘In addition to these things, they declare that the Demiurge,
desiring to imitate the infinitude, and eternity, and immensity,
and freedom from all measurement by time of the Ogdoad above,
but, as he was the fruit of defect, being unable to express its per-
manence and eternity, had recourse to the expedient of spreading
out its eternity into times, and seasons, and vast numbers of years,
imagining that by the multitude of such times he might imitate
immensity. They declare further, that the truth having escaped
him, he followed that which was false, and that, for this reason,
when the times are fulfilled, his work shall perish.” It is significant
1Trenaeus, Adv. Haer., 1, 17.2; trans. Roberts and Rambaut, p. 74.
also that, in the Christian forms of Gnosticism, the advent of the

Saviour was regarded as having disrupted the courses of the stars
which had hitherto determined the destiny of men.1
The close connection between this personification of Time, as
the ruler of this world, and the stars, which thus finds expression
in Gnosticism and is implied by the symbolism of Mithraism, is
undoubtedly to be traced back to the religious beliefs of ancient
Mesopotamia, and it has a distinct significance for this aspect of
our subject. In the Graeco-Roman world the Chaldeans were the
astrologers par excellence, and the very principle upon which their
pseudo-science was based, namely, that the position of the stars
determined the destiny of men, was tantamount to an assertion
that Time was the supreme arbiter of the affairs of mankind.?
However, despite this well-established reputation, the records of
Mesopotamian religion provide no evidence of an actual deifica-
tion of Time. From an early period the stars were indeed regarded
as ‘the writing of the heavens’, and it was believed that, the earth
being the counterpart of heaven, the celestial phenomena por-
tended what was to happen in the world below.? Nevertheless,
the universe, in its fourfold division, was ruled by a clearly defined
hierarchy of deities, which was still respected even when Marduk,
through the political hegemony of Babylon, was exalted to
universal lordship by the Babylonian theologians. It is, moreover,
to be noted that in the great Babylonian Creation Epic, the so-
called Enuma elish, Marduk assigns their positions in the heavens
to the stars, which is an act surely indicative of his power and
authority over them.® From such beginnings, it would seem that
1 Cf. Puech in Man and Time, p. 61, n. 28.
2Cf. Ed. Dhorme, Les Religions de Babylonie et d’Assyrie, pp. 282-3, 287;
Fr. Cumont, Astrology and Religion among the Greeks and Romans, pp. 16-56;
A.-J. Festugiére, La Révélation d’Hermes Trismégiste, I, pp. 37-44.
3Cf. Dhorme, pp. 283-7; B. Meissner, Babylonien und Assyrien, Il, pp.
400-17. 4 Cf. Brandon, Creation Legends, pp. 91, 96-8, 102-3.
5 Tab. V, 11.1-4, 11-12. Cf. G. Furlani, Miti babilonese e assiri, PP. 95-73
Brandon, Creation Legends, p. 103. Mme M. David, in her study of the Baby-
lonian concept of destiny (Les Dieux et le Destin en Babylonie, p. 23), concludes
that “A aucun moment, dans la religion babylonienne, n’apparait l’image d’un
complet fatalisme’.
TIME AS DEITY 53
the stars (and, through them, Time), came to acquire a deepening
significance, as the arbiters of personal destiny, when the idea of
the zodiac was formulated, for the zodiac is basic to horoscopic
astrology. Reference is first made to the zodiacal belt and to
certain of the constellations about 700 B.c., and a cuneiform text
exists giving the horoscope of a child born on 29 April, 410
B.c.1 An example of a horoscope, clearly attesting the way in
which it was believed that the situation of the planets at the time
of birth determines the lot of the individual concerned, may be
cited which dates from 263 B.c. Thus, after giving a careful des-
cription of the zodiacal position of the sun, moon, Jupiter, Venus,
Mercury, Saturn, and Mars at the moment, it is stated that the
child ‘will be lacking in wealth . . . His food will not satisfy his
hunger. The wealth which he has in his youth will not remain (2).
For thirty-six years he will have wealth. His days will be
fonoiy 4?
Since there does not appear to have been any cult of the stars or
astral speculation in ancient Iranian religion, it would seem that
the association of Zurvan dareghd-chvadhata with astral pheno-
mena in Mithraism and Gnosticism must have derived from Meso-
potamia, undoubtedly in the case of the former when en route from
Iran to the west. In these cults, Time was clearly regarded as the
creator or lord of the heavenly bodies, whose movements thus
determined the fates of men;* however, in other circles, concern
1Cf. H. W. F. Sages, The Greatness that was Babylon, pp. 490-1. See also
Meissner, II, pp. 256-7. Commenting upon the Mesopotamian interest in the
zodiac, Dhorme (p. 82) says, ‘ces astres et ces constellations n’influencaient pas
le culte et n’excitaient pas la dévotion au méme degré que les triades suprémes’.
2 Cf. Saggs, p. 491.
3 Cf. Cumont, Les religions orientales, p. 277, n. 46; Bidez-Cumont, I, p. 64;
Zaehner, Zurvan, pp. 19, 144(F); Duchesne-Guillemin, Zoroastre, p. 96; Ed.
Meyer, Ursprung und Anfange des Christentums, Il, pp. 85-6.
4 Although recorded in a ninth century a.D., Pahlavi book, the following
statement is of considerable interest in this context: ‘All the welfare and
adversity that come to man and other creatures come through the Seven and
the Twelve. The twelve signs of the Zodiac . . . are the twelve commanders on
the side of Ohrmazd; and the seven planets are said to be the seven commanders
on the side of Ahriman. And the seven planets oppress all creation and deliver
it over to death and all manner of evil: for the twelve signs of the Zodiac and
E
$4 HISTORY, TIME AND DEITY
about the significance of the stars could lead to forms of inter-

pretation that contained little apparent reference to Time itself.
Thus in Stoicism, the inevitability of sidereal movement inspired
the concept of *Avdéyxn, which was essentially the principle of
impersonal determinism,! while elsewhere the planets could be
venerated as gods® or be regarded, as they were most notably by
the Apostle Paul, as the daemonic rulers of the world who held
mankind enslaved and whose hold could only be broken by a
signal act of intervention by a transcendental deity.
Before we turn to consider the legacy of the other form of the
Iranian deification of Time, we may briefly notice what seems to
have been a personification of the grimmer aspect of Time in pre-
Islamic Arabia. We may take as a sure starting point a passage in
the Qur'an, in which Muhammad is represented as condemning
the beliefs of his opponents, which in turn must mean beliefs al-
ready existent in Arabia: “They say: “There is nothing but this
present life of ours; we die and we live, and it is only Time which
destroys us.” ’* This apparent hypostatization of Time is attested
by other evidence. The early poets frequently allude to the action
of Time (dahr, zaman), often equating it apparently with Destiny.
Thus Time is depicted as a kind of personalized entity determining
a man’s fate: “Time has brought woe upon him, for the days and
the (allotted) measure (qadar) have caused him to perish.’ In
describing the effects of old age, one poet uses the rare word ‘aud
for ‘Time’: “The arrows of “Aud have pierced my limbs and
the seven planets rule the fate of the world and direct it’ (Menok i Khrat, viii, x
trans. Zaehner, Zurvan, pp. 158, 369).
1Cumont, Astrology and Religion, pp. 84-9; R. Bultmann, Urchristentum im
Rahmen der antiken Religionen, pp. 163-73.
*Cumont, Astrology and Religion, pp. 66-8; Bidez-Cumont, II, pp. 272,
274, n. 10; Festugiére, I, pp. 95-7; A. Dieterich, Eine Mithrasliturgie, pp. 69-75.
3 Galatians iv. 3-4, 8-11; Colossians ii. 8, 20; I Corinthians ii. 6-8. Cf. M.
Dibelius in R.A.C., I, 631-3; Festugiére, I, pp. 89-96; Bultmann, pp. 198-9;
Brandon, Man and his Destiny, pp. 213-106.
4 Surah xlv. 23-4. W. Montgomery Watt (Free Will and Predestination in
Early Islam, p. 31, n. 23) cites a Tradition in which Allah is identified with Time.
® Quoted from Th. Néldeke in E.R.E., I, p. 66rb. Cf. R. A. Nicholson, A
Literary History of the Arabs, p. 19 (‘The Ballad of the Three Witches’).
TIME AS DEITY 55
joits’, while the imprecation is found: ‘I swear by the blood (of

the sacrifices) that flows round ‘Aud’. The implication of these
last words, that “Aud was actually a deity with a cultus, is con-
firmed by the statement of Ibn al-Kalbi, that ‘Aud was an idol
worshipped by the Bani Bakr b. Wa’il, a tribe of the north-
eastern part of Arabia.? The fact that Time, in its destructive as-
pect, was deified in this area of the country, might be significant;
for its comparative proximity to Persia, as well as the fact of
Persian suzerainty in Arabia during the sixth century a.p., could
mean that some knowledge of the Persian conception of Zurvan
dareghd-chvadhata might have been passed on to the Arabs, which
would undoubtedly have stimulated their innate tendency to
fatalism.?
The other form of Time, personified by the Persians as Zurvan

akarana, ‘Infinite Time’, and identified with the supreme deity,
was destined, under the names of Kronos or Aion, to have a
notable career in the world of Graeco-Roman culture. Thus, at
both Byblos and Berytos, Zurvan, as Kronos, was venerated as
the divine founder and patron of the city;* at Alexandria, in early
Ptolemaic times, under the name of Aidn, he was associated with
the older state gods, Sarapis-Helios and Agathos-Daimon, and, in
due course, by virtue of his eternal nature, he became the tutelary
of the great city that claimed itself to be eternal.' It would appear
that in Alexandria, also, a curious conception of Time came to be
held, which may have had its roots in native Egyptian tradition,
and is reminiscent of the main idea underlying the annual New
1 Cf, Noldeke in E.R.E., I, p. 662a.
2 Ibid. Cf. G. Ryckmans in H.G.R., IV, p. 311b.
3Cf, W. Montgomery Watt in E.I. (new ed.), Ill, pp. 94-5, Free Will,
pp. 20-2. For the more metaphysical conceptions of Time in later Islam see
L. Massignon in Man and Time, pp. 108-14. Cf. Brandon, Man and his Destiny,
pp. 241-3.
4 Cf. H. Sasse in R.A.C., I, 195; Nilsson, II®, p. 502; A. D. Nock in H.T.R.,
XXVII (1934), p. 86. See also Cumont, Les religions orientales, pp. 120-1, 269,
n. 109.
5 Cf. SasseinR.A.C., I, 195-6; R. Pettazzoni, Studies in the History ofReligions,
pp- 171-3.
Year festival at Babylon. Each year, on the night of 5-6 January,

the birth of Aidn was celebrated.1 The contradiction of concept
implied is so-obvious, namely, that the god of eternity could be
annually born, that some esoteric idea must have been involved.
What that idea was may be assumed with some confidence. Since
it was possible to conceive both of an unique aidéy as Eternity, and
a series of aidvec, it seems reasonable to suppose that such a
festival was based on the idea of Eternity continually being re-
newed or perpetuated in an unending series of aidves.?
The association of Aidn with Sarapis raises an interesting ques-
tion whether, and in what manner, the native Egyptians deified
Time or ascribed it as an attribute to a specific deity. From the
New Kingdom period, they had used an ideogram, heh, com-
prising the kneeling figure of a man, crowned with the symbol for
‘year’ and holding in each hand a measuring stave, which signified
‘millions of years’, being thus tantamount to eternity. However,
the figure did not represent a personification of eternity or in-
finite Time. The only personifications proper of Time seem to
have been the decan-stars and the hour-gods; but, although the
former were connected with fate through their astrological signi-
ficance? and the latter had a considerable importance in the
1 Cf. Sasse, op. cit., 196; Pettazzoni, ibid.; Cumont, Les religions orientales,
p. 286, n. 108. In a magical papyrus quoted by Reitzenstein (p. 177), a supremely
transcendent deity is addressed as 6 xatijg tod nadwyevots Aidvoc. Reitzenstein
comments (n. 1) on the passage: ‘Die Fortsetzung weicht weit ab und ist
stirker agyptisiert.’ Cf. Nock in H.Th.R., XXVII, pp. 84, 90-8.
2 Cf. Sasse, ibid. See also M. Eliade, Le mythe de l’éternel retour, pp-
127-36. On the myth of the Phoenix in this connection cf. Nilsson, II,
p- 505.
° Wb., Ill, p. 153. The figure was used as an amulet signifying unending time
(cf. Budge, The Mummy, p. 267). A beautiful representation of heh appears on
the cedar chair of Tut-Ankh-Amon; cf. A. Piankoff, The Shrines of Tut-Ankh-
Amon, pp. 14-15, and Plate 4. The expression m hh pn n mnpt (‘in this million of
years’) is found, the sign hh being shown without the measuring staves, since
these are denoted by mpwt; cf. A. H. Gardiner, Egyptian Grammar, p. 194. See
Fig. 3:
“Cf. Bonnet, Reallexikon, pp. 153b-155a; W. Gundel, Dekane und Dekan-
sternbilder, pp. 3-14; O. Neugebauer, The Exact Sciences in Antiquity, pp. 81-3,
90.
Egyptian figure representing millions of years or unending Time
(depicted on a chair of Tut-Ankh-Amon).
Osirian mortuary ritual,’ neither assumed any notable réle in the
Egyptian Weltanschauung. On the other hand, while great deities,
such as Isis and Thoth, were regarded as having dominion and
control of Time,? none was exclusively a personification of Time.
There are, however, some curious indications that in Egypt a ten-
dency may have existed to personify Time:in its more sinister
aspect, thus corresponding to the Iranian evaluation of Time in
the figure of Zurvan dareghd-chvadhata. For example, an Oxyr-
hynchos papyrus of the third century a.p. refers to a ‘yeveb Ai
106 Kodvov 6206 weyiotov’ (‘a birthday festival of Kronos, the
ereatest god’). The cult of this Kronos, moreover, was closely
connected with that of Sarapis, whose image at Alexandria,
according to Macrobius, was accompanied by an image of a three-
headed monster. These three heads had, on the poet’s interpreta-
tion, each a temporal significance. The central head, that of a lion,
represented Time present (praesens tempus), because, situated be-
tween the past and the future, by its immediacy it constituted
reality. The head to the left was that of a wolf; it signified Time
past (praeteritum tempus), since the memory of past events is
swallowed and destroyed. The head on the right side was of a
fawning dog (canis blandientis), and it symbolized future Time
(futurum tempus), which lures men forward with vague hopes.4
Whether this allegorical interpretation be the invention of Macro-
1 Cf. Bonnet, Reallexikon, pp. 753b-754a; ‘Jede Stunde wird in einer Gottin
personifiziert; denn das Wort ftir Stunde ist weiblichen Geschlechts.’
2 Isis announces herself to Lucius as ‘rerum naturae parens, elementorum
omnium domina, saeculorum progenies initialis’, Apuleius, Metamorphoses,
XI. 4. Cf. Bonnet, Reallexikon, p. 330. On Thoth as ‘lord of time’ see P.
Boylan, Thoth, pp. 83-7; Bonnet, pp. 807b-808a. Ptah was also nb rnp .wt (‘lord
of the years’), cf. M. Sandman-Holmberg, The God Ptah, pp. 178-82. For the
identification of the sun-god with Aidn in Egypt cf. Nock in H.Th.R., XXVIIL,
pp. 75-8, 84; Pettazzoni, pp. 176-7.
3P. Oxy. 1025, in Select Papyri, ed. A. S. Hunt and C. C. Edgar, vol. ii,
no. 359.
4 Macrobius, Sat. i, 20, 13. Cf. Pettazzoni, pp. 164-70; Bilderatlas zur
Religionsgeschichte (9-11. Lieferung, hrg. J. Leipoldt), Abb. 13, pp. iv-v. See
also Manetho, Fr. 80, Loeb ed., p. 194. Cf. the formula: Zeds jw, Zed zor,
Zev; éooeta, & peydde Zedc. Cf. Nilsson, Il?, p. 504. See above p. 30,
Zhe 1.
TIME AS DEITY 59
bius, or implicit in the original design of the image of the triceps

animans and generally known, the fact of the existence of such an
image, in association with that of Sarapis, is truly significant. For
Sarapis seems in origin to have been a chthonian deity, connected
with or derived from Osiris,! and he was, as we have just noted,
associated with Kronos, who was often equated with Chronos,
i.e. Time.” It is, moreover, notable that Plutarch, in his tractate
entitled De Iside et Osiride, records that the Egyptian mortuary-god,
Anubis, who was closely associated with Osiris, was identified
by some people (évioug 68 doxet) with Kronos.? This complex
of interrelations may be significant of a tendency, in Hellenistic
Egypt, to connect Time with death in a personified form.
For Anubis, represented according to Egyptian iconographic
tradition, with a dog’s or jackal’s head, was pre-eminently the
psychopompos, and, from this office of guiding souls to the next
world, it would seem that he came to be regarded as a personifi-
cation of death.* His appearance was sinister; for he was imagined
as black or dark blue in colour, and the implied ferocity of his dog’s
or jackal’s head strikingly parallels the lion’s head of the Mith-
raic representations of “Time of the long Dominion’.*If this inter-
pretation be sound, we should have an interesting example of a
gradual transition of concept in regard to Time in ancient Egypt.
Commencing, it would appear, with no particular preoccupation
with the significance of Time, beyond its duration in terms of
personal life, Egyptian thought seems perhaps gradually to have
associated Time with death. Whether this was due to the gradual
democratization of the royal mortuary ritual, whereby all who
had the necessary means could interest themselves in the Osirian
1 Cf. Bonnet, Reallexikon, pp. 649a-655a; H. Idris Bell, Cults and Creeds in
Graeco-Roman Egypt, pp. 19-22.
2 Cf. Pettazzoni, p. 178. See above, p. 47.
3 De Is. et Os. 44 (Moralia 368E).
4.C£ Brandon, ‘The Personification of Death in some Ancient Religions’,
in B.J.R.L., 43 (1961).
5 See the representations of Anubis on certain linen shrouds of the Roman
period studied by S. Morenz in Forsuchungen und Berichte (Staatliche Museen zu
Berlin), I (1957), pp. 52-70. See also the amulets illustrated in Bilderatlas (9.-11.
Lief.), Abb. 68, 69, 76, 79; chp. x: See’ Plates.
eschatology, or whether it was a reflection of that consciousness

of the decay of Egypt’s culture which finds such eloquent ex-
pression in the Hermetic literature,2 cannot be determined. It is
possible, also, that extraneous influences may have played some
part. As we have seen, the concept of Infinite Time under the
form of Aidn seems to have derived ultimately from Persia: such
a view of Time may have served to stimulate awareness of Time’s
other aspect, and to lead in turn to its personification—influenced
perhaps by knowledge of the Mithraic portrayal of Zurvan
daregho-chvadhata.
From Alexandria, in the first century B.c., the concept of Aion
came to Rome, where it was easily assimilated with the old
Roman idea of Time that finds expression in the double-faced
deity, Janus. It was a concept, too, that lent support to the
developing mystik concerning Rome’s imperial destiny, in the
twofold sense of the aeternitas populi Romani and the aeternitas
imperii.2 As Aeternitas, it was visualized, as on the base of the
column of Antoninus Pius, in the form of an heroic male figure,
nude, with the majestic wings of an eagle, and holding in its left
hand a globe encircled by serpents. When conceived in such
allegorical form, it may, however, be questioned whether Time
had any really effective réle in the Roman Weltanschauung.
In Gnostic speculation, the concept of Aidn underwent a
strange metamorphosis. It ceased to represent Infinite Time in the
1 See Herodotus’ account (II, 78) of the ‘memento mori’ custom observed
at Egyptian banquets. Cf. Brandon, Man and his Destiny, pp. 57-68.
2 “Futurum tempus est, cum adpareat Aegyptios incassum pia mente divini-
tatem sedula religions seruasse’, Asclepius 24, in Corpus Hermeticum (ed2 ASL):
Nock and A.-J. Festugiére), II, p. 327. Cf. Ph. Derchain in R.H.R., CLXI
(1962), pp. 187-96.
3 Representations of the Mithraic lion-headed monster have been found in
Egypt; cf. Pettazzoni, Plate viii, pp. 184-6.
* Cf. Sasse in R.A.C., I, 197. Commenting upon this identification of Janus,
K. Latte (Romische Religionsgeschichte, p. 136, n. 2) writes: ‘die alten Rémer
diesen Zeitbegriff nicht kannten’.
° Cf. Sasse in R.A.C., I, 197-200; Kleine Pauly, 1 (1962), 104; Latte, p. 323.
6 See G. Bendinelli, Compendio di Storia dell’ Arte etrusca e romana, Pp. 324,
fig. 249. Cf. Nock in H.Th.R., XXVII, pp. 85-6. See Plate vi.
eeVICR CAS ea) EllsYa 61
transcendental sense, as with the Persians, which might have

caused it to be equated with the highest form of deity. Instead, in
the Corpus Hermeticum, it was conceived as a quasi-personified
entity, standing next to God in an hierarchy of metaphysical ab-
stractions from cosmic phenomena. In terms of the revelation
made to Hermes Trismegistos, God (ed) makes (zovet) Aion,
and Aién makes (zovez) the World (xdoyov). In turn, xdop0¢
makes Time (Xgévov), and Time makes ‘becoming’ (yéveow).1 In
a consequent definition of the natures of these entities, it is signi-
ficant that change (wetafodrj) characterizes Time, while from
‘becoming’ (tio yerécewc) are derived life and death—the latter
derivation being notably reminiscent of the Buddhist ‘Chain of
Causation’.? This demotion of Aidn, from divine supremacy to
the status of chief agent of God, seems to point the way to the
general Gnostic usage of the term in the plural to denote a series
of daemonic beings or abstract entities between the supreme deity
and the material world.? This transformation of the idea of Aion,
as the personification of Infinite Time or Eternity, was un-
doubtedly facilitated, as we have already noticed, by the idea of
Aidn’s perpetually renewing itself in a series of aidveg.4
Since Christianity, true to its Hebraic heritage, could not deify
Time, but only equate it as an aspect of divine activity, Time came
to assume, as we shall see, a very different significance in the
Christian thought, i.e. in its official formulation. It is not without
interest, however, that, in what might be termed Christian folk-
lore, Time gradually acquired a character similar to that of the
Persian concept of “Time of the long Dominion’, i.e. as a per-
sonification of the force that brings old age and death to men.
Possibly as a result of the awful experience of the Black Death,
from about the end of the fourteenth century medieval European
1 Corpus Hermeticum, XI. 2 (ed. Nock-Festugiére, I, p. 147). Cf. Festugiére,
La révélation d’Hermes Trismégiste, IV, pp. 166-75.
2 rod 68 Xodvov % petaBodn: tio 68 yevécews 7) Cor xai Odvatoc, ibid. Cf.
Brandon, Man and his Destiny, pp. 338-9, and below, p. 103.
3 Cf Sasse in R.A.C., I, 201-2; Grant, Gnosticism and Early Christianity, pp.
$1-4, 109-110; Puech in Man and Time, p. 82.
4 See p. 56, above.
life shows a deepening preoccupation with death, and one that was
productive of a morbid imagery.1 Death came to be personified
as an animated skeleton; in a woodcut, dating from 1514, it is
depicted armed with a scythe and axe, and discharging its fatal
arrows at its victims.? Although in such a representation there is
no overt reference to Time, the scythe, as we shall see, has a sig-
nificance in this connection. In scenes from the ‘Dance of Death’,
which derive from Holbein, an association of Death with Time is
clearly indicated: the figure of Death, that seizes the young queen
or summons the preacher, holds an hour-glass.* Even more strik-
ing is the celebrated engraving of Albrecht Diirer, dating also
from 1514, of ‘the Knight, Death and the Devil’. Death, here
mounted on a grisly horse, holds the hour-glass and is entwined
about the neck by a serpent.*
Such representations are essentially medieval in spirit, and they
indicate that, while Death was connected with Time in men’s
minds, the emphasis was clearly upon Death and all that it sig-
nified in terms of medieval eschatology. A change of conception
reveals itself, however, in Renaissance art, inspired as it was by
classical traditions. By way, so it would seem, of astrology,
Saturn came to inspire the idea of Father Time, conceived as an
aged man, winged, and bearing scythe and hour-glass, emblems
of his activity in cutting short the brief span of the individual’s
1Cf. G. G. Coulton, Mediaeval Panorama, pp. 493-5, 501-4; J. Huizinga,
Autunno del Medio Evo, pp. 184-201; L. Stone, Sculpture in Britain: The Middle
Ages, pp. 213-16.
2 See J. Nohl, The Black Death, p. 23 (Figura Mortis: anonymous woodcut
from Geiler von Kaisersperg’s Sermones, 1514).
3 Cf. T. Tindall Wildridge, The Dance of Death, p. 17; Hans Holbein, Bilder
des Todes (Insel-Biicherei, Leipzig, 1950): the hour-glass is shown in twenty-
two of the illustrations. A significant example of the continuation of the
primitive Christian equation of the Devil with Death is to be seen in the
sculptured representation of the Legend of St. Theophilus at Souillac: cf. E.
Male, L’art religieux du XIIe siécle en France, p. 371, see also pp. 433-4. See
Plate vii.
4 Cf. L. Eckenstein, Diirer, p. 139. In the lesser known woodcut of ‘Death
and the Landsknecht’, dated 1510, the hour-glass appears; T. D. Barlow,
Woodcuts of Albrecht Diirer, No. 81 (Penguin Books, London, 1948). See Plate
vill.
Pate VII
The Dance of Death
(after Holbein)
In these scenes Death takes the Queen

(above) and the Soldier (right). Death
is depicted, according to medieval
tradition, as a skeleton armed with a
dart; however, the addition of the
hour-glass indicates the connection
with Time.
é
u4
Prate VIII. The Knight, Death and the Devil (A. Diirer)
In this engraving, Death has its medieval form; but, by its menacing presentation
of the hour-glass to the Knight, it is virtually a personification of Time.
TIME AS DEITY 63
life.t The figure has become traditional in Western culture; but it

remains essentially an allegorical creation, without the emotive
power of the medieval personification of Death.
More impressive, and interesting also in attesting the develop-
ment of a similar imagery in an alien cultural tradition, is the
picture of Time given by the Persian poet Firdausi (c. a.p. 935-
1020); it is a picture in which we may perhaps catch some recol-
lection of Zurvan dareghd-chvadhata: ‘Concerning the desert and
that man with the sharp scythe, and the hearts of moist and dry
are in terror of him; moist and dry alike he mows down, and if
thou make supplication, he hears thee not. This is the wood-
cutter Time, and we are like the grass. Alike to him is the grand-
son, alike to him the grandsire: he takes account of neither old nor
young; whatever prey comes before him, he pursues. Such is the
nature and composition of the world that save for death no
mother bore a son. He enters in at one door and passes out through
another: Time counts his every breath.”
Seen in its historical context, the equation of Time with deity

appears to be most characteristic of Indo-Iranian thought. Such an
equation represents a realistic evaluation of man’s experience of
the universe, particularly in its ambivalence; for Time is experi-
enced as both a creative and a destructive force. The existence and
relation of these two aspects of Time are intrinsically difficult to
account for both mythologically and metaphysically. They can
be regarded only as either opposing or as being complementary
to each other, and these alternative views have found expression,
as we have seen, in the historic mythologies concerned. However,
owing perhaps to man’s innate instinct for the assurance of ul-
timate personal security, the dualistic Weltanschauungen, which
have logically followed from such realistic evaluation of Time,
have never been consistently dualistic. Some goal has always been
1Cf. E. Panofsky, Studies in Iconology, pp. 73-4, 77, 82, Plates xxi-xl;
J. Seznec, La Survivance des Dieux Antiques, Plates xxii (45), xxix (6r),
xxx (64), xxxii (67). See Plate ix.
2 Sahnameh, trans. from the trans. of J. Mohl in R. C. Zaehner, Zurvan,
pp. 445-6.
envisaged beyond the reach of Time the Destroyer—hence Time,

so envisaged, is defined as being only of ‘long’ not of ‘ultimate’
Dominion, and above it is Infinite Time, in the security of which
man hopes that he may rest at last. In the Hindu forms of this
dualism, a similar hope is entertained, although, as we shall see in
the next chapter, the solution is found in a metaphysical theory
concerning the illusory nature of empirical Time.
CHAPTER FOUR
Time as the ‘Sorrowful Weary Wheel’

and as Illusion
N {AN’S time-consciousness generates within him, as we have

oted, a profound sense of insecurity. In his attempt to con-
trol Time by ritual magic or to propitiate it through worship as
the deity supreme, we have seen two significant reactions in which
the urgent personal challenge of Time has been faced. The
dynamic in each instance has been the individual’s awareness of
Time’s threat to his own existence and well-being within the
private world of his own experience; for the impact of Time is
essentially personal, even when we anticipate its more serious
aspects by observing its ravages among the older of our fellow-
men. However, in almost all communities, both primitive and
sophisticated, a tradition about the longer-term (i.e. beyond the
span of an individual’s lifetime) consequences of Time’s process is
gradually built up, and it becomes a cause of further reactions in
both personal and communal life. In other words, owing to man’s
powers of communication, Time generally acquires a significance,
and poses problems, over and above those which derive from his
own experience of it. Accordingly, in the various cultural tradi-
tions of mankind, Time has been evaluated not only in terms of
its significance for the individual, but also in relation to a specific
community, city or people, or even to the human race as a
whole. Although such evaluation might seem rather remote or
academic, the social aspect of Time must not be under-estimated
either as a cultural or religious force, in both the communal and
the personal context, and we must turn now to consider the
various forms in which it has found expression.
Before we can enter upon our own investigation of the relevant
data, we must, however, take account of an interpretation of
65
mankind’s reaction to Time that has recently commanded, and justly
so, much attention and has won wide acceptance. In 1947 Professor
Mircea Eliade published, under the title of Le Mythe de l’Eternel
Retour, the thesis that mankind, impelled by Ia terreur de histoire,
has sought by various devices to free itself from the definitive
character of historical event by assuming that return can be made
to an idyllic beginning of things.1 He accordingly posits for the
primitive mind a twofold conception of Time, namely, ‘le temps
sacré’ and ‘le temps profane’. The former constitutes a Golden
Age, which was usually imagined as having existed at the creation
of the world; the ‘temps profane’ connotes a declension from this
happy primeval state, and it is characterized by actions and ex-
periences that are evil and painful—Thistoire’ is the record of the
duration of this doleful state of being. Distinguishing thus between
two forms of Time, Professor Eliade believes that primitive
peoples sought to accomplish a ‘régénération périodique du temps’
by a New Year ritual. The rites concerned were designed to renew
or repeat the original act of creation, and they had the virtue of
wiping out the past, with all its misdeeds and misfortunes, and in-
augurating a fresh beginning, a new era, in the life of the com-
munity and ofits members. This idea of the perpetual renewing of
the primeval situation either inspired, or was inspired by, a view
of the temporal process as being cyclic in its movement. In terms
of this belief and its ritual implementation, Professor Eliade main-
tains that the primitive peoples thought that the definitive nature
of Time or History could be negated, since the ‘éternel retour’ to
a pristine beginning broke the entail of past sins or ill luck.2 We
shall have occasion presently to notice some of the further ramifi-
1 For other statements of Eliade’s thesis see his Traité d’Histoire des Religions,
PPp- 332-49; ‘Structure et fonction du mythe cosmogonique’, in Sources orientales,
I, pp. 447-95.
* “Cette conception d’une création périodique, c’est-a-dire de la régénéra-
tion cyclique du temps, pose le probléme de l’abolition de l’histoire . . .’, Le
mythe de l’éternel retour, p. 86, cf. pp. 64-5, 80, 100. Eliade, understandably,
makes reference to works of the ‘Myth and Ritual’ school, on which cf.
S..Giks Brandon inMyth, Ritual and Kingship (ed. S. H. Hooke),pp. 261-91.
On the idea of a “temps sacré’, see G. van der Leeuw, La religion, pp. 375-9;
L’Homme primitif et la religion, pp. 96-100, 214.
THE ‘SORROWFUL WEARY WHEEL’ 67
cations of Professor Eliade’s theory, particularly as it relates to the
Indian conception of Time. But now we must turn to investigate
the relevant material concerning the views about the long-term
significance of Time held by earliest literate societies, and by so
doing we shall be able to judge to what degree Professor Eliade’s
interpretation appears to be sound.
Commencing our enquiry with the evidence of ancient
Egyptian culture, we are at once impressed by the apparent desire
to make permanent records of their activities manifested both by
kings and private persons in Egypt. Far from Egyptian archaeo-
logy attesting a ‘terreur de l’histoire’, it shows us that this ancient
people rejoiced in the definitive nature of historic event and was
greatly concerned that the memory of what were deemed to be
notable achievements should not be lost. This concern finds ex-
pression very early: thus at the beginning of the dynastic period
(c. 3100 B.c.) the achievements of the so-called Scorpion king and
king Narmer are recorded in pictorial-symbolic imagery respec-
tively on ceremonial mace-heads and palettes. In the so-called
Palermo Stone we have most impressive evidence of the interest
which the pharaohs of the Fifth Dynasty (c. 2400 B.c.) had in
preserving the memory of their predecessors. This monument,
which commences with a list of predynastic rulers, records the
names, the regnal years, and the chief events that occurred during
their respective reigns, of each pharaoh of the preceding dynasties.
The events recorded are, moreover, not limited to royal exploits:
matters of economic significance are noted such as the census of
cattle and height of the Nile’s inundation above an arbitrary zero
level—a fact indicating the existence of graded Nilometers in pre-
dynastic times and a concomitant concern to preserve a record of
this annual phenomenon upon which the economic life of Egypt
essentially depended.? From the point of view of our present
1Cf. A. H. Gardiner, Egypt of the Pharaohs, pp. 379-407, see also plates
xix-xxii; W. B. Emery, Archaic Egypt, figs. 3, 4, 5, 10, 12, 20-3, 37; plates 1,
2a; L. Bull, in LH.A.N.E., pp. 12-15; Ed. Meyer, Gesch. d. Altertums, I, ii,
pp- 127-32.
2 Cf. Gardiner, pp. 62-4, 408, cf. plate iii; E. Drioton-J. Vandier, L’Egypte,
pp- 157-8; Bull, p. 15.
interest, we may also note that the Palermo Stone is the earliest in a
long series of monuments recording the names and achievements
of the kings of Egypt down to the end of the native dynastic
period (343 B.c.), while the history which the priest Manetho
wrote of his people’s past shows that in the Ptolemaic period both
the interest and the material existed for such an extended survey
of the past.1
Such records of the past clearly attest a belief in the unique and
definitive nature of the events thus commemorated, as well as the
conviction that the memory of them was worth preserving. Even
when, as is often done, the pharaoh attributes his success to the
favour of a patron god, the historic significance of the event is
emphasized. Moreover, it is evident that as the Egyptian, at any
specific period, looked back over the past, he envisaged the
sequence of events as a linear extension backwards.? There is no
hint of a repetitive cycle of events, an ‘éternel retour’ to some
primeval situation, such as Professor Eliade conceives. The
Egyptians did indeed imagine a kind of primeval age, which they
called the ‘first time’; but it is not certain whether they regarded
it as constituting an idyllic situation, and there is no evidence that
they desired to return to it.
The records, which we have been considering, may be desig-
nated official or state records of the past, and, lest it might be
thought that the ‘terreur de Vhistoire’ would not be reflected in
such public accounts, we may briefly look at the relevant evidence
1Cf. W. G. Waddell in Manetho (Loeb Classical Library), pp. vii-xxvi;
Gardiner, pp. 46-71. Significant in this context is the statement of pharaoh
Shabaka (716-695 B.c.), on the monument that now bears his name, recording
his preservation of a very ancient worm-eaten writing: “(he) copied it anew,
(so that) it was better than its state formerly, in order that his name might
endure and his memorial be made to last in the House of his father Ptah-South-
of-His-Wall in the course of eternity’, in K. Sethe, Dramatische Texte zu
altaegyptischen Mysterienspielen, I, p. 20, 1.2, and p. 21 (h)(i).
* This is very evident from the monumental king-lists, showing the car-
touches of the pharaohs arranged in sequential order from a very early period:
cf. W. M. Flinders Petrie, History of Egypt, I, fic. 4; Bi 3 Bails Ly
Abb. 66 (Der el Medine). See sie Ba presi Seapets
3 Cf. S. G. F. Brandon, Creation Legends of the Ancient Near East, pp. 16,
19, 48-9, ST, 53, 62, 65.
Prate IX. The Exposure of Luxury (Angelo Bronzino), c. 1546
In this famous picture, replete with Renaissance allegory, Time is depicted as a
vigorous old man, winged and bearing his hour-glass. Assisted by his daughter,
Truth, he exposes the dangers attendant on Love or Luxury, represented by Venus
and Cupid. Jealousy, as an elderly woman, tears her hair, rose buds are cast by
Folly, while Deceit, an innocent little girl with a serpent’s body, lurksin the shade.
Reproduced by courtesy of the Trustees, The National Gallery, London.
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OYA SOYINOJLED
JO sTY stossaoapoid
JORG
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THE “SORROWFUL WEARY WHEEL’ 69
as it concerns the outlook of private persons. From the Old King-
dom period (3100-2242 B.c.) onwards, Egyptian tombs abound
in what may be termed autobiographical mortuary inscriptions.
They take the form of a recitation by the deceased of the offices
which he held and the notable deeds which he had accomplished.
In some instances, the recital of virtuous acts was designed to per-
suade those who read the inscription to pronounce a magic for-
mula for the provision of mortuary offerings; but the impression
generally created by such records is rather one of a desire that the
memory of the deceased and his deeds should be for ever pre-
served.! There is evidence also that some Egyptians were interested
in their family pedigrees—a most notable instance of this is a
genealogy of Memphite priests covering sixty-six generations, i.e.
circa 750 B.C. back to 2100 B.c.?
To the witness of this evidence, concerning both public and
private interest in recording the past, we may add that which
attests a certain antiquarian concern: e.g. during the Saite period
(663-525 B.C.) there was a marked archaism in art,? while the
pharaoh Shabaka records how he arranged for the preservation of
the text of an ancient worm-eaten document on the stone now in
the British Museum, and known by his name.*
We see, then, that in ancient Egypt there is no evidence of that
‘terreur de l’histoire’, which Professor Eliade has distinguished as
characterizing the primitive mind. There was indeed, as we have
noticed, concern about the past, and we shall have later to con-
sider certain aspects of its significance; but now we must briefly
examine the culture of ancient Mesopotamia, to see whether
1Cf. J. Ste. Fare Garnot, ‘Les formules funéraires des stéles égyptiennes’,
in H.G.R., I, pp. 331b-332; H. Kees, Totenglauben und Jenseitsvorstellungen der
alten Aegypter, pp. 108-9. On the biographical in Egyptian mortuary art see
H. A. Groenewegen-Frankfort, Arrest and Movement, pp. 75-6, 79, 111. On
the connection between the biographical inscription and the idea of a post-
mortem judgment, cf. Brandon, Man and his Destiny, pp. 51-2.
2 Cf. Bull in .H.A.N.E., pp. 10-11. It may be noted that a similar desire to
preserve records of the past, both concerning the state and private persons,
found expression in ancient China.
8 Drioton-Vandier, pp. 559-63, 589-90; J. A. Wilson, Culture of Ancient
Egypt, pp. 294-6, 308-9. 4 Cf. p. 68, n. 1 above.
F
history was feared there, and whether any attempt was made to
annul it by repetitively restoring a pristine situation through the
annual enactment of a New Year ritual.
When the relevant material is studied, it is soon evident that the
peoples of Mesopotamia had as lively an interest in the past as the
Egyptians, and that they sought to record notable events as
having a definitive significance. Such historical records date back
to the Sumerian period. The so-called Sumerian King List, which
was probably composed in the time of Utu-hegal, king of Uruk,
although containing much fabulous material, presents a sequential
record of the rulers of the various city-states of Sumer, and the
results of their warfare, from a primeval age ‘when kingship was
lowered from heaven’. The sequence is interrupted by a flood,
which was evidently so devastating that the kingship had again to
be lowered from heaven.1 However, it is significant that, although
so signal an event meanta reconstitution of society, it was clearly re-
garded as a disaster and not a hoped-for restoration of a primeval
state.
This Sumerian King List is the earliest document of an abundant
historical literature in which the achievements of the various
rulers of Sumer, Babylon and Assyria are successively recorded.
Many of the documents concerned are grandiloquent accounts,
designed to extol the power and prestige of the monarchs con-
cerned, and often they take the form of declarations in the first
person. However, they all attest a lively appreciation of historical
event and the desire to perpetuate the memory of it.? In addition
ECEeAIN. E:T. pp.205-0:
"See the Babylonian and Assyrian historical texts translated by A. L.
Oppenheim in A.N.E.T., pp. 265-312; cf. H.-G. Giiterbock, “Die historische
Tradition und die literarische Gestaltung bei Babylonien und Hethetern bis
1200’, Zeitschrift fiir Assyriologie, neue Folge, Bd. 8 (Bd. 42), 1934. According
to E. A. Speiser (I.H.A.N.E., p. 56), “Given the theocratic premise and the
long succession of dynasties that had come and gone by the end of the 3rd
millennium, the social philosopher of the Old Babylonian period had every
reason to see the past in terms of recurring cycles.’ Speiser, however, gives no
convincing evidence of this beyond remarking that, ‘each succeeding dynasty
was the instrument whereby the gods displaced the given incumbent’. Cf.
H.-G. Giiterbock in Z.A. 8, neue Folge (1934), pp. 1-62.
to such formal records, there is much other evidence of a deeply
rooted interest in the past. In the construction of temples, Meso-
potamian rulers showed great concern about the preservation of
the foundation cone or nail, on which the record of their pious
act was inscribed, and in later restorations of such buildings these
memorials were diligently sought for and carefully preserved.1
Then, the libraries which were established in temples and palaces,
and from which so much of our knowledge of Mesopotamian
culture has been derived, were intended to conserve records of the
past. One peculiar facet of such conservation is particularly signi-
ficant for us. From the end of the third millennium s.c. omens
were carefully recorded for future reference.2 Now, since the
events concerned were often of a baleful nature, any assumption
of belief in a cyclic recurrence of phenomena would mean belief
also that the éternel retour would bring back disasters as well as
beneficial occasions.?
Mesopotamia, however, does provide the most notable evidence
of the celebration of a New Year ritual, upon which Professor
Eliade has based his theory of the myth of the Eternal Return. He
has maintained that New Year rituals were designed to effect
‘une régénération périodique du temps’ by repeating ritually the
original act of creation that produced the world.* The akitu or
New Year festival at Babylon affords the classic example of such
1Cf. E. Dhorme, Les religions de Babylonie et d’Assyrie, pp. 183-5; H. W. F.
Saggs, The Greatness that was Babylon, pp. 369-70; Speiser in I.H.A.N.E., pp.
46-7.
2 Cf. B. Meissner, Babylonien und Assyrien, IL, pp. 243-7; Dhorme, pp. 272-6,
285-9; Saggs, 320-5.
3 Such cyclic recurrence of phenomena was, of course, implied; but no
inferences concerning the nature of Time were drawn, as Meissner (II, pp.
246-7) emphasizes: ‘Aber dariiber hinaus haben die Gelehrten auch rein
theoretische Konstruktionen vorgenommen. Die Gesichtspunkte, die dabei
massgebend waren, resultierten aus dem Gesetz der gegenseitigen Entspre-
chungen.’ That the Mesopotamians regarded some events as unique is revealed
in a most significant way in the famous Epic of Gilgamesh: the futility of the
hero’s quest for immortality is shown by the uniqueness of the event which led
to Utanapishtim’s immortality; cf. Brandon, Man and his Destiny, p. 93.
4 Te mythe de ’éternel retour, pp. 83-94. Cf. H. and H. A. Frankfort in
LA.A.M., pp. 23-4.
a ritual, and our information about it has been the chief source
from which the so-called ‘Myth and Ritual’ theory, upon which
Professor Eliade very evidently depends, has been constructed. On
cursory reference, the relevant data do appear to offer support to
Professor Eliade on a number of points. Most notably, on two
occasions during the eleven days of the festival, the celebrated
Enuma elish or Creation Epic was liturgically recited by the
urigallu, or chief priest.1 An apparent repudiation of the past was
symbolized by the ritual humiliation of the king, who made a
kind of negative confession or protestation of innocence and sur-
rendered his regalia before the throne of Marduk, the great god of
Babylon. The subsequent restoration to the king of his symbols of
office, and the underlying belief of the festival that Marduk then
decreed the destiny of the state for the ensuing year, might also be
reasonably interpreted as signifying a new and propitious begin-
ning to another annual cycle of existence.? The force of such
apparent confirmation of the theory is, however, negatived by the
fact that the recitation, at this New Year festival, of the Enuma
elish was clearly intended to justify the exaltation of Marduk as
the supreme deity of the universe. Such justification was neces-
sary, since, in terms of the traditional Mesopotamian mythology,
Marduk was not the most ancient of the gods, and was in fact
regarded as the son of the old Sumerian deity Enki or Ea. The
Enuma elish is, accordingly, a piece of apologetic designed by the
Babylonian priesthood to justify theologically the supreme posi-
tion which Babylon had come to acquire politically. Thus, in the
narrative, while it is recognized that Marduk was not the first of
the gods, it is told how he had once saved all the other gods from
destruction, in gratitude for which they had conferred on him all
their authority.* And this was not all; for it is further related that,
Cf. F, Thureau-Dangin, Rituels accadiens, p. 136; S. A. Pallis, The Baby-

lonian Akiti Festival, p. 229; Brandon, Creation Legends, pp. 91-2.
= Cf. Eliade, p. 92; H. Frankfort, Kingship and the Gods, pp. 319-20; E. O.
James, Myth and Ritual in the Ancient Near East, pp. 55-6.
3 Cf. Brandon, Creation Legends, pp. 103-6, 108-9.
4 Enuma elish, Tab. Ill, 116-22; IV, 1-6, 13-14, 19-26. Cf. Brandon, pp.
97-9.
after killing Ti’amat, the primeval monster of chaos who
threatened the gods, Marduk had created the universe from her
body. This act of creation further endorsed Marduk’s authority;
for he had also, in the process, assigned to both the gods and the
stars(the “writing of the heavens’) their places in the heavens.1 We
see, then, that the New Year festival, which was celebrated at
Babylon, far from restoring annually a primeval situation by a
ritual representation of the act of creation, made reference, by
means of a tendentiously composed cosmogony, to certain myth-
ical acts designed to justify theologically the lordship of Marduk
over the traditional pantheon. In other words, what was com-
memorated annually at this festival was the hegemony of Babylon,
and it was done in terms of a liturgical representation of a
(mythical) situation, alleged to have established definitively the
precedence of Babylon’s patron god.?
It has been necessary to examine at some length this aspect of

Professor Eliade’s thesis concerning the myth of the Eternal
Return, because it supplies a different interpretation to the cyclic
conception of Time from that which will be proposed here.
There are other parts of the thesis which we shall have occasion to
utilize presently; for the moment it is sufficient to show that the
evidence available from the two earliest literate cultures of the
ancient world does not endorse the theory that such was the
primitive ‘terreur de l’histoire’ that a return to an idyllic primeval
state was periodically enacted by a ritual technique.
The emphasis laid by Professor Eliade on the importance of the
cyclic conception of Time in evaluating many of the historic
forms of human culture is, however, well based, and for our sub-
ject it has a very great significance. As we noted at the beginning
of this chapter, consciousness of Time not only determines essen-
tially the individual’s attitude to life, but it also produces a tradi-
tional view of its nature and operation. Through membership of
1 Enuma elish, Tab. IV, 141-6; V, 1-4, 11-12. Cf. G. Furlani, Miti babilonese e
assiri, pp. 95-7; Brandon, pp. 102-3.
2 See Brandon, pp. 91-109, and the references there given to the literature
concerned.
74 HISTORY, TIME AN De DELTY,
the community or group into which he is born, the individual

inherits a common memory of the past which may span many
generations. However long or short that span may be, and how-
ever vague and mythical the traditions preserved, the individual
accordingly becomes aware of a period of time that ranges back
far beyond the day of his own birth. He thus realizes that he is part
ofa great process of existence—that innumerable men and women
have lived out their lives before him and that innumerable others
will do so after his death. Such a vision of the stream of life, even
in those little disposed to philosophic reflection, is calculated to
provoke speculation about this mysterious process of coming into
being, of being, and then of ceasing to be. The conclusions that
have been drawn about this long-term aspect of Time, as distinct
from its short-term significance for the individual, constitute,
therefore, a further important field for our enquiry.
Man’s most frequent reminder of the passage of Time is the
succession of day and night, which is in warmer climates marked
by the daily spectacle of the rising and setting of the sun. The suc-
cessive phases of the moon afford a longer termed, and perhaps a
more dramatic, demonstration of temporal sequence, and the
lunar calendar probably represents man’s earliest attempt to
measure the passing of Time by means of a recurrent natural
phenomenon.! The procession of the seasons, and its relation to
the height of the sun’s course above the horizon, provided in the
solar year a still longer unit of measurement, but its apprehension
naturally involved more extended and involved calculations.*
Now, it is evident that constant observation of such phenomena
was likely to give rise to the impression that the passage of Time
is cyclic, i.e. that change manifests itself in a limited succession of
states, and, its movement being circular, that these states or events
perpetually recur. Viewed in this way, Time would inevitably
assume a peculiar significance for both the life of the individual
1 Cf. P. Derchain in Sources orientales, V, pp. 28-9; O. Neugebauer, The
Exact Sciences in Antiquity, p. 82; Eliade, pp. 129-31. It is significant that, in the
Mesopotamian pantheon, the moon-god was regarded as the father of the sun-
god; cf. Dhorme, Les religions de babylonie et d’assyrie, pp. 54-7.
= Cf. Neugebauer, pp. 82-8, 98-103; Sages, pp. 456-9.
and that of the community, or even the race, to which he be-
longed. That it has in fact done so is abundantly attested by the
evidence of many of the historic cultures of mankind, and the
subject has deeply engaged the attention of many scholars—most
recently, as we have just noted, that of Professor Eliade. It would
seem, however, that, in many of these studies, one aspect of the
subject has tended to predominate and so prevent a properly
balanced assessment of the cultural effect of belief in the cyclic
nature of Time. The aspect concerned derives from the basic in-
tuition that, if the pattern of existence is cyclic, human life must
have this form, so that birth, growth, decay and death, are suc-
cessive stages in a recurrent process. This intuition has found ex-
pression in many forms, both primitive and sophisticated, and it
has, understandably, a great intrinsic interest for most people.! In
approaching its study from the point of view of our subject, we
must, however, be careful to evaluate it as one of several reactions
of mankind to the impression that Time, as manifest in the pheno-
mena of change, is cyclic in its movement.
The fact that in the Upper Palaeolithic era the dead were usually
buried in a crouched posture, and not in the extended position
which seems to our minds the more natural, has caused much
speculation among prehistorians and students of comparative
religion. The view has been seriously put forward that burial in
such a posture was inspired by the idea that the dead were laid
back in the womb of Mother Earth for future rebirth—the
crouched position of the body imitating that of the pre-natal
posture of the foetus. Such an idea would, of course, imply some
cyclic conception of life. From what we know of, or may
reasonably deduce from, Palaeolithic culture, such a conception
would not be impossible; for, while there is no contemporary
evidence of interest in the movement of the heavenly bodies, it is
clear that man was then greatly concerned about the phenomenon
of birth or pregnancy, and it is probable that, as a hunter, he was
aware of the recurrence of the breeding season and the migratory
movements of animals. However that may be, it has also to be
noted that alternative explanations can be given for the crouched
1Cf, E. B. Tylor, Primitive Culture, Il, pp. 2-18; E.R.E., XII, pp. 425-40.
position of the corpse—it could indicate belief that the dead were
asleep; it could have a purely utilitarian cause, namely, that a
crouched body needs a smaller grave than one that is extended; it
could, at least in some instances, mean that the corpse had been
trussed up for burial, owing to some fear that the dead might
return to molest the living.
If we could be reasonably certain that this Palacolithic burial
custom implied belief in rebirth, thereby carrying back the begin-
nings of the cyclic conception of life to the very dawn of human
culture, we still would be unable to assess its significance for the
individual. A useful comparison may be made here by reference
to ancient Chinese belief in this connection. The eminent Sinolo-
gist Marcel Granet, from his study of early Chinese folk customs
and institutions, has shown how the deeply rooted conviction of
the basic integrity of the family probably affected the primitive
Chinese Weltanschauung. In the early rural communities it was the
custom for marital intercourse to take place in the south-western
corner of the house. This was the spot where, being furthest from
the light, the seed-corn was stored, while it was also the nearest
point to the place where the family-dead were buried. This juxta-
position of the place of procreation, the seed-corn, and the
family grave, was expressive of the belief that the family stock
(la substance familiale) was eternal and integrated with the earth
upon which the homestead stood, and also with the seed-corn that
came forth and would return to the earth in which the ancestors
lay. Accordingly, at any given moment this substance familiale
existed in two forms: its larger part comprised une masse indistincte
of the ancestors, whose bodies mingled with the earth, through
the fertility of which the living members of the family were
nourished, These living members were the individualized portion
of the common stock. Birth was, consequently, regarded as the
re-incarnation of an ancestor, or, rather perhaps, the emergence
from the earth of a unit of the substance familiale, by means of the
1Cf. E. O. James, Prehistoric Religion, pp. 29-30; H. Breuil and R. Lantier,
Les hommes de la pierre ancienne, pp. 304, 306, 319; Th. Mainage, Les religions
de la Préhistoire, pp. 171-2, 188-9; Brandon, Man and his Destiny, Pp. 9-10,
14-16, 22-3.
marital act. The process, moreover, was one of inter-change: the
new-born replaced a deceased member, who, on death, returned
again to the earth and was resolved back into the masse indistincte
of the family stock. This conception underlay the ancestor-culkt,
and it found symbolic expression in the arrangement of the
memorial tablets in the family shrine—the tablets of grandfather
and grandson were contiguous, not those of father and son.1
This primitive Chinese belief clearly involved some idea of the
passage of Time as cyclic in movement or effect. But the process,
whereby what might be termed the ‘super-terranean’ part of the
family was recurrently replaced, through birth and death, by the
‘sub-terranean’ portion, can only be termed metempsychosis in a
qualified sense. The primitive conception here of the family stock,
and its relation to the earth, suggests that it might afford a closer
parallel to the idea of rebirth that may have inspired the Palaeo-
lithic custom of crouched burials; for it does not involve the
rather sophisticated concept of a non-material soul that passes
through a series of incarnations as in the better known forms of
metempsychosis. We may notice, too, that the ancient Chinese
view of the individual’s life as being essentially integrated in an
impersonal process of cyclic pattern did not produce a desire for
deliverance from it or a negative attitude towards life itself. In-
deed, to the contrary, as is evident in the classic philosophies of
China, the sense of integration with the cosmic process encouraged
a strongly affirmative approach to life and a sense of well-being
that derived from fulfilling one’s réle in the scheme of things as
they are.?
In ancient Egypt it would appear that the spectacle of the cyclic
movement of the cosmic phenomena was actually a source of
comfort, although it did not inspire belief in reincarnation or
1M. Granet, La Religion des Chinois, pp. 22-4, 72-3, 74; Chinese Ci vilization,
pp- 172, 316-17. Cf. Brandon, Man and his Destiny, pp. 359-60. In the ancestral
sacrifices the grandson was virtually regarded as the reincarnation of the
grandfather. Cf. L. Wieger, Hist. of Religious Beliefs in China, pp. 54-5.
2 Cf. Granet, La Pensée chinoise, pp. 116-19, 126, 128 f., 341; H. O. H. Stange
in Anthropologie religieuse, pp. 134, 138; Fung-Yu-Lan, Short History of Chinese
Philosophy, pp. 193-6; Brandon, pp. 356-8, 370-2 (especially on the concept of
Yin and Yang).
metempsychosis. Thus the diurnal course of the sun through the
heavens provided a basic concept of post-mortem security and well-
being. The sun-god was imagined as crossing the sky each day in
his boat, giving light and warmth to the living; then, descending
beneath the western horizon, he was thought to pursue his way
through the underworld, illuminating its darkness, until he arose
once more at the dawning of the next day. This perpetually re-
peatedjourney, instead of inspiring a sense of tedium, represented
to the Egyptians an idyllic existence, untouched by change, decay
or death—hence, from the time of the Pyramid Texts, the hope is
constantly expressed that the deceased will find everlasting felicity
with Re, the sun-god, on his unceasing voyage through the upper
and lower heavens. The same sense of comfort and security from
an unchanging cycle of action or state of being finds expression in
other forms of the Egyptian idea of post-mortem beatitude. Thus,
for example, the deceased sometimes aspires to join the company
of the circumpolar stars, the ‘Imperishable Ones’? while the
original title of the so-called Book ofthe Dead was ‘Chapters of the
Coming Forth by Day’ (prt m hrw), which signified the belief that
the deceased, ritually resurrected and with his faculties restored,
would come to the entrance of his tomb each day to see the sun
and partake of his mortuary offerings—this he hoped to do per-
petually, without any trace of ennui at the prospect of an ever-
lastingly repeated pattern of existence.?
We see, then, from this Egyptian evidence, that the cyclic
movement of certain forms of cosmic phenomena afforded a
sense of stability of being and so provided an inspiring imagery in
which to frame eschatological hopes. But we can also see from our
earlier references to Egyptian thought and practice that it was
possible for this talented people to hold yet other views about
Time, without any apparent sense of incongruity. Thus, in the
practice of the Osirian mortuary ritual it was believed that a
1 Pyr. 365-8. Cf. Bonnet, Reallexikon, pp. 738a-741 (‘Sonnenschiff’); Kees,
Totenglauben, pp. 301-2; Bilderatlas, 2-4. Lief. Abb. 20.
* Pyr. 656. Cf. H. Frankfort, Ancient Egyptian Religion, pp. 100, 103, 106-8.
* Cf. Bonnet, Reallexikon, pp. 826b-827a; A. Moret, ‘Le Livre des Morts’,
in Au Temps des Pharaons, pp. 204-217; Brandon, pp. 45-8.
definitive event of the ancient past could be ritually re-presented,
or perpetuated, so that its original efficacy could be utilized on
each occasion that the ritual was performed.! Their feeling for
antiquity and their recording of the past also suggest that they saw
the sequence of human affairs as extending in a straight line, not-
withstanding their appreciation of its circular aspect when meas-
ured in shorter periods by the movements of the heavenly bodies
or the Nile’s annual inundation.?
Their ability to contemplate Time in a longer perspective than
that of the span of their own individual lives, seems to have
evoked from some ancient Egyptians, who were possibly of a
cynical frame of mind, a feeling of weariness and a sense of dis-
illusionment. Thus, in the so-called Song of the Harper, which was
reputed to have been originally inscribed in the tomb of Antef, a
king of the Eleventh Dynasty (c. 2160-1580 B.c.) and of which
versions have been found in Eighteenth and Nineteenth Dynasty
tombs, both a cynicism about the significance of life and a scep-
ticism about the traditional eschatology find expression:
Generations pass away, and others remain

Since the time of the ancestors.
The gods who lived formerly rest in their pyramids,
The beatified dead also, buried in their pyramids,
And they who built houses—their places are not.
See what has been made of them!
I have heard the words of Ii-em-hotep and Hor-dedef,
With whose discourses men speak so much.
1 See above, pp. 20-5.

2 The Egyptians seem to have equated eternity, hh, with millions of years,
stretching out in an unending sequence; cf. Wérterbuch, Il, p. 299 (hhw m hh),
Ill, p. 153 (bh hr hhw). “Hier und jetzt muss nur erwahnt werden, dass sich die
Worte fiir “Ewigkeit”, nhh und d.t, so gewiss sie im Hinblick auf Grund-
bedeutung und gegenseitiges Verhaltnis wie auch in ihrem denkbaren Bezug
auf riumliche Bereiche neben den zeitlichen der Klarung bediirfen, im Laufe der
igyptischen Geschichte durchaus auf die Zukunft hin, also auf die ewige Dauer
nach vorwirts orientiert haben. Demzufolge steht dem “ersten Male” der
Schépfung das “bis in Ewigkeit” (etwa: r nhh d.t) gegentiber, und das Sein des
Agypters, sofern er religidser Mensch ist, hat einen vom Schépfer gesetzen
Anfang, aber kein Ende’, Morenz, Agypt. Religion, pp. 178-9.
80 HISTORY, LIMEVAN DE DET Y
What are their places (now)?

Their walls are broken apart, and their places are not—
As though they had never been!
There is none who comes back from (over) there,
That he may tell their state,
That he may tell their needs,
That he may still our hearts,
Until we (too) may travel to the place where they have gone.*
The pessimism and sense of futility concerning the efficacy of the

mortuary cultus evident here is understandable. When the ancient
Egyptian of any period contemplated the tombs of his predeces-
sors, the fact was only too obvious, from their ruin, that the
changes wrought by Time brought to nought all human hopes
and endeavour. But it is not only the evidence of Time’s destruc-
tion that inspires the cynicism of this poetry; there is also the
feeling of the purposelessness of human existence when viewed
in the longer perspective of Time. This emerges in another ver-
sion, in which it would appear that the cyclic movement of
phenomena could induce in some minds a sense of despair instead
of security:
Ré showeth himself in the morning, and Atum goeth down in
Manum. Men beget, women conceive, and every nose breatheth
air—day dawneth, and their children go one and all to their places.?
Such cynicism about life’s having any ultimate meaning for either
the individual or society did not, however, as we shall see it doing
in some other cultures, lead the Egyptians to deny either the
reality or value of this life. Instead, it counselled a vigorous ex-
ploitation of life, in an endeavour to wring from it all the joys that
Translated by J. A. Wilson in A.N.E.T., p. 467a; see also A. Erman,

Literature of the Ancient Egyptians, pp. 132-4. For a detailed discussion of these
songs and other related compositions see M. Lichtheim in J.N.E.S., IV (1945),
pp. 191-211; E. F. Wente in J.N.E.S., XXI (1962), pp. 118-28. li-em-hotep
and Hor-dedef were traditional sages of Egypt, who lived in the Old Kingdom
period.
2 Trans. in Erman, Literature, p. 252. The composition dates from the New
Kingdom (1580-1090 B.c.).
THE “SORROWFUL WEARY WHEEL’ 8I
it could offer during its brief span. This carpe diem philosophy is
cloquently recommended in the Song of the Harper:
Follow thy desire, as long as thou shalt live.
Put myrrh upon thy head and clothing of fine linen upon thee,
Being anointed with genuine marvels of the gods’ property.
Set an increase to thy good things;
Let not thy heart flag.
Follow thy desire and thy good.
Fulfil thy needs upon earth, after the command of thy heart,
Until there come for thee that day of mourning.}
We see from this Egyptian evidence that, in one of the two
earliest literate cultures, Time could be regarded in several ways,
according to the particular interest immediately concerned or the
mentality of those making the assessment. In particular, we may
note that the apparent cyclic aspect of the temporal process, as
denoted by the movement of certain cosmic phenomena, was duly
appreciated; but reaction thereto was diverse. To the general mind
the spectacle of a perpetually repetitive pattern of movement in-
spired a sense of security from the menace of change and decay
which the passage of Time entailed; to an apparent minority the
same phenomena, when related to the evidence of the destruction
wrought by Time, revealed the senselessness of history and the
futility of the traditional eschatology, so that a carpe diem attitude
to life seemed the only rational attitude that a man could adopt.
In the sister culture of Mesopotamia the traditional eschatology
precluded any hope of a happy after-life, so that the Weltan-
schauung of the Mesopotamian peoples could provide no ground
for belief that the cruel logic of Time, as it concerned the in-
dividual person, could be surmounted after the manner of that
which inspired the Osirian mortuary cultus.? However, despite
this radical difference, there is one aspect of the Mesopotamian
evaluation of Time that is similar to that which finds expression in
the Egyptian Song of the Harper. As we have already noticed, the
inhabitants of Mesopotamia were interested in preserving records
of the past. They could contemplate the sequence of human affairs
1 Trans. J. A. Wilson in A.N.E.T., p. 467b.
2 Cf. Brandon, Man and his Destiny, pp. 57-68. ° Cf. Brandon, pp. 79-105.
in their land stretching back to the creation and the first establish-
ment of an ordered government. However, as an abundance of
evidence shows, while they sought to ensure for their achieve-
ments a long future, they were aware that Time inevitably brings
decay and ruin. Rulers seem to have taken a realistic view of this
process, and they contented themselves with the hope that their
works would in time be restored by their successors as they had
renovated those of their predecessors.t But it would appear that
many, perhaps ordinary folk, who reflected on the longer per-
spective of Time, were impressed, or rather depressed, by the
apparent senselessness of its repetitive pattern of coming into being
and of ceasing to be. Thus, in the celebrated Epic of Gilgamesh
which epitomizes the Mesopotamian philosophy of life, eloquent
expression 1s given to this view:
Do we build a house for ever?
Do we seal (contracts) for ever?
Since the days of yore there has been no [permanence];

The resting and the dead, how alike [they are]!
Do they not compose a picture of death,
The commoner and the noble,
Once they are near to [their fate]??
The pessimism of this conclusion is matched by the bitter reflec-
tion recorded in an Assyrian text of the eighth century 3.c.:
Ascend thou into the ruins of cities, go to those of old;
Behold the skulls of the latter and the former ones—
Which is now an evil doer, which now a benefactor2?
1 Cf. Speiser in I.H.A.N.E., pp. 46-7.
2Tab. X, col. vi, trans. E. A. Speiser in A.N.E.T., Pp- 92-3; see also A.
Heidel, The Gilgamesh Epic, p. 79. F. R. Kraus inJ.N.E.S., XIX, p. 121 and
n. 29, endeavours to lessen the witness of this passage, but his explanation really
shows that the idea must have been well established—‘Aber selbst wenn
Utapishtim hier die sattsam bekannte Unabwendbarkeit des Todes umstindlich
erdrten sollte, diirfte man in seiner Tirade nichts anderes sehen als ein durch die
Okonomie der Dichtung rein technisch gefordertes Motiv’. Cf. Speiser in
ILH.A.N.E., p. 68; W. G. Lambert, Babylonian Wisdom Literature, pp- 11-12,
17-18.
* Translated by S. H. Langdon in Babylonica, VIL, p. 207. Cf. R. H. Pfeiffer
The development of astrology in Mesopotamia, as we have
noted, led to the belief that the destiny of each person was deter-
mined by the stars.? This belief was, however, conditioned by the
traditional doctrine of man, namely, that the gods had created
human beings to serve them here on earth but had withheld im-
mortality from them. Consequently, although the cyclic move-
ments of astral phenomena were carefully studied as indicative of
future events, orthodox eschatology precluded any analogous idea
that the pattern of human life might also be cyclic, so that death
would be followed by rebirth. However, if metempsychosis was
thus excluded, there is some possibility that astrology did en-
courage a cyclic view of Time, and to some degree did affect the
Mesopotamian Weltanschauung in its longer perspective. We may,
accordingly, recall that we have already noticed that omens were
carefully recorded, in the belief that the recurrence of similar
phenomena would result in the recurrence of the event or situa-
tion which had accompanied the original manifestation of the
phenomena.® To what degree the idea of the cyclic pattern of the
temporal process, implied here, was developed in Mesopotamian
thought is unknown from the cuneiform records; but, if Seneca’s
report of the teaching of the Babylonian priest Berossos is to be
trusted, such an idea had led to the conception of a periodic des-
truction of the universe, which must also imply its periodic re-
creation. Thus, according to Seneca, “Berossos, who is the inter-
preter of Bél (ic. Marduk), says that everything takes place
according to the course of the stars; further he affirms this so con-
fidently that he assigns times for the conflagration (conflagrationi)
of the world and the flood (diluvio). For he asserts that the world
(terrena) will burn, when all the stars, which now pursue diverse
courses, come together in (the constellation of) the Crab, thus
in A.N.E.T., pp. 437a-448b; Jacobsen in [.A.A.M., pp. 216-17; C. J. Gadd,

Ideas of Divine Rule in the Ancient Near East, pp. 86-7; Lambert, pp. 140-9;
E. A. Speiser inJ.C.S., VII (1954), pp- 98-105.
2 See Epic of Gilgamesh, Tab. X, col. iii, 1-14. Cf. Brandon, Man and his
Destiny, pp. 92, 97-101.
3 See above, p. 7I.
positioned under the same sign so that a straight line may pass
through all their orbs. As to the future inundation (it will happen)
when the same body of stars meet in (the constellation of)
Capricorn. The former constellation denotes the summer sol-
stice, the latter the winter solstice: they are the signs of great
power, since in them the turning-points of the year lie.’?
Whether such speculation, which so strikingly illustrates the
myth of [’éternel retour, did really stem from Mesopotamian
astrology, or whether it represents a later synthesis of various
eschatological traditions such as finds expression in the Stoic con-
cept of the Great Year, which we have presently to consider, it is
significant that no trace of it appears in the Mesopotamian Welt-
anschauung, as known to us from native sources. The influence of
astrological belief was certainly very great, and it was calculated to
foster the idea that Time, when viewed in long perspective, was
cyclic in its movement; but it is obvious that it had not the power
to change the estimate of human life from that of the practical
carpe diem philosophy recommended in the Epic of Gilgamesh as
the only sensible deduction to be made from the traditional
eschatology.?
Il
In our introductory survey of the five views of Time that may be

regarded as typifying the traditional interpretations of mankind,
we cited a passage from the Hebrew book of Ecclesiastes to illus-
trate the cyclic view: “That which hath been is that which shall be;
and that which hath been done is that which shall be done: and
there is no new thing under the sun. Is there a thing whereof men
say, See this is new? it hath been already, in the ages which were
before us.’ This passage was chosen for citation, because it is both
1 Nat. Quest. II, 29, 1; in P. Schnabel, Berossos und die babylonisch-hellenistische
Literatur, pp. 266-7, see also pp. 251-2. Cf. Meissner, II, pp. 117-18.
2 Cf. Brandon, Man and his Destiny, pp. 92-4.
8 Eccles. i. 9-10. See above, p. 4. On Josephus’s statement that the souls
of the just return, in the revolution of the ages (& meqitoomij¢ aidywyr) to anew
incarnation see Brandon, Man and his Destiny, pp. 149-50, cf. Pp. 143-4, 147.
well known and is a vivid and succinct statement of the cyclic
interpretation. We briefly noted that it was not, however, char-
acteristic of Hebrew thought on the subject; it does in fact most
probably derive from Greek tradition, and is representative of the
Hellenistic influence that so profoundly affected Jewish culture of
the Diaspora during the last two centuries B.c. and the first cen-
tury of the present era. It serves now to remind us that this aspect
of Greek thought must have represented a well-established tradi-
tion, to have exercised so powerful an influence onan alien tradi-
tion, and to it we must now turn our attention.
We may conveniently start by considering a statement of
Aristotle: “How should one define the terms “before” and “after”
(to xedteoov xai to botegorv)? Should it be in the sense that the
people of Troy are before us, and those previous to them before
them, and so on continuously? Or if it is true that everything has a
beginning, a middle, and an end, and when a man grows old he
reaches his limit and reverts again to the beginning, and those
things which are nearer the beginning merit the term “before”,
what is there to prevent us from regarding ourselves as nearer the
beginning [than the men of Troy]? If that is true, then we should
be “before’’. As therefore in the movement of the heavens and of
each star there is a circle, what is there to prevent birth and death
of the mortal from being of this nature, so that mortals are born
and destroyed again? So they say there is a cycle in human affairs
(xabdneo vai gaol xx«dov elvar ta Gr0odnwa). The suggestion
that those who are continually being born are numerically
(t@ Goud) identical is absurd, but we could accept that they are
the same in “form” (z@ eider). In that sense we should be “before”
[the men of Troy], and we should assume the arrangement of the
series to be of the type (tv tod eiouod tééw) which returns
(xédw énavaxduatew) to the starting-point and produces con-
tinuity and is always acting in the same way (ovveyés soveiv
xal del xara tabta eyew). For Alcmacon tells us that men die
because they cannot connect the beginning with the end—a clever
saying, if one supposes him to be speaking in a metaphor, and not
to wish his words to be taken literally. If then, there is a circle,
and a circle has neither beginning nor end, men would not be
Gc
“before” because they are nearer the beginning, nor should we be

“before” them, nor they “‘before”’ us.’?
This statement is notable, from the point of view of our present
interest, for several things. First, it would appear that the cyclic
movement of the stellar universe provided the argument, by way
of analogy, for regarding the sequence of human life as being also
cyclic. Then, it is significant that, while proof is thus deduced for
so regarding the pattern of mankind’s existence, both individually
and as a whole, no comment is made on the metaphysical aspect
of the matter—some form of metempsychosis would seem to be
implied, but nothing explicit is said of the issue.
The analogy drawn here by Aristotle between the pattern of
human affairs and the movement of the stars is in line with the
development of Greek thought from early times. As we have al-
ready noted in another connection, Anaximander, who seems
almost to have hypostatized Time, regarded the cosmic process as
a perpetually balancing process of becoming and perishing: ‘the
source of coming-to-be for existing things is that into which
destruction, also, happens’. He saw this alternating rhythm as part
of the fundamental pattern of reality—‘according to necessity’
(xata td yoedy), and he described it poetically as a mutual pay-
ment and retribution which all entities pay and require ‘for their
injustice according to the assessment of Time’ (xata tv tod
yodvov tdéw).* However, although Heraclitus also was impressed
by the seeming struggle for existence manifest in the cosmic pro-
cess and explained the phenomenon of change as due ‘to strife and
necessity (xara gow xal yoedy),® it would appear that the Greek
instinct for rational order could not be satisfied with the notion
that the universe was basically a chaos of mutual strife, even if
1 Aristotle, Problemata, xvii, 3; tr. W. S. Hett (Loeb Classical Library ed.,
I, p. 367). Cf. H.-C. Puech in Proceedings of the 7th Congress for the History of
Religions (1951), pp. 34-5; J. F. Callahan, Four Views of Time in Ancient Phil-
osophy, pp. 73-4, 80-2: ‘(We should note that the evidence given here by
Aristotle is to show that there is a connection between time and circular
motion as such, not the circular motion of the sphere)’; see also pp. 83-7.
°G. S. Kirk and J. E. Raven, The Presocratic Philosophers, pp. 106-7; see
above p. 47.
3 Fr. 80, Origen, c. Celsum VI, 42, in Kirk-Raven, p. 195.
thythmic in expression.! Moreover, there seemed to be evidence
of a rational order, as convincing as it was beautiful, in the
universe itself. As they observed the stars and planets and analysed
their stately movements through the heavens, the Greeks saw a
demonstration of order that was harmonious and eternal, and its
pattern was cyclic. Hence Plato could write: “When the father
and creator saw the creation which he had made moving and
living, the created glory of the eternal gods, he was delighted, and
in his joy determined to conform his work to the original (i.e.
eternal pattern or idea) still more, and as this was eternal, he
sought to make the universe eternal, as far as might be. Now the
nature of the living being (¢éov) is eternal, but to attach eternity
to the creature is impossible. Wherefore he resolved to have an
image of eternity, which he made when he set in order the heaven
(odgardv) moving according to number, while eternity rested in
unity, and this image we call Time (yodvov). For there were no
days and nights and months and years before the heaven was
created, but when he created the heaven he created themalso. They
are all parts of Time, and the past and future are created species of
Time... These are the forms of Time when imitating Eternity
and moving in a circle measured by number.”?
The Greek conception of Time as being cyclic in its motion
was, accordingly, cosmological in inspiration, and, as we have
seen from Aristotle’s statement and as we shall also see in subse-
quent Stoic speculation, it could be held without much apparent
concern for its significance in regard to human destiny. However,
there were some in Hellas who, from an early period, did become
very much concerned with the personal issue; but their specula-
tions were also linked with a new concept of human nature which
seems to have emerged sometime during the sixth century B.c.
1 Heraclitus himself witnesses to this instinct as Fr. 51 (Hippolytus, Ref. IX,

9, 1) shows: ‘They do not apprehend how being at variance it agrees with
itself [literally, how being brought apart it is brought together with itself]:
there is a back-stretched connexion, as in the bow and the lyre’, in Kirk-Raven,
p- 193. Cf. L. Robin, La pensée grecque, pp. 88-90.
2 Timaeus 37c. Cf. J. A. Gunn, The Problem of Time, pp. 20-1; Callahan,
pp. 16-21.
According to the earlier Homeric view of man, only the psyche,

the life-principle, survived after death, departing to Hades, where
it became the eiddlon, the insubstantial image or shade of the
former living person. As such it was without mind (nous), for
during life it was the Ovudc, not the psyche, which was the prin-
ciple of intelligence and consciousness; but. at death the Ovyds
ceased to exist. Homeric eschatology was consistent with this
view of human nature: true human life required an integrated
person, comprising body, @vuds and psyche; the disintegration of
this complex at death was definitive, and only the eiddlon survived,
to dwell apparently for ever in Hades. In process of time, it
appears that this distinction between the Ovuds and psyche was
dropped, and the psyche came to connote the intelligent life prin-
ciple which indwelt the individual, animating him and endowing
him with personality. The psyche came also to be regarded as
being essentially independent of the body, not only in the older
Homeric sense of surviving the disintegration of the body, but
also as pre-existing it. Accordingly, a conception of the soul grew
up in certain circles such as would provide the basis for, if con-
versely it was not a concomitant of, a belief in metempsychosis or
the transmigration of the soul from one bodily form of existence
to another.”
How belief in metempsychosis originated in Greece has been
the subject of much speculation: it has been seen both as an in-
digenous growth and as an importation from some alien culture.*
But, whatever its origin may have been, the importance of the
belief from our point of view is that, by being related to the
cyclic conception of Time, it inspired a very distinctive view of
human destiny. This clearly emerges in what appears to be the
Siliesetetercnce to thesbclie een toca d a jibe which
1 Cf. Brandon, Man and his Destiny, pp. 160-2, and the references there given.
2 Cf. W. Jaeger, Theology of the Early Greek Philosophers, pp. 72-84; E. R.
Dodds, The Greeks and the Irrational, pp. 138-9; M. P. Nilsson, Gesch. d. griech.
Religion, I, p. 195; F. Cumont, After Life in Roman Paganism, pp. 177-184.
* On Herodotus’s statement that the Greeks derived the belief from Egypt,
see below, p. 89. Cf. E. Rohde, Psyche, II, pp. 131-4; van der Leeuw, Pp- 294-6;
O.C.D., p. 921; A. C. Pearson in E.R.E., XI, pp. 432-4; Nilsson, I, pp.
694-5; Dodds, p. 172 n. 97; V. Macchioro, Zagreus, pp. 233-41.
Xenophanes is recorded to have made against the teaching of
Pythagoras: “What he (Xenophanes) says about Pythagoras runs
thus: Once they say that he was passing by when a puppy was
being whipped, and he took pity and said: “Stop, do not beat it;
for it is the soul (yuy7) of a friend that I recognized when I heard
it giving tongue.” *! Even if the story be apocryphal and designed
to ridicule, it truly reflects, as later evidence attests, the important
fact that with such as Pythagoras metempsychosis was not merely
an intriguing theory but embodied an evaluation of life that
could be profoundly disturbing to those who held it. The his-
torian Herodotus gives a summary of the doctrine, which is par-
ticularly valuable for its objective statement, although obviously
inaccurate in its attribution of the origin of the belief to the
Egyptians: ‘Further, the Egyptians are the first who maintained
that, the soul of man being immortal, when the body perishes, it
enters into another animal (¢@ov) that is then in the process of
being born; when it has encompassed (xeguéA6) all forms of life
on the earth, the sea and the air, it enters again a human body that
is being born. The cycle (zegujAvow) is accomplished in three
thousand years. There are certain Greeks (i ‘EAAyjvwv) who have
adopted this doctrine, some in former times and some in later, as
though it were their own invention; I know their names but do
not write them.”
We see, accordingly, that the present life of each individual
person was regarded as but one in a long series of incarnations to
which the soul is subjected; many forms of these incarnations
were degrading, and transit from one to the other necessarily in-
volved repetition of the anguish of birth and death. Herodotus
mentions no cause as being assigned for the process; but other
evidence shows that the process was regarded as due to some
original fault or misfortune. Thus Pindar, in an ode written in
476 B.C., which is usually thought to reflect Orphic teaching,
1 Diogenes Laertius viii, 36, trans. Kirk-Raven, p. 222(268); cf. other passages,
pp. 222-4.
21T, 123. Cf. A. Erman, Die Religion der Aegypter, pp. 292-3; H. Ranke in
Z.A.S.A., 79 (1954), pp. 52-4; W. Federn inJ.N.E.S., XIX (1960), pp. 241-55.
Sce also W. K. C. Guthrie, Orpheus and Greek Religion, pp. 170-1.
remarks cryptically: ‘And all they that, for three lives in either
world, have been steadfast to keep their soul from all wrong-
doing (a6 adunay ddixwr yew poydr), travel by the highway of
Zeus to the Tower of Kronos, where the Ocean airs breathe about
the Islands of the Blest.’1 In a fragment of another poem, he
makes reference to ‘those from whom Persephone shall exact the
penalty of the primal woe, in the ninth year she gives up again
their souls to the sunlight of the world above’. The mysterious
Empedocles (fl. 450 B.C.) writes with an equally tantalizing ob-
scurity about this process of transmigration, in which he believed
himself to be signally involved: “There is an oracle of Necessity,
ancient decree of the gods, eternal and sealed with broad oaths:
whenever one of those demi-gods (da/uovec), whose lot is long-
lasting life, has sinfully defiled his dear limbs with bloodshed, or
following strife has sworn a false oath, thrice ten thousand seasons
(ceic pv pvetac eac) does he wander far from the blessed, being
born throughout that time in the forms of all manner of mortal
things and changing one baleful path of life for another . . . Of
these I too am now one, a fugitive from the gods, who put my
trust in raving life.’* Plato also interpreted human destiny in
somewhat similar terms of a metempsychosis consequent on a
fall from an original state of bliss. He is not precise as to the cause
of this fall. In his most explicit account of the matter, he en-
visages certain souls as being unable to maintain themselves in the
primeval heights of beatitude—‘but whenever, from inability
(dévvatijoaca) to follow, it has missed that glorious sight, and,
through some mishap (ovrtayid) it may have encountered, has
become charged with forgetfulness and vice, and been so bur-
dened as to shed its feathers and fall to earth, in that case there is a
1 Pindar, Olymp. 2.62, in N. Turchi, Fontes Historiae Mysteriorum Aevi
Hellenistici, p. 35; trans. F. M. Cornford, Greek Religious Thought, p. 63. Cf.
Jaeger, pp. 86-7.
? Dirges, frag. 133, trans. Cornford, p. 64. Cf. Jaeger, p. 87; Rohde, II,
p. 211, n. 2; I. M. Linforth, The Arts of Orpheus, pp. 346-8.
3 Empedocles, frag. 115 (Hippolytus, Ref. vii, 29 and Plutarch, de exilio
17,607C); trans. Kirk and Raven, pp. 351-2 (471). See also frag. 117 in Kirk-
Raven, p. 354 (476). Cf. Jaeger, pp. 144-5, 147-8; Rohde, II, pp. 165, n. 2,
178-82.
THE ‘SORROWFUL WEARY WHEEL’ QI
law (»dqoc) that the soul thus fallen be not planted in any bestial
nature during the first generation. ..’! The errant soul has sub-
sequently to pass through a series of incarnations for ten thousand
years before it can return to its former place; but this immense
period could be reduced by living through three successive in-
carnations as a philosopher during the course of the third millen-
nium of incarnations.”
We see, then, that there were those in Hellas who, accepting
the cyclic view of Time, envisaged human life as passing through
successive cycles of birth and death, and being incarnated suc-
cessively in various forms. The process seems generally to have
been regarded as a declension from an original state of spiritual
bliss, and the soul suffered it either by mischance or through its
own misdeeds. Hence the human situation was viewed pessimis-
tically; but it was not without hope, for it was believed that
deliverance could be obtained from this painful degradation and
return made to the state of primal beatitude. Such a conception of
man’s nature and destiny seems to have characterized the so-called
Orphic communities, which have been the subject of much
specialized research and a considerable conflict of specialist opinion.
Perhaps the most significant expression of the reaction, which this
conception of life evoked, occurs in some lines engraved on a gold
leaf, found in a grave near Timpone Grande, in Southern Italy.
The inscription takes the form of a kind of affidavit for the
deceased to make before Persephone, the queen of the under-
world:
Out of the Pure I come, Pure Queen of Them Below,
And Eukles and Eubouleus, and others Gods and Daemons:
For I also avow me that I am of your blessed race.
And I have paid the penalty for deeds unrighteous,
Ihave flown out of the sorrowful weary Wheel;

I have passed with eager feet to the Circle desired;
And now I come a suppliant to holy Phersephoneia
1 Phaedrus, 248; trans. J. Wright.
2 Phaedrus, 248-9. Cf. Robin, p. 246; Guthrie, pp. 164-8; Rohde, II, p. 276,
n. 4. It may well be questioned how far a cyclic form of Time is implied here.
Q2 HVS ORY ae UNE AUN DD BleiYe
That of her grace she will receive me to the seats of the Hallowed—
Happy and Blessed One, thou shalt be a God instead of Mortal.1
Here, in the words of the deceased: ‘I have flown out of the

sorrowful weary Wheel’ (xdxdo<v> Sééntay Bagumerbéos
doyadgoww), we surely glimpse something of the despondency
that contemplation of the cyclic pattern of existence could evoke.
It may be questioned, however, whether the pessimism implicit
in this view of human destiny was inspired primarily by a cyclic
conception of Time. It seems more likely that the cyclic pattern
was incidental, and that the ‘sorrowful weary Wheel’ was really
constituted by the grim prospect of an almost infinite series of in-
carnations, with all their attendant suffering and degradation of
soul.? The process, moreover, was not infinite, and therein lay a
gleam of hope; for, although immense periods of Time were
assigned to its duration, it was ultimately to be terminated and the
state of original bliss restored—seen in terms of this ultimate res-
toration, Time was, accordingly, not truly conceived as being
essentially cyclic; for its duration, though immense and ex-
perienced as cycles of incarnations, had both a beginning and an
end for the individual soul in it. Further, when the process of
metempsychosis was regarded as punishment, Time was invested
with purpose, so that its passage signified the gradual achievement
of that purpose.
In other traditions of Greek thought, belief in the cyclic pattern
1 Trans. G. Murray in J. Harrison, Prolegomena to the Study of Greek Religion,
pp. 667-9. Cf. Guthrie, p. 173. Nilsson, Il, p. 226, hesitates in describing these
tablets as Orphic: ‘Sie gehoren mystisch eingestellten Kreisen an, von denen
sonst in dieser Zeit nichts Naheres bekannt ist; freilich muss man mit orphisch-
pythagoreischern und vielleicht auch platonischern Einfluss rechnen.’
2 On the idea of the ‘wheel of birth’ see Proclus, ad Tim. s, 330 (Diehl):
pia owmtygia tho pyts avtn maga tod Snutovgyod mgotelvetat Tod xbxhov THs
yeyéoems anakiattovoa xai tH¢ moAAtc nAdvyng xal tho dvnvitov Cwijc,...
(in Turchi, p. 33). J. Harrison (pp. 588 f) thinks that wheels had a ritual signi-
ficance, and she refers to the representation of wheels on the so-called Orphic
vases of Southern Italy (figs. 161, 162). Cf. Guthrie, pp. 207-8; Kirk-Raven,
pp. 354-5. For a comparative study of the ritual symbolism of the wheel (but
which throws no significant light on its Orphic use) see R. Pettazzoni, Essays on
the History of Religions, pp. 95-109.
of Time did, however, inspire a Weltanschauung that was funda-
mentally senseless so far as human interests were concerned. Thus,
according to Stoic cosmology, the present world (kosmos) was the
existent example of a series of worlds that had been and that
would be, all of which repeat the same pattern. The production
(diakosésis) of these worlds from fire, and their absorption into it
again (ekp/rosis) were events as constant in their occurrence as the
course of events that constitutes the history of each kosmos of the
series.1 The process, known as the ‘Great Year’, has been vividly
described by Nemesius, the fourth-century bishop of Emesa: “The
Stoics say that when the planets return, at certain fixed periods of
time, to the same relative positions, in length and breadth, which
they had at the beginning, when the kosmos was first constituted,
this produces the conflagration and destruction of everything
which exists. Then again the kosmos is restored anew in a pre-
cisely similar arrangement as before. The stars again move in their
orbits, each performing its revolution in the former period, with-
out variation. Socrates and Plato and each individual man will live
again, with the same friends and fellow-citizens. They will go
through the same experiences and the same activities. Every city
and village and field will be restored, just as it was. And this res-
toration of the universe takes place, not once, but over and over
again—indeed to all eternity without end. Those of the gods who
are not subject to destruction, having observed the course of one
period, know from this everything which is going to happen in all
subsequent periods. For there will never be any new thing other
than that which has been before, but everything is repeated down
to the minutest detail.”
The prospect of such an eternally repeated pattern of events
must inevitably have robbed human life, when seen either from
1Cf. E. V. Amold in E.R.E., XI, p. 862; Robin, p. 418; W. K. C. Guthrie,
In the Beginning, pp. 64-9; Eliade, Le mythe de l’éternel retour, pp. 183-4; K. F.
Smith in E.R.E., I, pp. 198a-200b.
2J. von Arnim, Stoicorum Veterum Fragmenta, Il, frag. 625; trans. E. Bevan
in Later Greek Religion, pp. 30-1. Cf. V. Goldschmidt, Le systéme stoicien et
Vidée de temps, p. 188, n. 5. Cf. M. Aurelius, Meditations, VII, 19. On the cyclic
interpretation of history cfJ. B. Bury, The Ancient Greck Historians, pp. 204-7,
248.
the angle of the individual or that of mankind as a whole, of any
worthwhile meaning—it did in fact provide the logical basis for
the Stoic counsel, that the wise man should live ‘according to
nature’, i.e. to conform his will and his actions to the great cosmic
process, so that he would not strive to achieve some personal sig-
nificance in a world-scheme that was basically impersonal and
indifferent to human values and desires.1 The effective acceptance
of such a Weltanschauung, so that one truly conformed one’s
aspirations and conduct in accordance with its austere discipline,
clearly demanded great resolution of mind and constant self-
abnegation. The mental and emotional strain that such an outlook
occasioned to the sensitive soul, whose intellect approved the
physics upon which the Stoic evaluation was based, but whose
humanity cried out against the senselessness of the process, is very
evident in the Meditations of Marcus Aurelius, the Stoic emperor of
Rome. Thus, while he repeatedly assures himself of the superiority
of the rational soul (rio Aoysxijs poyiic), which the wise man
should seek to cultivate, he is also aware of the chill consequences
of its illumination: ‘it (the rational soul) goeth about the whole
Universe and the void surrounding it and traces its plan, and
stretches forth into the infinitude of Time (ei¢ ty dzewwiay tod
aiévoc), and comprehends the cyclical Regeneration (tj
sepuodixny sadvyyevectay) of all things, and takes stock of it, and
discerns that our children will see nothing fresh, just as our fathers
1 Cf. Brandon, Man and his Destiny, pp. 175-9. According to Goldschmidt,
who maintains that “Le temps stoicien est qualitatif, non mathématique’, ‘Le
grand mouvement périodique qui scande le temps infini selon les naissances du
monde et ses conflagrations, se définit tout autant que par les révolutions
astrales, par la vie organique de ce Vivant qu’est l’Univers. Il en est de méme
du temps de la vie morale qui échappe 4 toute mesure objective, puisque c’est A
celui qui le vit, de le “délimiter’. Mais cependant, cette délimitation n’a rien de
subjectif ni d’arbitraire; l’agent moral, ici comme partout ailleurs, ne fait que
se conformer 4 la légalité stricte de la nature universelle’ (p. 187). Cf. G.
Mancini, L’etica stoica da Zenone a Crisippo, pp. 140-1: ‘Per gli Stoici il fato &
concatenamento senza principio e senza fine di tutto cid che accade causalmente
nel mondo; ogni accanimento é un anello di questa catena, che come effetto &
unito alla causa antecedente, e come causa con |’effeto sequente.’ See also
R. Bultmann’s estimate: ‘der Stoiker meint seine Zeitlichkeit eliminen zu kénnen;
seine “Entweltlichung” ist “Entzeitlichung” ’ (Das Urchristentum, p. 161).
too never saw anything more than we. So that in a manner the
man of forty years, if he have a grain of sense, in view of this
sameness has seen all that has been and shall be.’! However, as he
surveys the cosmic process, which he holds to be rational, doubt
sometimes assailed him, and he could only recommend the philo-
sopher to persist in his own rational ways despite the disturbing
thought that the fundamental pattern of the universe might, after
all, be irrational: “The periodic movements of the universe (ra
t0d xdopov éyxbxhia) are the same, up and down from age to age.
And either the universal intelligence puts itself in motion for
every separate effect, and if this is so, be thou content with that
which is the result of its activity; or it put itself in motion once,
and everything else comes by way of sequence in a manner: now,
if in a manner, everything is atoms (Goo), or deity (6edc), all is
well; but if chance rules (r6 eixg), do not thou also be governed
by it (u% xai od eixf).* But such a prospect, which taxed the
fortitude of the philosopher, was calculated to breed cynicism in
more ordinary folk, and an epitaph such as the following surely
reflects an attitude that was widespread in Graeco-Roman society:
obx Huny, |évevduny, |ob él, |0d wéAet mot
(I was not; I became; I am not; I care not)?
How far the Stoic concept of the Great Year, in view of the
considerable influence of Stoicism, really affected people’s outlook
on life, so that they felt that events had no ultimate significance,
may well be questioned.* The concept has the appearance of being
1 Meditations, XI, 1; trans. C. R. Haines, Loeb Classical Library ed., p. 293.
2 Meditations, IX, 28; trans. G. Long. Cf. Goldschmidt, p. 192, n. I.
3]. W. Mackail, Select Epigrams from the Greek Anthology, p. 161 (xxxiii);
see also sections xi and xii. Cf. J. Carcopino, Aspects mystiques de la Rome
paienne, pp. 221, 228-35; F. Cumont, After Life in Roman Paganism, pp. 6-19;
I. A. Richmond, Archaeology, and the After-Life in Pagan and Christian Imagery,
pp: 25-8.
4 Commenting on the Stoic popularization of the idea of the Great Year,
Eliade (Le mythe de ’éternel retour, p. 183) maintains that “Avec le temps, les
motifs de “‘T’éternel retour” et de la “fin du monde” finissent par
dominer toute la culture gréco-romaine’. The chief evidence that he produces
in support of this view is that the Romans believed that their city was allotted a
kind of ‘Great Year’, which was determined by the ‘nombre mystique’ of the
rather of the nature of an intellectual tour de force that doubtlessly

intrigued those of a speculative turn of mind. The period in-
volved was, however, so vast, while the date of its commence-
ment was unknown, that the idea was scarcely calculated to in-
spire any sense of urgency that the end of the world might be at
hand—as we shall see, a dynamic eschatology requires a corres-
pondingly dynamic conception of a personal deity.! Accordingly,
outside the Orpheo-Platonic tradition, it would seem that a cyclic
view of Time was incorporated into a Weltanschauung that was
pessimistic, not because of the incorporation of such a view, but
by virtue of an evaluation of human nature and destiny that was
based on other considerations. Moreover, in so far as the cyclic
concept of the temporal process, implicit in astrology, induced a
sense of fatalism, as indeed it did, it was inspired rather by the
notion that chance irrevocably associated each individual with
some sidereal situation than by the thought of the undeviating
cyclical movement of the stars in the course of Time. It would
appear, therefore, that in both Hellenic and Hellenistic society the
conception of Time as cyclic in its process did not alone greatly
affect the evaluation of life; to have a personal significance, it had
to be linked with some estimate of human nature and destiny
which supplied the raison d’étre of such significance.”
twelve eagles seen by Romulus (pp. 199-204). Eliade refers particularly to
J. Hubaux’s Les grands mythes de Rome; however, although in his interesting
book he notes the apocalyptic significance of Cicero’s Somnium Scripionis
(pp. 10-11), Hubaux clearly shows that “Le destin de Rome est celui d’une
nation qui croit savoir qu’elle ne vivra que pendant un certain laps de temps’
(p. vii), but this belief was not inspired by Stoic eschatology.
1 Cf. W. Warde Fowler, The Religious Experience of the Roman People, pp.
403 f., 428 f.; Hubaux, pp. 114-41; A. D. Nock in C.A.H., X, pp. 468-81;
A. Peretti, La sibilla babilonese, pp. 23-32, 38, 303-444; J. Bidez-F. Cumont,
Les mages hellénisés, Il, pp. 147, n. 3, 43 148, n. 2, 3; 367, n. 3.
? According to P. Vidal-Naquet in R.H.R., t. 157 (1960, p. 80), ‘Le fait le
plus frappant a notre sens est la scission qui se produit au v® siécle entre la
“science” et “Thistoire”’. D’un cété, l’affirmation d’une cosmogonie qui, pour
rendre compte du changeant, ne pouvait que prendre une forme cyclique; de
Pautre, le sentiment que I’humanité s’arrache peu 4 peu spirituellement et
matériellement 4 I’enfance.’ On the generally pessimistic Greek evaluation of
man’s destiny see Brandon, Man and his Destiny, pp. 160-83.
Til
We saw, when considering the deification of Time, that in the

great epic poem of Hinduism, the Bhagavad-Gitd, Vishnu, the
supreme deity, reveals himself as “Time that makes the worlds to
perish, when ripe, and come to bring on them destruction’; and
the terrified Arjuna sees all forms of being passing to annihilation
in the fearsome mouths of the awful god.1 This concept of the
destructive process of Time was deeply rooted in the Indian mind;
but it was linked there with two other closely related ideas which
have profoundly conditioned the Indian view of life. In the Gita
one of these ideas finds concise expression in the lines:
For to one that is born death is certain,
And birth is certain for one that has died.?
.
Thus, concisely, is stated the essential pattern of samsara, the doc-

trine of the transmigration of souls or rebirth, which characterizes
the Weltanschauungen of both Hinduism and Buddhism. The
linkage of this doctrine with an evaluation of Time as embodying
the destructive principle operative in the universe is peculiar to
Indian thought; but its raison d’étre is not immediately apparent. A
clue is, however, given in the Gita, in some lines in which the
supreme deity reveals another aspect of his nature:
All beings, O son of Kunti, go to my Nature at the end of a
world-cycle (kalpaksaye), and again at the beginning of a cycle
(kalpadau) I emit them.®
Existence, in all its multifarious forms, is thus envisaged as passing
through successive cycles (kalpas), which involve periodic creation
and destruction. Belief in this cyclic pattern of the temporal pro-
cess appears to be ancient; it can be traced back to the Vedic
period. Although the origin of the belief cannot be determined, it
See Pp. 31-2.
211. 27, trans. F. Edgerton, The Bhagavad Gitd, I, p. 21. Cf. S. Radhakrishnan,
La Bhagavad-gita, pp. 122-3.
31X. 7, trans. E. J. Thomas, The Song of the Lord, p. 73. Cf. Edgerton, I,
p. 89; Radhakrishnan, pp. 252-3; S. Dasgupta, History of Indian Philosophy, I,
p. 526, see p. 520; P. Deussen, The Philosophy of the Upanishads, pp. 219-21.
is significant that it was very early perceived that existence in-
heres in Time and is essentially conditioned by it. Thus, according
to the Atharvaveda, heaven and earth were brought into being by
Time (kala), and, ‘in Time all that exists and will exist is contained,
called from it into life... In Time is thought and in Time is life,
in Time is the name (of all beings) contained . . . In Time is the
Tapas, in Time is the Most High, in Time is Brahman contained.
Time is the Lord of all, he, who was the father of Prajapati.’! This
dual equation of Time with the totality of being and with the
highest form of deity must inevitably have raised a metaphysical
problem—how was creation to be accounted for, if Time was
thus absolute? The answer was found in the conception of an un-
ceasing series of world-cycles that allowed for both creation and
the idea of an absolute Time, the latter connoting neither begin-
ning nor end to the process in which it manifested itself.? It is in
terms of this evaluation of Time that human nature and destiny
came to be interpreted; although the possibility must be allowed,
as we shall see, that the evaluation itself may also have been
decisively conditioned by other theories concerning the nature of
man.
A cyclic view of Time, as we have seen in the first part of this
chapter, does not necessarily entail belief in metempsychosis.
However, where some form of that view was held together with
a theory of metempsychosis, as in Orphism, it did significantly
produce a markedly pessimistic attitude towards life in this present
world. But it must be noted that such pessimism stemmed essen-
tially from the estimate of human nature which was held; the
time-periods concerned, immense though they were, were ulti-
mately to be terminated, and little emphasis seems to have been
1 Atharvaveda XIX, 53. 4, 7, 8, in R-G.L., p. 164. K. F. Geldner defines the
Tapas here (ibid., n. 7) as “Der heisse Schépfungsdrang oder die Askese’.
Prajapati, the “Lord of Creatures’ is the highest personalized form of deity.
GE Ho yacobi in ERE Ol pazora:
2 Commenting upon the system of the kalpas, Eliade remarks: “ce qui mérite
de retenir notre attention dans cette orgie de chiffres est I’éternelle répétition du
rythme fondamental du Cosmos: sa destruction et sa recréation périodiques’
(Le Mythe de I’Eternel Retour, p. 172). Cf. H. Zimmer, Myths and Symbols in
Indian Art and Civilization, p. 142.
placed upon them. The Indian evaluation, in comparison, appears
to differ notably by its stress on the connection between the des-
tructive aspect of Time and the doctrine of metempsychosis. Some
reason for this is possibly to be found in the acute awareness of the
inevitable decay, investing all forms of life, that finds early ex-
pression in Indian literature. It is reflected, for example, in the
following passage from one of the earliest Upanisads: ‘When this
(body) gets to thinness, whether he gets to thinness through old
age or disease, just as a mango or a fig or a fruit of the peepul tree
releases itself from its bond (gets detached from its stalk), even so
this person frees himself from these limbs and returns again as he
came to the place from which he started back to (new) life.’! The
terms of the analogy here surely reveal the preoccupation of its
author, especially by virtue of its inexact parallelism. The fruit
falls, presumably, because it is ripe; but the demise of man is sig-
nified by the decay wrought either by disease or old age. What is
adumbrated here is found more emphatically expressed in the
later Maitri Upanisad. In the passage concerned, after a brutal
analysis of the corruptible nature of the human body, the dis-
course continues: ‘In this body which is afflicted with desire,
anger, covetousness, delusion, fear, despondency, envy, separation
from what is desired, union with the undesired, hunger, thirst,
old age, death, disease, sorrow and the like, what is the good of
the enjoyment of desires? And we see that all this is perishing, as
these gnats, mosquitoes and the like, the grass and the trees that
grow and decay.”
This concentration upon the ills of physical existence must have
been a marked feature of Indian society at this period (c. 800-500
B.C.); for it also permeates Buddhism, finding expression both in
the legend of the Four Signs that first awoke Gotama to his voca-
tion and in the Four Contemplations designed to instil in the
disciple a loathing for physical existence.? Another aspect of it is
1 Brhad-aranyaka Upanisad, IV, 3, 36; trans. S. Radhakrishnan, The Principal
Upanisads, p. 268. Cf. Zimmer, pp. 211-13. See Plate xi.
2 Maitri Upanisad, I, 3-4, trans. Radhakrishnan, op. cit., pp. 796-7.
3Cf. T. W. Rhys Davids, Buddhist Birth Stories, pp. 166-8; E. J. Thomas,
The Life of Buddha as Legend and History, pp. 51-2; Early Buddhist Scriptures,
seen in the extreme austerities practised by Indian ascetics to gain

supernatural powers. Now, in the history of religions such aver-
sion to the physical in its other (and later) manifestations has been
inspired by a view of life that saw the true end of man in a future
world of the spirit. Both Jewish and Christian asceticism, in all their
many diverse forms, have been motivated by an evaluation of the
flesh as evil, or as a source of evil, from which the devout would
be delivered by death. Such deliverance was definitive: hence
death, though awesome in contemplation and painful in experi-
ence, could be welcomed. Indian eschatology, however, has pre-
cluded such an evaluation. The sufferings of mortal existence have
perhaps been even more keenly felt; but death is not deliverance—
it is but a repetition of a grim experience already endured number-
less times, and which has to be endured again and again without
end. For samsdara held not the inspiring promise of endless living,
but the terrible prospect of ceaseless dying.
The origins of the Indian doctrine of samsara have been intently
studied and greatly discussed, without the achievement of any
agreed conclusion.? What is certain is that some time after the
Vedic period, the idea of metempsychosis began to make its in-
fluence felt in the Indian view of life. Even in its first intimations
the idea appears to have been associated with the notion of
penalty for failure. Thus, in an eschatology that finds reflection in
one of the earlier Upanisads, the dead were predestinated to one of
two forms of existence according to the tenor of their earthly
lives, which meant in effect the degree of their punctiliousness in
proper ritual observance. Those who so deserve take the devayana,
i.e. the path of the gods, to eternal union with Brahman. Others
go by the pitryana, ic. the way of the fathers, to the moon,
pp- 73-5; E. Conze, Buddhist Meditation, pp. 95-107; H. Giinther, Der Buddha
und seine Lehre, pp. 44-8; Brandon, Man and his Destiny, pp. 336, 338-9.
Jainism was inspired by a similar pessimism; cf. H. Jacobi in E.R.E., VII,
p. 4065.
1 Cf. A. S. Geden in E.R.E., Il, pp. 87a-95a.
* E.g. see Deussen, Philosophy of the Upanishads, pp. 324-32; Dasgupta,
History of Indian Philosophy, I, pp. 53-7; S. K. Chatterji in The Vedic Age,
p- 151;J.Gonda, Die Religionen Indiens, 1, pp. 207-9; R. C. Zachner, Hinduism,
pp- 79-82.
‘nsuvy (ueNYYo-nTYO) Moons ye eyppng SurdoeJsg oy Jo opduuay
sysnoys wiolyt SUISIOUIO ueul e& syudsoidoir on4eys YIU IY L
stsoydiourrjott Jo uoNdoou09 astyppng VY “TX ILV1d
eeon
Prate XII. The Wheel of Becoming
A Tibetan example of a traditional Buddhist attempt to depict the cause and
nature of existence. The three animals in the innermost circle symbolize the
causes of suffering: passion, hatredand stupidity. The scenesin
the sectors made
by the six spokes of the Wheel depict six destinies, each visited by Avalo-
kiteSvara on his mission of salvation. The figures in the outer rim represent
the twelve niddnas, i.e. causes of existence. The black monster embracing
the Wheel is Impermanence (anityata), that devours all existence.
THE “SORROWFUL WEARY WHEEL’ IOI
whence in time they return to be born again on earth.1 Reincarna-

tion is, accordingly, seen as a punishment incurred by all who
are not enlightened. It subjected the individual once more to
the process of living in this world, and, so, once again to the
necessity of having to endure all its ills of disease, old age and
death.?
Life, viewed in such terms, inevitably provoked speculation as
to its cause, and the way by which escape might somehow be had
from its grim entail. Since physical death was not definitive, it
appeared that within the living person there must abide some
entity that survived bodily disintegration and so became the prin-
ciple of another incarnation. This entity was distinguished by the
Indian sages as the dtman (the soul or self),? and its doleful career
of successive incarnations was explained as due to two factors.
One was kama, i.e. desire, above all for the continuance of life,
which naturally means involvement in the time-process and all
which that entails. The other factor was karma, i.e. action: every
act has its consequences for good or ill, which the atman must work
out. Karma, consequently, was ever determining the future. The
nature of each incarnation, whether human or bestial, was the sum
of past karma; it operated, moreover, according to its quality,
either to keep the atman ignorant of its true condition, or to enable
it to advance towards enlightenment.®
The whole raison d’étre of both Hinduism and Buddhism is the
1 Chandogya Upanisad, IV, 15.2; V, 10.1-7. See also Brh. Upan., Ill, 2.13.
2Cf. Deussen, Philosophy of the Upanishads, pp. 334-8, Das System des
Vedanta, pp. 392-5; S. Konow in R-G.L., II, 74-5; L. Renou, Religions of
Ancient India, pp. 76-7.
3 On the origin of the concept of the atman cf. Brandon, Man and his Destiny,
pp- 324-6, and the references given in the notes.
4 Tt is interesting to note in this connection that consistently with the idea
that desires (kama) led to rebirth, we find in some Upanisads the discharge of
the semen in the womb of a woman as a result of desires is considered as the
first birth of men, and the birth of the son as the second birth and the birth
elsewhere after death is regarded as the third birth’, Dasgupta, History of Indian
Philosophy, I, p. 57.
® See, ¢.¢.5. Br: Upan., IV, 4-53 Chand. Upan., V, 10.7. Cf. Dasgupta, I,
pp- 54-7; Gonda, I, pp. 206-8; Eliade, Le mythe de Eternel Retour, pp. 145-7.
H
possibility that the individual self may reach, by following a

prescribed discipline, such a state of ultimate enlightenment that it
achieves moksa or nirvana, i.e: final emancipation from the weary
cycle of unceasing births and deaths. The nature of this goal sig-
nificantly reflects the Indian fear of Time.
If existence in Time involves suffering, then deliverance from
suffering will mean deliverance from Time. Consequently the
desire to continue to live must be due to some fundamental delu-
sion about the nature of life such as involved subjection to Time.
Indian thinkers found this delusion in the notion of self-conscious-
ness. To be conscious of one’s self was to be conscious of the
temporal categories, of past, present and future; it was to become
enmeshed in history which was but the sorry tale of the working
out of karma. Accordingly, the more one cherished this awareness
of self, and sought to preserve it, the more one subjected oneself
to the relentless logic of Time. Conversely, deliverance from the
tyranny of Time meant the obliteration of that sense of self which
inheres in the consciousness of having a past, of existing in the
present, and anticipating a future.!
The notion, implicit in such thinking, of a transcendental self,
that could be distinguished from the empirical self, was un-
doubtedly the product of mystical trance, so characteristic of
Indian asceticism.? Such trance-states were induced by various
forms of mental and physical discipline. Yoga praxis aimed par-
ticularly at the abolition of Time by starting with the exercise of
pranayama, the regulation of breathing, and passing on to other
1R. C. Zaehner remarks, sagaciously: ‘Where, however, they (ie. the
primitive Indians) seem to differ from other primitives is that, when once they
became fully conscious as individuals, they were not prepared to accept the
fact. Individual consciousness did not seem to them the unqualified good it so
often seems to us’ (At Sundry Times, p. 60). In this connection it is significant
that in the Orphic grave-tablets the initiate is warned not to drink, in the next
world, of the fountain of Lethe (Forgetfulness), but to quench his thirst from
the pool of Memory (cf. Guthrie, Orpheus, p. 177): the intention is surely to
retain one’s self-consciousness. Cf. Zaehner in The Saviour God, pp. 224-5;
Eliade in H.R., II (1963), pp. 329-44.
> Cf. E. Conze, Buddhist Thought in India, pp. 17-19. See also Dasgupta,
History ofIndian Philosophy, 1, pp. 208-11, 250.
techniques designed to deaden the time-sense of normal conscious-
ness. The ability to induce a sense of timelessness, and the experi-
ence thereof, naturally led to attempts to describe or explain such
a state of being. It is, accordingly, significant to find the Indian
sages anticipating the concise dictum of Boethius, that Time is
constituted by the ever-flowing present (nunc fluens), while eter-
nity manifests itself as the abiding present (nunc stans).2 Thus, in
the early Chandogya Upanisad, for the enlightened one the passage
of Time, marked by the succession of day and night, is no more:
‘Verily, for him, who knows thus, this mystic doctrine of
Brahma, the sun neither rises nor sets. For him it is day for ever.’
And the Buddha is represented as describing the state of Nirvana:
‘There, monks, I say there is neither coming nor going nor staying
nor passing away nor arising. Without support or going on or
basis is it. This indeed is the end of pain.’ Buddhist metaphysi-
cians felt impelled to go even farther in their rejection of Time.
Laying absolute emphasis upon the impermanency that in-
vests the phenomenal world, they denied the existence of any
abiding self that is the subject of a continuous presentation of
experience, stemming from its existence in a world of time and
space. The so-called person was a temporary conglomeration of
psychical and material elements (the skandhas), that, according to
some teachers, were being renewed each instant (kshana).® More-
over, since each kshana is essentially discrete, the conception of
Time as a continuous process is merely part of the basic illusion of
self-consciousness. Accordingly, it was explained: “Consciousness
consisting of the skandhas, dhatus, and ayatanas, which are with-
out a self or of anything of the nature of a self, arises from
1Cf. Dasgupta, Yoga as Philosophy and Religion, pp. 135-6, 145-9, see also
p- 79; Eliade, Images and Symbols, pp. 81, 85-7, 88, 89; inHR., Il, Pp. 331-2.
2‘Nunc fluens facit tempus, nunc stans facit aeternitatem’, Boethius, De
consol., 5.6. Cf. A. K. Coomaraswamy, Time and Eternity, pp. 37, 47.
3 I]I, 11.3; trans. S. Radhakrishnan, The Principal Upanisads, p. 386.
4 Udana, VIIL.1; trans. E. J. Thomas, Early Buddhist Scriptures, p. 110. Cf.
T.R. V. Murti, The Central Philosophy ofBuddhism, pp. 47-50; Coomaraswamy,
p- 33-
5 Cf. Conze, Buddhist Thought, pp. 98-106, 105-12. See also Dasgupta,
Yoga as Philosophy and Religion, p. 45, note.
ignorance, karma, and craving, and it functions through being

attached to grasping at things by means of the eye and all the
organs, and makes the presentations of its store-mind appear as
bodies and vessels, which are manifestations of its own mind (the
store-consciousness). Unstable like a river, a seed, a lamp, wind,
a cloud, it is subject to destruction from moment to moment.”
Such demonstration of the illusory nature of Time was not,
however, apparently considered sufficient by the Indian sages to
convince their fellow-men of the folly of taking the phenomenal
world for reality. For they laboured to present a picture of the
process of Time that was calculated to overwhelm by showing
both the immensity of that process and the futility of its operation.
A mahayuga was conceived, which was a period of twelve thousand
years, comprising four ages, and marked by a successive decline of
standards. But these years were reckoned as years of the gods, each
of which equalled three hundred and sixty human years. In turn,
one thousand of these mahayugas made up one kalpa, which was
equivalent to one day of Brahma and spanned the whole period
from the creation to the destruction of a world. A kalpa, or one
day of Brahma, was followed by a night of equal duration, which
is a time of quiescence, and, for the soul, of unconsciousness. How-
ever, with the dawning of the next day, Brahma creates the
world anew, and the dreary wheel of existence begins to turn once
more for another kalpa. Throughout these immense periods of
Time, the unenlightened soul pursues aimlessly its weary course of
successive births and deaths, dragging with it the ever-increasing
burden of its karma.
A chronology, so fantastic and repellent, and of which variant
versions appear in Buddhism and Jainism, clearly attests the Indian
dread of Time. But it is to be seen, together with the other two
1 Lankavatara, 68; trans. E. J. Thomas, History of Buddhist Thought, p. 234;
see also pp. 164, 165, 222, 257. Cf. Conze, Buddhist Thought, pp. 34, 134-7
(Conze also shows how the doctrine of momentariness (kshanikavada) had to be
modified to safeguard the reality of karma, cf. pp. 1 37-44); Coomaraswamy,
Pp- 32-7, 56, 59-60; Eliade, Images and Symbols, pp. 80-r.
* Cf. H. Jacobi in E.R.E., I, pp. 200b-202a; Zimmer, Myths and Symbols in
Indian Art and Civilization, pp. 13-19; Zaehner, Hinduism, pp. 80-2; Eliade,
Images and Symbols, p. 67; Le mythe de l’Eternel Retour, pp. 169-72. See Plate xii.
attitudes we have noted, as witnessing not only to the profundity
of that dread, but also to a very shrewd insight into the essentials
of human experience. The conception of deity as ambivalent in
character, manifesting itself in both creation and destruction, and
the equation of this deity with Time, connotes a realistic appre-
ciation of what existence in time and space must involve. The
acceptance of this situation did not, however, remove its dread,
and the instinct to escape from it has been, through the centuries,
the abiding motive of Indian religious thought and practice.
Hence the twofold effort to magnify the suffering caused by the
‘sorrowful weary wheel’ of Time, and to deny Time’s ultimate
reality. The solution is essentially an existential one; for it assumes
both the reality of empirical existence and the reality of those
psychic states that attest an existence beyond Time. In other
words, the nunc fluens is real for those who accept it and become
enmeshed in it, and it is, moreover, for such, endless. But its spell
can be ended by the enlightened yogin, who, by meditative tech-
niques, perceives its fundamental illusion and glimpses the nunc
stans, into which he will for ever pass on the extinction of his
karma.
CHAPTER FIVE
History as the Revelation of Divine Purpose
MONG the sacred literatures of mankind that of the Hebrews

is distinguished by its concern with what purports to be his-
torical fact. Not only does a large part of the constituent docu-
ments take the form of historical narrative, but in almost every
other writing of the corpus reference is constant to certain notable
events of the nation’s past. Moreover, throughout the long period
of this literature’s composition, i.e. from about 800 to 100 B.C., a
distinctive evaluation of the past forms both a constant source of
inspiration and an abiding criterion in terms of which the chal-
lenge of the present is faced and judged by each successive writer.1
This past, to which appeal is thus continuously made, consti-
tutes a definitive pattern of events: that Yahweh, the god of
Israel, having chosen the nation to be his own peculiar people,
had given to them Canaan as their home and holy land. This act
of divine providence had been foretold in promises made to the
original patriarchs of the nation, and its achievement had been
marked by a signal manifestation of divine power: their ancestors
had been miraculously delivered from their bondage in Egypt;
they had entered into a covenant with Yahweh at Sinai; then,
after many adventures, they had, by divine aid, possessed them-
selves of Canaan, the land “flowing with milk and honey’, of
Yahweh's promise.
Belief in the enjoyment of divine favour as a peculiar national
prerogative has not, of course, been limited to the Hebrews. Many
peoples have claimed that their own particular gods have specially
blessed them, making them great and prosperous. The records
of Israel’s neighbours indeed afford abundant evidence of such
1Cf. M. Burrows in I.H.A.N.E., pp. 101-31; T. R. Peet, A Comparative
Study ofthe Literatures ofEgypt, Palestine and Mesopotamia, pp. 26-7; A. Jeremias,
Das Alte Testament im Lichte des alten Orients, pp. 1-2; P. A. Weiser, Glaube und
Geschichte im Alten Test., p. 47.
106
THE REVELATION OF DIVINE PURPOSE 107
claims: Rameses II of Egypt was as certain that his god, Amun, had
made him victorious over the Hittites as Sennacherib was assured
that he had conquered through the help of Ashur, the patron deity
of Assyria.! What has characterized the Hebrew belief has been
the abiding conviction that it was Yahweh’s purpose to make
Israel prosperous and strong in Canaan, the land of his ancient
promise, but that the fulfilment of this purpose was conditional
on the nation’s loyalty to Yahweh’s commandments. Accordingly,
the vicissitudes of fortune, which Israel experienced down the
centuries, were seen as manifestations of Yahweh’s pleasure or dis-
pleasure. Thus a kind of admonitory formula was evolved by the
leaders of the national cultus which was essentially historical in its
reference: Yahweh delivered your forefathers from their bondage
in Egypt and gave them this land; the reality of his providence
has been unfailingly attested in your subsequent history—faith-
fulness has been rewarded by national prosperity, apostasy
punished by national disaster.
This preoccupation with their national past, as revelation of the
providential purpose and power of their god, was obviously a
disposition that had gradually been formed among the Hebrews,
and it must have originated in some experience so profound as to
impress itself thus upon the common mind. So far as the extant
documents are concerned, the tradition can be traced back in the
so-called Hexateuch to about the ninth century B.c. The general
consensus of expert opinion concerning the composition of the
Hexateuch is that four distinctive strands of tradition have gone
to form these first six books of the Bible as we now have them.
Of these four strands or sources, that designated the Yahwist or J
is the oldest. But not only is it the oldest; it has also the character
of a veritable philosophy of history.’
1Cf. A. Erman, Literature of the Ancient Egyptians, pp. 263-7; A.N.E.T.,

p- 287b.
2 Specialist opinion seems generally to date the composition of J for the
period 900-750 B.c. Cf. O. Eissfeldt, Geschichtsschreibung im A.T., pp. 8-45;
R. H. Pfeiffer, Introduction to Old Testament, pp. 147-8; C. R. North in The Old
Testament and Modern Study, p. 81; A. Lods, Histoire de Ia littérature hebraique et
juive, pp. 180-2.
This Yahwist tradition is indeed a remarkable composition,

and, so far as the extant evidence goes, it seems to have set the
pattern of the Hebrew view of history as the progressive mani-
festation of the purpose of Yahweh. This conclusion is an in-
ference from the fact that the tradition is found, on analysis, to
divide into three distinctive parts which have been obviously,
though skilfully, joined to form a continuous narrative embody-
ing a clearly defined theme. Thus the narration starts with an
account, extending from Genesis ii. 4b to xi. 9, of the creation of
mankind and its early development in its original habitat until a
world-wide dispersal of its members takes place, in consequence
of a sudden diversification of their aboriginal speech.t This sec-
tion, which may be conveniently designated the Primeval History,
is concerned with the human race as a whole; but, as we shall see
in a detailed examination presently, the essential theme of Israel’s
election to be Yahweh’s peculiar people is already adumbrated
therein in the episode of Noah’s blessing and cursing of his sons,
according to their respective merits (ix. 18-26).?
The legend of the Tower of Babel (xi. 1-9) affords the Yahwist
writer a convenient bridge from the Primeval History to the
next division of his narrative, which comprises a series of tales
about the patriarchs of the Hebrew people. In this Patriarchal Saga
(Genesis xii. I sq.), interest is now concentrated on showing how
Yahweh promised the original ancestors of the nation that from
them would stem a great people and that they would possess the
land of Canaan. The promise is first made to Abram in the form
of a command from Yahweh to leave his home in Haran in order
to settle in Canaan: “Go from your country and your kindred and
your father’s house to the land that I shall show you. And I will
make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your
name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who
bless you, and him who curses you I will curse; and by you all the
families of the earth shall bless themselves.’ Then, after his
1 See below, p. 129. 2 See below, pp. 128-9.
8 Gen. xii. 1-3 (R.S.V.). Cf. G. von Rad, Genesis, pp. 155-6; H. H. Rowley,
The Biblical Doctrine of Election, pp. 32-4; K. Galling, Die Erwahlungstraditionen
Israels, pp. 68, 93.
THE REVELATION OF DIVINE PURPOSE I09Q
arrival in Canaan, at Shechem, as if to allow of no possible doubt,

Yahweh again appears to Abram and declares: ‘To your descend-
ants I will give this land.’ This promise, in varying form, is made
in turn to Isaac and Jacob, who are represented as the son and
grandson respectively of Abraham (Abram).? However, and the
fact is surely significant, these patriarchs and their families are
depicted only as nomads, dwelling temporarily in various places
in Canaan. They do indeed increase in numbers; but finally they
are described as migrating to Egypt, after Joseph, a son of Jacob,
acquires a position of great power and prestige there.* By the
time of this migration, these descendants of Abraham are repre-
sented as comprising twelve tribes, each named after a son of
Jacob. Now, even on a cursory reading, this Patriarchal Saga
clearly shows signs of the conflation of diverse material, although,
as a whole, it is skilfully moulded to exhibit the gradual fulfilment
of Yahweh’s promise to make Abraham the ancestor of a numer-
ous people. The most significant clue to its origin, as we shall see,
lies in the fact that the promise to give Abraham’s descendants
possession of Canaan is curiously delayed; for instead of the Patri-
archal Saga ending with those descendants settled in Canaan, it
actually closes, as we have just noted, with their settlement in
Egypt.
When the Yahwist resumes his narrative in Exodus i. 8-12, a
very different situation appears to exist from that with which the
Genesis account ended. Quite clearly a considerable period of
time is assumed to have elapsed, during which the descendants of
Jacob had become a nation so populous as to constitute a menace
to the Egyptians, among whom they live. The fact that the
Yahwist tells nothing of what had happened during a period that
must be reckoned in centuries surely indicates that, despite the
apparently smooth transition of narrative, a very different cycle
1 Gen. xii. 6-7.

2 Gen. xxvi. I-5} XXVlli. 13-15.
3 Gen. xlvi. 1-27. It is doubtful how far these verses are derived from J;
howeverJ is a basic constituent of the Joseph tradition. Cf. von Rad, Genesis,
pp- 396-7.
4 Gen. xlix. 28. Cf. von Rad, Genesis, pp. 416-17.
IIo HISTORY, TIME AND DEITY
of tradition was now being drawn upon for the continuation of

the theme.! Indeed, when the nature of this cycle is considered, as
we shall soon see, there is cogent reason for thinking that it must
originally have supplied the Yahwist with his theme for the
Patriarchal Saga. For the account that now follows of Israel’s mira-
culous deliverance from its bondage in Egypt, and its triumphant
settlement in Canaan, describes events of which the memory
ever after remained one of the chief (if not the chief) formative
factors in the life both of the nation as a whole and of the in-
dividual Israelite.
As we shall see, the Yahwist’s account of these signal events
exercised a profound influence upon subsequent Hebrew thought;
but it is evident that, although he greatly enhanced their signifi-
cance for his people by the context in which he set them, the
memory of these events had already been preserved in some
effective manner before he wrote. Now, even allowing that the
Yahwist did most probably dramatize these events and elaborate
their presentation with much legendary material, we are accord-
ingly faced with a question of fundamental import: how came
the memory of these events, whatever the exact character of their
historical reality, to be so lively that it inspired the Yahwist to
compose his great seminal work? The question is indeed of funda-
mental importance; for, when we consider that at least some five
centuries must have elapsed from the actual Exodus to the Yah-
wist’s recording of it, we surely discern a situation of basic sig-
nificance for our subject.? It means that, throughout that long
* According to Exodus xii. 40, the period was reckoned at 430 years. Josephus,
Ant. Il, 204, estimates it at 400 years; see H. St. J. Thackeray’s note on the
passage in the Loeb edition of Josephus, vol. iv, p. 252. Cf. H. H. Rowley,
From Joseph to Joshua, pp. 66-79, 99, 107, 135; M. Noth, History ofIsrael, p. 120.
It is generally agreed in recent studies that 400 years is far too high a figure.
2 Rowley (From Joseph to Joshua), after a long and detailed discussion of the
enigmatic data, would seem to place the Exodus about 1230 .c. (pp. 133-6,
cf. p. 161). Cf. W. F. Albright, Archaeology ofPalestine, pp. 108-9; E. Drioton-J.
Vandier, L’Egypte?, pp. 415-16, 433, 650-1, 653; A. Parrot in R.H.P.R.,
t. xxx (1950), pp. 4-11; E. Drioton in R.H.P.R., t. xxxv (1955), pp. 36-49
(Drioton concludes: ‘les découvertes récentes faites en Egypte ne permettent
pas encore de trancher définitivement la question de savoir si l’Exode des
THE REVELATION OF DIVINE PURPOSE Til
period, the Israelite people had for some reason, and in some
manner, remained highly conscious of certain happenings of the
past. It would, accordingly, seem that, powerful as was the sub-
sequent influence of the Yahwist narrative in fostering an appeal
to history as evidence of Yahweh’s providence, that appeal in
some form had already existed before the narrative was composed.
And this is not all: when we recall the curious fact that the
Patriarchal Saga, while recording Yahweh’s promises to the
patriarchs that their posterity should possess Canaan, ends instead
with their settlement in Egypt, it would seem likely that the com-
position of this Saga was in some way connected with the Yah-
wist’s purpose, which was evidently inspired by the significance
of the existing tradition concerning the Exodus and Conquest of
Canaan.
It may be well at this juncture to pause for a moment, in order
to review the rather complex situation which we encounter here,
and to clarify the issues involved.
We have seen that the Yahwist narrative is the earliest known
account of the origins of the Israelite nation. This account has, as
its major theme, the wonderful way in which the national god,
Yahweh, had delivered his people from enslavement in Egypt and
settled them as conquerors in Canaan. What is thus. related as a
divine achievement undoubtedly had its origin in historical fact.
Israel was actually in possession of Canaan, and there is reason for
thinking that the people came there as invaders. The historical
reality behind the story of the Exodus is harder to interpret, but
it surely preserves some genuine folk memory of an actual escape
from Egyptian bondage. We may, accordingly, assume that
behind this part of the Yahwist’s narrative lay the recollection of
a very distinctive event, or complex of events. However, the
Yahwist represents these events as the culminating episode in an
age-long drama of Yahweh’s election of Israel to be his chosen
people. To show this, he composed, as we have noted, a highly
personalized account of the reputed patriarchs of the nation, to
Hebreux a eu lieu sous Aménophis III, vers 1480, ou sous Méneptah, vers 1230.
Les deux opinions conservent des arguments valables’, p. 49). Noth, History of
Israel (19602), p. 120 dates it “during the 1 3th century’.
II2 HISTORY, TIME AND DEITY
whom he alleges that Yahweh made a succession of promises that

their posterity should be great and possess Canaan. Now, this
section of his narrative, the Patriarchal Saga, obviously cannot be
based upon historical fact, however the promises may be in-
terpreted, as was that concerning the Exodus and the Conquest of
Canaan. Although he undoubtedly used traditional material in
the Saga, as we shall presently see, the Yahwist was clearly con-
cerned to provide therein, in a consequential narrative, a kind of
prolegomena to the account of the Exodus and Conquest of
Canaan, showing how these events constituted the fulfilment, on
behalf of later generations, of promises made centuries before to
their ancestors. The implied assumption of his work is that the
Twelve Tribes of Israel were in possession of Canaan because
they were the descendants of a common ancestor, Abraham,
whose god, Yahweh, had promised that this should come to pass.
There is, accordingly, about the Patriarchal Saga a tendentiousness
that suggests that the corpus was specifically designed by the
Yahwist to cope with some situation of special concern to himself
and those whose outlook he represented. The nature of that
situation we have to investigate; but it would appear that its
elucidation depends upon a proper understanding of the original
form of the tradition, which the Yahwist received, concerning
the Exodus and Conquest of Canaan. Moreover, from what we
have already seen of the Primeval History, it seems likely that its
proper evaluation also is bound up with the same problem. We
have, accordingly, to turn now to consider this problem, which
appears so basic for any assessment of the origins of Hebrew
historiography.
In seeking some likely means by which the memory of the Exodus

and the Conquest of Canaan was preserved in Israel prior to the
composition of the Yahwist narrative, the festival of the Passover
at once springs to mind. Here, it would seem, is a most obvious
instance of the cultic perpetuation of a past event, connected with
the Exodus, that by its clear commemorative purpose, its dramatic
ritual, and its popular character would have ensured that all
Hebrews were made annually conscious of the deliverance from
THE REVELATION OF DIVINE PURPOSE Il3
Egypt. Indeed the book called Exodus (xiii. 14) actually stresses
the commemorative aspect of the ceremony: ‘And when in time
to come your son asks you, “What does this mean?” you shall say
to him, “By strength of hand the Lord (Yahweh) brought us out
of Egypt, from the house of bondage.”’’ However, although this
commemorative aspect of the Passover is very ancient, there is
evidence that the festival originally had a different meaning, and
that in process of time it was ‘historicized’ in terms of the Exodus,
as indeed were other festivals in connection with other notable
events of Israel’s history.t Since, therefore, we cannot trace this
‘historicized’ version of the Passover back beyond the Yahwist
narrative in Exodus, we must seek for some more certain indica-
tion of the way in which the memory of the Exodus, and the
Settlement in Canaan, was perpetuated before the Yahwist
wrote.
Such an indication, also of a liturgical character, seems to be
found in regulations prescribed in Deuteronomy xxvi. 4-9, for
offering to Yahweh the first fruits of the harvest: “Then the priest
shall take the basket from your hand, and set it down before the
altar of the Lord (Yahweh) your God. And you shall make re-
sponse before the Lord your God, “A wandering Aramaean was
my father; and he went down into Egypt and sojourned there,
few in number; and there he became a nation, great, mighty, and
populous. And the Egyptians treated us harshly, and afflicted us,
and laid upon us hard bondage. Then we cried to the Lord, the
God of our fathers, and the Lord heard our voice, and saw our
affliction, our toil, and our oppression; and the Lord brought us
out of Egypt with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, with
great terror, and with signs and wonders; and he brought us into
this place and gave us this land, a land flowing with milk and
honey.” ’ In the light of the Yahwist’s elaborate presentation of
1 Cf. G. von Rad, Das formgeschtl. Problem des Hexateuchs, p. 48; Weiser, pp,
71-2; A. Lods, Israél, pp. 335-40, 505-6; W. O. E. Oesterley-T. H. Robinson,
Hebrew Religion, pp. 96 £., 148-9; S. H. Hooke, Origins of Early Semitic Ritual,
pp. 50 f.; J. Pedersen, Israel, I-IV, pp. 736-7; N. S. Snaith in Promise and
Fulfilment (ed. F. F. Bruce), pp. 178, 182-3; H. Wildberger, Jahwes Eigentums-
volk, pp. 43-55.
II4 HISTORY, TIME AND DEITY
Israel’s history, this liturgical confessio is significantly limited in its

references: the nomadic condition of the nation’s ancestor is
acknowledged, with the rather surprising admission of his
Aramaean origin. Only one ancestor is mentioned, and the state-
ment that he went to Egypt.and multiplied there would seem to
indicate that the reference is to Jacob only.? In other words, in
these lines the foreign origin of Israel, in relation to Canaan, is
acknowledged; nothing is said, however, of a line of patriarchs
such as the Yahwist depicts, or of promises being made to them
about their posterity’s settlement in Canaan. Next, we must note
that, while Yahweh is recognized as ‘the god of our fathers’, the
Settlement in Canaan is described without any reference to its
being the fulfilment of Yahweh’s promise to the patriarchs, as the
Yahwist had so insistently represented.? In effect this confessio
commemorates four events which were evidently regarded as of
fundamental significance: that Israel, as a people, were of Ara-
maean origin; that, their numbers increasing greatly in Egypt,
they had been oppressed by the Egyptians; from this oppression
they had been signally delivered by the ancestral god, Yahweh;
that Yahweh had settled them in Canaan.
It is impossible to date exactly this credal formula given in
Deuteronomy; that it is ancient is probable, and its silence about
Yahweh’s promise to the patriarchs sugggests that it antedates the
narrative of the Yahwist. That it occurs in a liturgical context is,
moreover, significant: the fact surely indicates that the com-
memoration of certain key events of the nation’s past had been
early incorporated into the liturgy, which in turn means that the
preservation of the memory of these events would thus have been
1Cf. von Rad, Das formgesch. Problem, pp. 4, 51. Galling, pp. 7-8, remarks:
‘In Anbetracht der Tatsache, dass die Israeliten und die Aramaecer seit Salomos
Zeiten in bitterster Feindschaft lebten, konnte man die Entstehung des Gebetes
noch weiter zuriickverlegen, doch wird man dafiir keinen Beweis liefern
k6nnen.’
2 Of the crucial word TAX S. R. Driver, Deuteronomy, p. 289, says that, by
suggesting the idea of lost by straying, it would be applicable to Jacob. It must
be noted, however, that it could also apply as a general description of the
nomadic condition of Israel’s ancestors. Cf Wildberger, p. 71.
3 Cf. Noth, History of Israel, p. 125.
THE REVELATION OF DIVINE PURPOSE IIs
ensured by a solemn annual reference to them.! The occasion

concerned here was a harvest festival, and it is readily under-
standable that on such an occasion reference might be made to
the way in which the nation came to possess a land so prosperous.
However, it may be questioned whether such a commemoration
was likely to be the original form in which these key events were
liturgically remembered. It would seem rather, in view of what
must surely have been the unique nature of the Exodus experience,
that the commemoration of this, and the associated event of the
conquest of Canaan, would have taken some more specific form
than that of the harvest thanksgiving. In other words, that the
nature of these events would have created their own occasion
and form of commemoration.
The Passover festival appears to embody such an occasion and
form; for, so far as the Exodus is concerned, the ritual graphically
perpetuates the memory of a profoundly dramatic event. We
have noted, however, that the Passover, as described in Exodus,
seems to have been a ‘historicized’ transformation of a primitive
rite connected with the offering of the first-born; accordingly, it
is unlikely that it is the original liturgical form in which the
Exodus and the Conquest of Canaan were periodically com-
memorated. Some clue to that form is perhaps to be found in a
remarkable formula which occurs in five places in the Yahwist
narrative relating to the Exodus and the settlement in Canaan.
It runs, with some slight variations: ‘I promise that I will bring
you up out of the affliction of Egypt, to the land of the Canaanites,
the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the
Jebusites, a land flowing with milk and honey’ (Exodus iii. 17).
The long list of the ancient inhabitants of Canaan, and the quaint
metaphor describing its economic richness, might well reflect a
traditional formula, firmly established by liturgical recitation at
some well-known festival.2 Some memory of such a festival may
1 ‘Deut. xxvi. sf. is a credo with all the signs and qualifications of such,
supposedly the oldest that is known. There must also have been a place in the
cult at which such a confession was recited’, von Rad, Das formgesch. Problem,
p- 4. Cf. Noth, History of Israel, p. 111.
2 See also Exodus iii. 8b, xii. 5, xxiii. 23, Xxxili. 2, xxxiv. 11; Deuteronomy
possibly be preserved in the account in the Book ofJoshua,* of

Joshua’s dialogue with Israel, gathered at Shechem. The occasion
is represented as the eve of Joshua’s death, when he bids farewell
to the people whom he had led, under the hand of Yahweh, into
the Promised Land. However, the ensuing dialogue really takes
the form of Joshua’s invitation to the Israelites to confirm their
acceptance of the sovereignty of Yahweh. Joshua’s opening
speech reviews the whole sequence of Yahweh's providential
care from the time of Abraham to the settlement in Canaan.
Emphasis is laid essentially upon Israel’s dependence on Yahweh's
providence: ‘I gave you a land on which you had not laboured,
and cities which you had not built, and you dwell therein; you
eat the fruit of the vineyards and oliveyards which you did not
plant.’ To the admonition contained in the concluding verses of
this speech Israel is represented as replying: ‘Far be it from us that
we should forsake the Lord (Yahweh), to serve other gods; for it
is the Lord our God who brought us and our fathers from the
land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage, and who did those
great signs in our sight, and preserved us in all the way that we
went, and among all the peoples through whom we passed; and
the Lord drove out before us all the peoples, the Amorites who
lived in the land; therefore we also will serve the Lord, for he is
our God.” In answer to this affirmation, Joshua is made, signifi-
cantly, to utter a warning: ‘If you forsake the Lord and serve
foreign gods, then he will turn and do you harm, and consume
you, after having done you good.’* After Israel’s acceptance of
this condition, the account tells how Joshua records the solemn
covenant thus made and sets up a stone in witness thereof.*
vii. 1; Jos. iii. 10, xxiv. 11; Jud. iii. 5; I Kings ix. 20. The comment of W.
Rudolph (Der ‘Elohist’ von Exodus bis Joshua, p. 246) on Jos. xxiv. 11b that,
“so gewiss uns diese Stilform in Hexateuch oft genug begegnet ist, so ist sie doch
gerade hier bei der sonstigen Knappheit dieses geschichtlichen Uberblicks wenig
wahrscheinlich’, taken with his other remarks on pp. 9, 54, constitutes an
unintentional, but very valuable, indication of its independence as a respected
cult formula. Cf. Brandon, Time and Mankind, p. 72;J. Gray; The Canaanites,
pp- 16, 43.
1 Joshua xxiv. ® xxiv. 13-18 (R.S.V.).
eakie lon USy\Ve 4 xxiv. 25-8.
THE REVELATION OF DIVINE PURPOSE II7
Now, although the making of this covenant is depicted as mark-

ing the end of Joshua’s career, and so, in this sense, was a unique
event, the account of it might well be modelled on a festival that
was periodically celebrated at Shechem, where a stone monu-
ment commemorated an original covenant between Israel and its
god. The likelihood that there did exist such a festival would well
explain how the memory of the Exodus and the Conquest of
Canaan continued to be so strong among succeeding generations
of Israelites, finding reflection in other forms of the cultus, which,
as we have seen, could have had no original connection with the
events concerned. The assumption of the existence of such a
festival is, moreover, a necessary inference from a certain inter-
pretation of the origins of Israel which has commended itself to
much expert opinion, and which is closely related to the view
that is here being developed of the origin of the historical element
in Hebrew religion.
In seeking to explain the origin and organization of the Twelve
Tribes, which, according to Hebrew tradition, formed the people
of Israel, Professor Martin Noth has found illuminating parallels
in the so-called amphictyonies of early Greece and Israel.?2 These
amphictyonies were confederations of neighbouring city-states,
made for some political or commercial reason. They were
centred on some religious sanctuary, the deity of which became
the divine patron of the league. Cult festivals were held, sym-
bolizing the union of the constituent members in the service of the
god.? Now, such worship involved these members in a two-fold
1 Cf. M. Noth, Das System der Zwolf Stamme Israels, pp. 70, 96-8; History of
Israel, pp. 92-4; von Rad, Das formgesch. Problem, p. 33, who thinks that Jos.
xxiv points to a ‘periodisch wiederkehrenden Bundesfest’; Rowley, From
Joseph to Joshua, pp. 43, n. 5, 125-6; Brandon, Time and Mankind, pp. 71-2;
Wildberger, pp. 65-6; N. H. Snaith in The Old Testament and Modern Study,
pp- 89-90.
2 Das System der Zwolf Stémme Israels, pp. 46-60; History of Israel, pp. 85 f.
Cf. W. F. Albright, From the Stone Age to Christianity, p. 215; A. Alt, Der Gott
der Vater, p. 63; Rowley, From Joseph to Joshua, pp. 120-3.
3Cf W. R. Halliday in C.A.H., Il, p. 640; L. Gernet-A. Boulanger, Le
Génie grec dans la Religion, pp. 165-7; M. Cary in C.A.H., II, pp. 604, 610, 630;
F. E. Adcock, idem, p. 697.
I
religious loyalty: to the god of the amphictyony as members

of the confederation, and to the tutelary deity of their own city
state. Such a division of devotion was not, however, deemed in-
compatible in a polytheistic society. Comparing the Greek, par-
ticularly that centred on Delphi, and the Israelite organizations,
Professor Noth summarizes his conclusions as follows: “The list
of the tribes of the Pylo-Delphic amphictyony is indeed none other
than a Twelve-tribes-system (Zwélfstimmesystem), with the same
schematization, and the same tendency to maintain, at least theo-
retically, the original establishment of the Twelve, just as we are
obliged to note it in the case of the Israelite Zwolfstammesystem.
The difference which exists between them is that the Greek
tradition still knows well the connection of such a tribe-system
with the institution of the amphictyony, while to the Israelite
tradition concerning the Zwélfstimmesystem the memory of the
connection had become lost. This difference can very simply be
explained in that, when we have information of them, the Greek
amphictyonies are still living institutions, but the Old Testament
tradition of the Zw6lfstammesystem came exclusively from a time
when no parallel to such a system any longer existed, for sub-
sequent political development had effected a change of relation-
ship.’
The Twelve Tribes of Israel, accordingly, appear to be a con-
federation of Hebrew tribes constituted for the conquest of
Canaan. Of these tribes, a group which claimed descent from an
eponymous ancestor, Joseph, seems to have escaped from bond-
age in Egypt, with the aid, as it was believed, of their god Yahweh.
The so-called Leah tribes, with whom the Joseph tribes allied
themselves, accepted Yahweh, undoubtedly because of his mar-
tial reputation, as their divine leader for the invasion of Canaan.?
As with the Greek amphictyonies, this acceptance was an ad hoc
arrangement: the warlike Yahweh was the divine patron of the
1 Das System, p. 58.
2 Cf. Noth, Das System, pp. 69-70, 90; Noth (p. 121) thinks that the expres-
sion “das Volk Gottes’ (Jud. xx. 2) also comes from the tradition of the ancient
amphictyony. See also Noth, History of Israel, pp. 85-92. Cf. von Rad, Das
formgesch. Problem, pp. 36-7; Rowley From Joseph to Joshua, pp. 144-8.
THE REVELATION OF DIVINE PURPOSE I1IQ
confederation, but to acknowledge him as such did not mean that

the tribes renounced their own ancestral gods.
This Israelite amphictyony achieved considerable success in its
undertaking; but, despite the statement in the Book ofJoshua that
the whole of Canaan was conquered, it is obvious from other
evidence that this was not accomplished until the reign of David,
several centuries after the initial invasion.? What appears to have
happened was that the tribes, under the original impetus of their
assault, succeeded in establishing themselves in Trans-Jordan and
some of the central region of Canaan.* Their pressure upon the
Canaanites then began to slacken, as they consolidated their hold
on the areas which they had won. In turn their confederation
began to break up, since it had in a measure achieved its purpose.
Consequently the tribes’ allegiance to Yahweh, the amphictyonic
deity, weakened, and they became more occupied in the service
of their ancestral gods, or the new deities which they acquired
from the Canaanites. This dissolution of the confederation, with
its consequent abandonment of Yahweh, was, however, resisted
by those whose devotion to Yahweh went deeper, perhaps be-
cause he was their ancestral god, and they set themselves to main-
tain his power and prestige as the god of the Twelve Tribes.‘
The logic of events powerfully assisted the Yahwist cause. The
dissolution of the amphictyony meant the disorganization of
military strength, and the consequences of this soon became ob-
vious through the reviving power of the Canaanites and the
newly established Philistines. The Israelite tribes began to suffer
defeat and subjection at the hands of their enemies. The pattern
of the ensuing events is significantly stated in terms of the Yah-
wist interpretation of them in the Book ofJudges: “And the people
of Israel did what was evil in the sight of the Lord (Yahweh) and
served the Baals; and they forsook the Lord (Yahweh), the God
of their fathers, who had brought them out of the land of Egypt;
1 Joshua xxi. 43-5, XXIV. 13.
2 Compare Gen. xv. 18-21 and II Sam. xxiv. 5-7. Cf. von Rad, Das formgesch.
Problem, pp. 67-8; Noth, History ofIsrael, pp. 191-3.
3 Cf. Lods, Israél, pp. 79-82.
4 Cf. Brandon, Time and Mankind, pp. 96-8.
they went after other gods, from among the gods of the peoples
who were round about them, and bowed down to them; and
they provoked the Lord (Yahweh) to anger . . . So the anger of
the Lord (Yahweh) was kindled against Israel, and he gave them
over to plunderers, who plundered them; and he sold them into
the power of their enemies round about, so that they could no
longer withstand their enemies.’
The Yahwist case, accordingly, began to take the form of an
appeal to the past, in order to explain the situation in the present,
and so to persuade the tribes to return to Yahweh. The pro-
tagonists of that cause were, moreover, undoubtedly assisted in
their propaganda by the continued observance at Shechem, as we
have seen, of a festival commemorative of Yahweh’s mighty
deeds in delivering the people from their Egyptian bondage and
settling them victoriously in Canaan. The memory of Yahweh’s
providence was thus so firmly established that appeal could be
made to it without question or explanation; the recollection of
the glorious past deepened the misery of the present degradation.
From time to time there was a revival of allegiance to Yahweh
and the presenting of a united front to the enemy. Return to
Yahweh consequently meant an increase of military strength, and
the resulting victory naturally redounded to Yahweh’s credit,
thus further confirming his character as a god who reveals him-
self effectively in political events. In the account of Israel’s for-
tunes during the period covered by the Book of Judges, this
process is presented in terms of the clearly defined pattern des-
cribed in the introductory section of the work: ‘Then the Lord
(Yahweh) raised up judges who saved them out of the power of
those who plundered them . . . Whenever Yahweh raised up
judges for them, Yahweh was with the judge; for Yahweh was
moved to pity by their groanings because of those who afflicted
and oppressed them. But whenever the judge died, they turned
back and behaved worse than their fathers, going after other gods,
serving them and bowing down to them; they did not drop any
of their practices or their stubborn ways.’
1 Judges ii. 11-12, 14 (R.S.V.).
2 Judges ii. 16, 18-19 (R.S.V.).
THE REVELATION OF DIVINE PURPOSE I2I
This constant backsliding of Israel from loyalty to Yahweh,

during the period from the Settlement to the beginning of the
monarchy, such as it is represented in the Yahwist sources, is sig-
nificant. It shows that the cult of Yahweh did not naturally ex-
press the religious needs and aspirations of those Semite tribes
that came to be known collectively as Israel. Indeed the very
idea, which finds dramatic expression in the Yahwist narrative,
that the tribes entered at a definite moment into a covenant rela-
tionship with Yahweh, attests the fact that Yahwism was not the
ancestral cult, but one that had been specially adopted. Accord-
ingly, what is denounced as apostasy from Yahweh and ‘going
after other gods’, was, in the early days of the settlement, often a
continuing attachment of the tribes to their ancestral deities
and a lack of zeal for an alien god, whose cult had originally
been accepted for a specific purpose that had now largely been
achieved.
If this interpretation of early Israelite history be sound, it pro-
vides the clue also to understanding the true purpose of the
Patriarchal Saga in the scheme of the Yahwist’s philosophy of
history. A confederation of tribes would be essentially an im-
permanent thing unless some force or common interest worked
for a deeper integration—for an organic unity, so that the several
members might feel that they were related to each other by
natural ties of blood and ancestral tradition. Now, it is this very
thing that the Patriarchal Saga seeks to provide. The theme that
runs throughout is that the Twelve Tribes of Israel have descended,
through the sons of Jacob, from a common ancestor. Conse-
quently, they are all of one blood, a homogeneous people. And
that is not all: for the Saga also shows that, in their possession of
Canaan, they are the inheritors of the promise made by Yahweh,
1‘On peut donc affirmer presque 4 coup sir que le culte de Yahvé a été
introduit dans la confédération des tribus hebraiques par une berit, sans qu’on
puisse préciser, du reste, la forme de cette alliance: alliance entre Moise et le
peuple s’obligeant réciproquement 4 observer le nouveau culte ou alliance entre
Yahvé et le peuple, ou peut-étre entre diverses tribus sous la garantie du Dieu
commun adopté pour patron de la confédération’, Lods, Israél, p. 364. Cf.
Brandon, Time and Mankind, pp. 95-6.
their ancestral god, to succeeding generations of their fore-

fathers.
That this demonstration of Israel’s fundamental homogeneity
and unity of faith was a matter of high concern to the Yahwist
writer is significantly revealed in two ways. First, as we have
already seen, from the literary point of view, the Patriarchal Saga
contains a kind of anticlimax in that, after the repeated promises
that their seed should possess the land of Canaan, the narrative
ends with Jacob and his sons settled in Egypt, with a long and
obscure period to elapse before the Exodus. It would, accordingly,
appear that, having fashioned from the diverse material available
to him, a highly personalized narrative attesting the common
ancestry of the Hebrew tribes settled in Canaan, the Yahwist
could only link this narrative with the Exodus by leaving un-
recorded the vital period during which a nomadic family was
allegedly transformed in Egypt into a nation. In other words,
despite all his literary skill, he could only connect two essentially
different cycles of tradition by this unsatisfactory assumption of a
long tunnel period linking them together.
The other way in which we may estimate the measure of the
Yahwist’s concern to show the essential unity of Israel is by noting
the significance of the fact that, according to the later Priestly
tradition recorded in Exodus vi. 2-3, the patriarchs had not wor-
shipped God under the name of Yahweh, but that this divine
name had first been revealed to Moses. This testimony means
that the Yahwist had himself identified the deity (or deities),
whom the tribal ancestors had worshipped, with Yahweh, the
god of the later Israelite amphictyony.? By so doing, he had, of
course, been able to exhibit the Twelve Tribes as not only of a
common ancestry, but also as the inheritors of an ancestral faith
that was centred on Yahweh.
Consideration of these factors points irresistibly to the con-
Cf. von Rad, Das formgesch. Problem, p. 63; Weiser, pp. 33f., J.Hempel in
Record and Revelation, p. 53; C. R. North, The Old Testament Interpretation of
History, pp. 24-5; Brandon, Time and Mankind, pp. 68, 83-4.
* See the theophany passage in Ex. iii, where Jmakes the identification by a
simple assertion (iii. 16). Cf. Brandon, Man and his Destiny, pp. 107-8.
THE REVELATION OF DIVINE PURPOSE I23
clusion that, when the Yahwist composed his narrative of Israel’s

past, there must have been some pressing need for showing that
the nation was essentially one in origin and faith. The history of
Israel provides several occasions on which such a need must have
been felt. A likely one would have occurred in the years follow-
ing the death of Solomon, when what had for a while been a
united nation became two conflicting states. It is, however, im-
possible to identify the situation with certainty; but the date is
not of primary importance from our point of view, for it is suffi-
cient to note that the Yahwist’s account of the past was motivated
in this manner.
It would, accordingly, appear that the Yahwist, intent on show-
ing the essential unity of Israel in origin and faith, fabricated an
apparent historical narrative that traces out the gradual fulfil-
ment of Yahweh's purpose from the day of his first promise to
Abraham to its ultimate achievement, accompanied by signs and
wonders, attesting his almighty power. As we have seen, the
memory of Yahweh’s mighty deeds in delivering the people from
Egypt and leading them into Canaan, had already become firmly
established in the popular mind by its perpetuation in the cult;
moreover, appeal to that memory constituted also an essential
part of the constant effort of those who sought to maintain the
tribes’ allegiance to Yahweh, which was the basis of the original
Israelite amphictyony. Accordingly, a disposition to see in history,
or what passed then for history, evidence of Yahweh’s provi-
dence for the nation, already existed before the Yahwist began
his composition. But the fact does not lessen his achievement.
For, not only did he weave tribal traditions, disjointed as they
undoubtedly were, into a highly dramatic narrative; but by
fusing the story of the Exodus and Conquest of Canaan with the
Patriarchal Saga, he fashioned a conspectus of the past that showed
the Twelve Tribes as having descended from a common ancestor,
whose god, Yahweh, had wonderfully fulfilled his ancient pro-
mise. Hence, so far as our evidence permits us to know, the
Yahwist writer has the unique distinction of being the first to
1] Kings xii. 1-17. Cf. Noth, History ofIsrael, pp. 226-8; Pfeiffer, Introduction
to Old Testament, p. 147.
employ history to authenticate the peculiar status claimed on

behalf of a deity by his devotees—a status, moreover, that was
deeply implicated with a political situation.
Since we have seen that, prior to the Yahwist’s undertaking, the

tradition was already established of appealing to the witness of
Yahweh’s great deeds in the past, we may naturally enquire
whether the material used by the Yahwist in the Patriarchal Saga
had embodied a similar tradition. Some clue towards an answer
has already been given in the fact that the Yahwist identified the
deity or deities worshipped by the tribal ancestors with Yahweh,
the god of the Israelite amphictyony, although the accepted tradi-
tion was that Yahweh only became the god of Israel through a
covenant enacted about the time of the Exodus. In other words,
whatever had been their nature, these ancestral cults had not been
centred on Yahweh. That this was so is actually admitted in the
farewell speech of Joshua, which we have already noticed. This
ereat Yahwist hero, under whose leadership the invasion of
Canaan was effected, is represented as exhorting the people,
assembled at Shechem: ‘Now therefore fear Yahweh, and serve
him in sincerity and in faithfulness; put away the gods which
your fathers served beyond the River, and in Egypt, and serve
Yahweh. The ‘River’, to which reference is made here, is un-
doubtedly the Euphrates, so that the passage preserves a memory
of the fact that, prior to entering Canaan, the ancestors of Israel,
both in Mesopotamia and Egypt, had worshipped gods other than
Yahweh.
If Yahweh was not, therefore, the original god, it follows that
the material from which the Patriarchal Saga was constructed con-
cerned other deities. What these were is not known, since their
names obviously were not preserved once Yahweh was identified
as the ‘god of the fathers’. It is possible, however, that these gods
had no personal names but were designated by reference to the
tribal patriarch who was first believed to have worshipped them.
It has been reasonably suggested that such curious designations as
1 Jos. xxiv. 14.

the “God of Abraham’ (O973N “1 2N), the ‘Fear of Isaac’ (703

iPS”), and the ‘Mighty One of Jacob’ (apy? YAN), preserve the
memory of the anonymous numina associated with the eponymous
ancestors of the Israelite tribes.! Since many stories of the patri-
archs are connected with sanctuaries as the scenes of theophanies
or cult acts, it is possible that such stories were originally the
hieroi logoi of local sanctuaries taken over by various of the tribes
—indeed many of the tales seem to be, as Professor Adolphe
Lods aptly described them, récits juridiques, i.e. stories explaining
and justifying the Israelite possession of Canaanite sanctuaries;
for it would appear that many of the sacred places of Canaan
were accepted as sacred and used as such by the invading Hebrews.”
Whether the god of such a local sanctuary was merely added to
the tribes’ already existing pantheon, or whether the deity was
identified with an ancestral god cannot be known, because in
their extant form, in the Patriarchal Saga, the legends have already
been adapted to the Yahwist thesis.
Besides stories of such form and origin, the tribal tradition on
which the Yahwist drew undoubtedly contained folk-lore and
legends, such as are common among all primitive peoples. It
would seem unlikely that any of this material was either cast in
historical form or inspired by historical interest, unless the récits
juridiques are to be regarded as such because they sought to justify
possession of sanctuaries by appeal to the past. However that may
be, the achievement of the Yahwist is manifest. For he fashioned
from this amorphous material the consequential narrative of the
Patriarchal Saga, with its high sense of drama and clearly limned
characters, in which he represented the Twelve Tribes as the
descendants of a common ancestor, and the inheritors of the pro-
mise that Yahweh had made to that patriarch. Thereby, as we
have seen, he presented Israel with an interpretation of its past as
1 By Alt, Der Gott der Vater, p. 29, see also pp. 32-48, 51, 74-82. The expres-
sions concerned are in Gen. xxxi. 42, xlix. 24. Cf. Albright, From Stone Age,
pp. 188-9; Brandon, Time and Mankind, pp. 66-7.
2 Cf. Lods, Israél, p. 175, see also p. 471; Weiser, p. 37; Alt, pp. 53-4; von
Rad, Dasformgesch. Problem, pp. 52-3.
3 Cf. Alt, pp. 54-5, 65, 69-70.
the chosen people of Yahweh; for in that past Yahweh had so

signally demonstrated his providence for them.
The fusion of the Patriarchal Saga with the story of the Exodus
and Settlement in Canaan achieved the Yahwist’s purpose, as we
have seen. That he chose to preface this demonstration of Yah-
weh’s providence for Israel with the Primeval History surely
attests still further his remarkable historical sense. For he sets
thereby the drama of Israel’s election as Yahweh’s peculiar people
in the context of world history. Indeed, as we have already
briefly noted, by means of the episode of Noah’s blessing and
cursing of his sons, the story of Israel’s election is cleverly dove-
tailed into the Primeval History, so that Israel’s eventual settle-
ment in Canaan appears as the culmination of Yahweh’s
providential action that commences with the very creation of
man.1 However, while the Primeval History does truly pro-
vide a most impressive prologue to the theme of Israel’s elec-
tion, there is reason for thinking that another motive also
operated in the composition of this narrative, at least in its first
part.
This motive appears to be distinctly theological, and it seems to
stem from a peculiar situation in which the devotees of Yahweh
found themselves, as they strove to make their god supreme in
Israel in the period following the Settlement. The nature of this
motive quickly becomes apparent when the logic of the Yahwist
story of the Temptation and Fall of Adam is considered. Therein
Yahweh is represented as forming man (adam) out of the clay or
dust of the ground (‘adamah), and animating him by breathing
‘the breath of life’ into him.? As part of the penalty for his act of
disobedience, Yahweh pronounces his doom: “dust thou art, and
unto dust shalt thou return’. For’ Adam, deathis to be resolved back
into the ‘adamah from which he was made. Nothing is said of the
nephesh, or of ‘the breath of life’: presumably, since the latter came
1 For fuller treatment of the matter see below, p. 128.
> Gen. ii. 7. Cf. Brandon, Creation Legends of the Ancient Near East, pp-
123-4.
3 Gen. iii. 19. Cf. Brandon, Creation Legends, pp. 138-9.
from Yahweh, it was withdrawn by him.! In other words, as

represented by the Yahwist, the penalty of death decreed for
Adam was virtual annihilation; nothing was left to survive the
dissolution of the body. Moreover, since Adam was the pro-
genitor of mankind, this was inevitably the fate also of each
human being.?
This uncompromising picture of human nature and destiny
does indeed have parallels in Mesopotamian literature, and the
influence of the older tradition may be traced here.? However,
whereas the Mesopotamians generally believed that the gods had
withheld immortality from man,* there is abundant evidence that
mortuary customs and cults were practised by the early Hebrews
that were essentially based upon belief that the dead had some
effective existence after death.® Such belief appears to have been
ancient, and it was connected with deities other than Yahweh.
Consequently the Yahwist party, in the interests of their god,
not only condemned such mortuary cultus but expounded an
eschatology that represented death as virtual annihilation. It is
significant, therefore, that in the Yahwist account of the creation
and fall of Adam a view of human nature and destiny is implied
which provides a rationale for that eschatology.®
If the Yahwist writer thus utilized this opening section of the
Primeval History to expound a specific doctrine of Man, he was
also concerned to provide an intelligible account of the develop-
ment of the human race from its creation down to the point at
which he could begin the Patriarchal Saga. He clearly envisaged
mankind as descended from one pair of ancestors, and as origin-
ally living within the general vicinity of Eden, which means
approximately the area now usually known as the ‘Fertile
1 Since the animals are also formed of the ddamah and are called ‘living souls’
(Gen. ii. 19), the nephesh is evidently conceived as the life-principle, shared by
man and animals. Cf. Brandon, Creation Legends, p. 124.
2 Cf. Brandon, Creation Legends, pp. 133-40; Man and his Destiny, pp. 125-7.
3 Cf. Brandon, Man and his Destiny, pp. 89-101, 103-5.
4 Cf. Epic ofGilgamesh, Tab. X, col. iti, 1-5.
5 Cf. Man and his Destiny, pp. 110-18.
6 Cf, Man and his Destiny, pp. 122-7; Creation Legends, p. 139; in Promise and
Fulfilment (ed. F. F. Bruce), pp. 31-2.
Crescent’. In constructing his narrative, he obviously drew upon

much traditional material. He evidently felt that it behoved him
to explain the origin of many things, from the pain of childbirth
to the origin of viniculture.? In dealing with the latter, there is
reason for thinking that he used some already existing cycle of
legend which explained the invention of wine as a mitigation of
the hard toil of agriculture to which mankind was condemned.*
However, if he were indeed using some established tradition in
this part of his narrative, he kept clearly in mind his main purpose,
namely, that the Primeval History was to serve as a prologue to
the Patriarchal Saga. And so we find that, although he briefly men-
tions that Noah made the first wine,‘ instead of showing how this
act fulfilled the prophecy of Noah’s father that his son ‘shall bring
us relief from our work and from the toil of our hands’,® he
utilizes the incident of Noah’s consequent drunkenness as a means
of introducing the theme of Israel’s election. Noah, on awaking
from sleep and realizing the indignity that his younger son had
done him while drunk, curses him and blesses his two virtuous
sons.® Now, these sons of Noah are the eponymous ancestors of
the three peoples that inhabited Canaan. Hence the significance
of Noah’s cursing and blessing: “Cursed be Canaan; a slave of
slaves shall he be to his brothers’ . . . “Blessed by Yahweh, my
God, be Shem, and let Canaan be his slave. God enlarge Japheth,
and let him dwell in the tents of Shem; and let Canaan be his
slave.’? Thus, in the person of their eponymous ancestor, the
Canaanites incurred the penalty of being made subject to the
descendants of Shem, i.e. the Semites or Hebrews, and those of
Japheth, who are probably to be identified with the Philistines.*
In this adroit manner, the Yahwist prepared not only for the
theme of the Patriarchal Saga, but also for the actual historical
1 Gen. ii. 8-14, iti. 24. Cf. Creation Legends, pp. 125-6.
2 CE Creation Legends, pp. 126-8, 130, 132-8, 139-43.
3Cf. von Rad, Genesis, pp. 103, 132-3; Brandon, Creation Legends, pp.
140-45 (where the significance of the Flood legend in the Yahwist’s scheme is
discussed).
4 Gen. ix. 20-1. 5 Geni v. 28-0. 8 Gen. ix. 24-7.
7 Cf. Creation Legends, pp. 143-5; Time and Mankind, pp. 78-81.
8 Cf. von Rad, Genesis, p. 134.
situation in Canaan where the Philistines had won the coastal

lands from the original inhabitants.
Having thus provided a kind of primordial justification for the
Canaanites’ subjugation to the Israelites and the Philistines, the
Yahwist evidently felt that the point had been reached at which
the Patriarchal Saga should begin. The transition entailed a change
of scope from tracing the development of mankind as a whole to
that of pursuing the fortunes of one family. The transition is
cleverly effected by the episode of the so-called Tower of Babel.
The story seems to derive from a Mesopotamian background;
but so far no cuneiform prototype has been found. Whatever its
origin, the story provides an adequate pretext for discontinuing
the Primeval History: the primeval unity of the human race is
shattered by the confusion of speech which Yahweh causes to
descend upon its members for their act of hubris, and he scatters
them abroad ‘over the face of all the earth’.
And so, in a skilfully articulated narrative, the Yahwist presents
an impressive conspectus of the past, from the very creation of
man down to the settlement of Israel in the land of Canaan. It is a
veritable philosophy of history, and the first ever propounded. It
interprets the past, as the author knew it or chose to depict it, as
the field in which God, identified by him with the Yahweh of
Israel, manifested his providence for Israel. This is the essential
theme of the composition; but, cleverly integrated with it, is the
design to show that the tribes that settled in Canaan were a single
people in origin and religion. As we have seen, a predisposition
to appeal to the past stemmed from the peculiar circumstances of
the Israelite amphictyony and so antedated the Yahwist’s writing;
but his was the genius that wove, out of the disparate traditions of
the tribes, the dramatic narration of the unfolding of Yahweh’s
providence.
Having fashioned his people’s traditions into a national history,

1 Gen. xi. I-9.
2 Cf. von Rad, Das formgesch. Problem, p. 60, Genesis, pp. 143-150; H. Gunkel,
Die Urgeschichte und die Patriarchen, pp. 98-9; O. Procksch, Die Genesis, pp.
85-6; Brandon, Time and Mankind, pp. 85-6.
the Yahwist’s work henceforth inspired and shaped Israel’s con-

ception of its destiny under the hand of Yahweh. And that con-
ception found expression in all forms of the nation’s life, from cult
practice to prophetic utterance; from poetry to historiography,
from apocalyptic to politics.
We have already noted that the great national festival of the
Passover was given an historicized explanation by the Yahwist,
although it is uncertain how far he was responsible for this tranis-
formation of the two primitive rituals which were incorporated
into the festival. A similar problem is connected with the legend
of the Covenant and giving of the Law at Sinai; it has been sug-
gested that the Yahwist has, in his account of this crucial episode,
historicized either a New Year festival or the original amphic-
tyonic covenant feast.? But, whatever the Yahwist’s part in their
origins, both the Passover and the drama of Sinai have mightily
affected the Hebrew conviction that in the past lies the key to the
nation’s destiny. As to the influence of the Yahwist narrative on
prophetic utterance, there is reason for thinking that, by the
middle of the eighth century B.c., the story of Jacob was already
so well known that Hosea could refer as familiarly to it as he did
to the Exodus.?
That the Yahwist’s interpretation of the past was known not
only to the literate but also to ordinary folk, the Psalms provide
eloquent testimony. These hymns were used liturgically, and so
would frequently be heard, and perhaps recited by the people;
some were doubtless used in private devotion.* The following
1Cf. von Rad, Das formgesch. Problem, pp. 68-9; Hempel in Record and
Revelation, pp. 53-4; Brandon, Time and Mankind, pp. 93 f.
® Ex, xix. rf. Cf. D. S. Mowinkel, Le Décalogue, pp. 119-21; von Rad, Das
formgesch. Problem, pp. 31-7; Brandon, pp. 72-4; W. Beyerlin, Herkunft und
Geschichte der diltesten Sinaitraditionen, pp. 173-4, 185-7, 188. See also Rowley,
From Joseph to Joshua, pp. 105-8; Noth, History of Israel, pp. 127-38.
3 Hosea xii. 2-4. Cf. North, Old Testament Interpretation of History, p. 42;
W. R. Harper, Amos and Hosea, p. 373; S. H. Hooke in Peake’s Commentary?,
TOM entOC!
4 ‘Here we see also how the great idea, especially expounded by the prophets,
that the history of Israel is a living together (Zusammenleben) of Yahweh with
his people, influenced the formation of the ideas of later generations. The
verses from Psalm 105 reveal how closely the sequence of the
Yahwist narrative was followed:
O give thanks unto Yahweh, call upon his name;
Make known his doings among the peoples.
Talk ye of allhis eoteaieny tos ee
He is Yahweh our God:

His judgements are in all the earth.
He hath remembered his covenant for ever,
The word which he commanded to a thousand generations:
The covenant which he made with Abraham,
And his oath unto Isaac;
And confirmed the same unto Jacob for a statute,
To Israel for an everlasting covenant:
Saying, Unto thee will I give the land of Canaan,
The lot of your inheritance:
When they were but a few men in number;
Yea, very few, and sojourners in it;
He sent a man before them;

Joseph was sold for a slave
The king sent and loosed him;

Even the ruler of peoples, and let him go free.
He made him lord of his house,
And ruler of all his substance:
Israel also came into Egypt;

And Jacob sojourned in the land of Ham.
And he increased his people greatly,
And made them stronger than their adversaries
He turned their heart to hate his people
To deal subtilly with his servants.
introduction of the sacred legend into the hymn is truly a peculiarly Israelite
phenomenon, for which no parallel can be found in Babylonia or Egypt’,
H. Gunkel, Einleitung in die Psalmen, p. 78, see also pp. 324-7; cf. W. O. E,
Oesterley-T. H. Robinson, Introduction to Old Testament, pp. 182-3, 194, 196-7;
W. J. Pythian-Adams, The Call of Israel, pp. 11 f., 29 f.
He sent Moses his servant,

And Aaron whom he had chosen.
They wrought his signs among them,
And miracles in the land of Ham.
He smote also all the firstborn in their land,

The chief of all their strength.
And he brought them forth with et and gold.
And there was not one feeble person among his tribes.
Egypt was glad when they departed;
For fear of them had fallen upon them.
For he remembered his holy word,

And Abraham his servant.
And he brought forth his people with joy,
And his chosen with singing.
And he gave them the lands of the nations;
And they took the labour of the peoples in possession:
That they might keep his statutes,
And observe his laws,
Praise ye Yahweh.
While the Yahwist’s narrative of Yahweh’s saving acts (so con-

veniently denoted by the German term Heilsgeschichte) was thus
setting the pattern of Hebrew faith, as it found expression in cult,
in prophecy, and poetry, it was also inspiring other writers in
their interpretation of subsequent history. Accordingly, they are
found not merely recording the changing fortunes of Israel, but
judging events and those involved therein, in terms of the
nation’s covenanted relationship with Yahweh. We have already
noted how this criterion is applied by the author of Judges in
chronicling the period immediately following the Settlement. It
similarly provides the underlying theme of the accounts of Saul
and David in the Books of Samuel and Chronicles.2 It does also in
1 Ps, 105. I-2, 7-13, 17, 20-I, 23-7, 36-8, 42-5. Cf. G. W. Anderson in
Peake’s Commentary”, 381.
2 Cf. H. Schmidt, Die Geschichtsschreibung im Alten Testament, p. 24; Weiser,
Glaube und Geschichte, pp. 44-5; Eissfeldt, p. 12; von Rad, Das Geschichtsbild
des Chronistischen Werks, p. 135.
the records of the kings of Judah and Israel in the Books of the
Kings. It finds reflection, too, in the so-called Deuteronomic
theme, namely, that Solomon’s Temple is the unique sanctuary
of Yahweh, which runs through both these books and Chronicles;
for the centralization of the cult at Jerusalem had necessarily to be
justified by an appeal to the sacred past.2
The fact that, throughout all these writings, history is presented
essentially as a drama concerning Israel’s faithfulness to its god, is
symptomatic of that original tension which stemmed from the
amphictyonic relationship, as we have seen. This tension is not
apparent in any other ethnic religion, and the cause surely lies in
the peculiar origins of Yahwism. The Israelites had originally
found the natural expression of their spiritual needs and aspira-
tions in their ancestral cults; the cult of Yahweh had been accepted
only in a specific situation and for a specific purpose, and it would
appear that, but for the zeal of the Yahwist devotees, it would
never have established itself as the national religion through its
own inherent appeal. After the Settlement, the people began to
feel the attraction of the native Canaanite deities, perhaps because
of the association of these deities with the agricultural economy
which had then to be adopted in the place of the old nomadic way
of life. And so the original tension continued, with the result that
the Yahwist devotee came instinctively to see his people primarily
in terms of their faithfulness or disloyalty to Yahweh. Always he
sought to remind them of their covenant relationship, and of
Yahweh’s mighty deeds that had given their ancestors possession
of Canaan. Hence history for the zealous Yahwist was essentially
Heilsgeschichte, the record of Yahweh’s original deliverance of
Israel and of his continuing providence according to the nation’s
deserts.?
What might have happened if, after finally acquiring the whole
of Canaan, Israel had been left in peace to enjoy the land of
1Cf. Pfeiffer, Introduction to Old Testament, pp. 379, 381.
2 Cf. Schmidt, p. 40; Eissfeldt, pp. 16-20; Pfeiffer, pp. 377-83.
3 ‘What is here set forth from the creation of the world, or from the calling
of Abraham, to the completion of the Settlement in Palestine under Joshua is
Yahweh’s ancient promise, is a matter for speculation. But Israel
could not enjoy peace and security, because of its geographical
position. Canaan lay athwart the highway that joined Egypt with
the Mesopotamian kingdoms, and into the conflict that was waged
between these great powers those who dwelt in Canaan were in-
evitably drawn. It would seem that at first the Yahwist prophets
did not recognize the real proportions of the new menace—that
Israel now had to deal, not with small peoples such as Canaanites
or Philistines, but with great military empires. Thus Isaiah even
hailed Assyria as Yahweh’s instrument to chastise his faithless
people. However, the true nature of the new situation gradually
made itself grimly apparent. One of the greatest shocks to the
Yahwist view came with the disastrous end of Josiah. This king
had zealously carried out all the reforms demanded by the Yah-
wists to ensure the absolute supremacy of Yahweh. According to
the logic of their interpretation of history, now should have
dawned the golden age of Israel’s prosperity. Instead, Josiah was
defeated and killed by the Egyptians,” and, within a few decades,
Jerusalem, together with Yahweh’s Temple, was destroyed by the
army of Nebuchadrezzar and the more significant part of the
nation was exiled in Babylonia.’
Quite clearly the traditional pattern of Yahwist apologetic did
not fit the new situation. The power of Israel’s enemies was too
great to permit of any hope of immediate restoration. With
Salvation-History (Heilsgeschichte); one might call it a credo which recapitulates

the chief events of the Heilsgeschichte’, von Rad, Das formgesch. Problem, Dae
Cf. C. R. North in The Old Testament and Modern Study, pp. 73-6; Pedersen,
Israel, I-II, pp. 475-9, I-IV, pp. 653-69; Brandon, Time and Mankind,
pp. 62-3, 94-5; Wildberger, Jahwes Eigentumsvolk, pp. 99-106.
sax, 5.
“It is significant that, while the author of II Kings contented himself with a
mere statement of the fact (xxiii. 29-30), the later writer of II Chron. tried to
explain the theological awkwardness of the event away by representing the
Egyptian king as the agent of God, whom Josiah impiously opposes (xxv. 20-4).
Cf. Lods, Les prophetes d’Israél, pp. 49, 180; E. L. Curtis, Chronicles (I.C.C.),
p- 517 on v. 21; Brandon, pp. 99-100. See also Josephus, Ant. x. 5.
3 Cf. W. O. E. Oesterley-T. H. Robinson, History of Israel, I, pp. 25-413
Noth, History of Israel, pp. 280-9.
Israel enslaved and bereft of its holy land, had Yahweh’s ancient
purpose then been frustrated? The prophets of the Exilic period,
Jeremiah and Ezekiel, who had to handle the difficult situation,
met their problem by a new elaboration of the traditional
Yahwist philosophy of history.1
Jeremiah explains the disasters, that had now befallen Israel, as
Yahweh’s punishment for the nation’s failings, extending back to
the Exodus: ‘From the day that your fathers came out of the land
of Egypt to this day, I have persistently sent all my servants, the
prophets, to them, day after day: yet they did not listen to me, or
incline their ear, but stiffened their neck. They did worse than
their fathers.’ The older pattern, which finds expression in
Judges, namely that repentance is followed immediately by res-
toration, is thus tacitly ignored, and Israel’s past, assessed as a
whole, is seen as meriting such punishment.? However, although
present disaster is proclaimed as the manifestation of Yahweh’s
will, the very genius of Yahwism demanded that restoration
must come. The realities of the existing situation made it in-
evitable that the promise of such restoration should be set in the
future, but a future that was not too closely defined. Hence the
prophet’s pronouncement, significantly guaranteeing the future
by reference to the past: “Therefore, behold, the days come, saith
Yahweh, that they shall no more say, ““As Yahweh liveth, which
brought up the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt’; but,
“As Yahweh liveth, which brought up and which led the seed of
the house of Israel out of the north country, and from all the
countries whither I have driven them; and they shall dwell in
their own land.’ ”* It is further notable that for Jeremiah memory
of the past also significantly moulds his vision of this future
restoration. The glories of David’s reign, when Israel counted as
a power among her nearer neighbours, now set the ideal of the
future: ‘Behold, the days come, saith Yahweh, that I will raise
1Cf. Brandon, Time and Mankind, pp. 100-4.

2 Jer. vii. 25-6; cf. xxv. 4; XXvi. 5; XXix. 19; xxxv. 15; xliv. 4.
8 See above, p. 120. Cf. also Jer. xi. 1-11 with Solomon’s prayer at the
dedication of the Temple (I Kings viii. 33-4, 46-53; II Chron. vi. 24-5, 36-40).
4 Jer. xxiii. 7-8.
unto David a righteous Branch, and he shall reign as a king and

deal wisely, and shall execute judgment and justice in the land.
In his days Judah shall be saved, and Israel shall dwell safely: and
this is his name whereby he ‘shall be called, Yahweh is our
righteousness.! This prophecy, inspiring the Messianic hope,
was destined to have tragic consequences for Israel.”
Ezekiel, Jeremiah’s younger contemporary, developed more
radically, and with a more vivid imagery, the thesis that Israel’s
past had been one long act of apostasy from Yahweh.* He also
promised future restoration; however, that restoration would
come not because Israel deserved it, but because Yahweh had
thereby to vindicate his honour: “Thus saith the Lord God: I do
not this for your sake, O house of Israel, but for mine holy name,
which you have profaned among the nations whither ye went.
And I will sanctify my great name which hath been profaned
among the nations, which ye have profaned in the midst of them;
and the nations shall know that I am the Lord, saith the Lord God,
when I shall be sanctified in you before their eyes. For I will take
you from among the nations, and gather you from out of all the
countries, and will bring you into your own land.’4
The Yahwist philosophy of history thus came to acquire a
forward-looking motif. Its inherent teleology no longer found its
telos in the original acquisition of Canaan; it was projected into
the future, and it became, moreover, charged with a heightened
sense of the nation’s destiny at the hand of its god. Beyond the
restoration of their homeland, the Jews were encouraged to
think that Yahweh’s favour would exalt them in some signal
manner above the nations that oppressed them. Even in the
prophecies of the so-called Deutero-Isaiah, where the celebrated
Servant Sagas seem to develop the theme of the martyred nation,
1 Jer. xxiii. 5-6. Cf. von Rad, Das Geschichtsbild des Chronistischen Werkes,
135; S. Mowinckel, He That Cometh, p. 167.
2 Josephus (Wars vi. 310-15) maintained that his countrymen had been led
by the Messianic hope into their fatal revolt against Rome in a.D. 66-70; cf.
Brandon, The Fall ofJerusalem and the Christian Church, pp. 113-14, 165, n. 2.
See also Mowinckel, pp. 284-6; Noth, History of Israel, pp. 451-2.
3 Ez. xvi, xx. 2-33, xxiii. Cf. Lods, Les prophétes, pp. 245-6.
4 Ez. xxxvi. 22-4. Cf. Lods, Les prophetes, pp. 252, 257-8.
THE REVELATION OF DIVINE PURPOSE 137)
this expectation finds expression: ‘And kings shall be thy nursing

fathers, and their queens thy nursing mothers: they shall bow
down to thee with their faces to the earth, and lick the dust of thy
feet; and thou shalt know that Iam Yahweh, and they that wait
for me shall not be ashamed.”
With the vicissitudes of fortune which Israel endured, from the
Return from the Babylonian Exile in 538 3.c. down to the end of
the national state in A.D. 70, prophecy gradually changed into
apocalyptic. The ancient pattern of interpretation was indeed
still applied: Yahweh had proved his providence for his people in
the past; he was still shaping events for the final and most glorious
achievement of his ancient purpose, namely, the exaltation of
Israel, proved faithful and cleansed by many tribulations. But the
range of Hebrew vision was now greatly broadened, in accord-
ance with the concept of Yahweh as the divine lord of the uni-
verse and the nation’s acquaintance with a wider world than that
of the Fertile Crescent. In consequence, the stage, on which
Yahweh’s purpose was majestically unfolded as it moved towards
its achievement, was now that of world history so far as such a
concept could then be envisaged. The Book ofDaniel provides the
first and most notable evidence of this wider scope. Writing
under the stress of the Seleucid danger, its author transported his
theme to an earlier setting, namely, the reign of the Babylonian
Nebuchadrezzar, so that from that distant standpoint he could
present a conspectus of world-history ranging from the downfall
of the Babylonian empire, on through the rise and fall of Persia
and the career of Alexander of Macedon, to the affairs of the
Seleucid monarchs, in which the fortunes of Israel were then
implicated.? This conspectus is presented as a revelation of the
divine purpose, thus presupposing that all these mighty affairs,
involving all the known world, were directed by the god of
Israel, for the ultimate salvation of his people.
This transformation of the old Yahwist Heilsgeschichte also
1 Isa, xlix. 23; cf. lx. 14. See also Zechariah viii. 22-3.
2 Dan. ii. 31-45, vii-viii, x-xi. Cf. E. Schiirer, Geschichte des jiidischen Volkes,
Il, pp. 505-6, Ill, pp. 186-8; Pfeiffer, Introduction to Old Testament, pp. 750-3,
756-60, 777-80.
marked a new and most notable stage in the development of the

Yahwist doctrine of human nature and destiny. As we have seen,
the Yahwist account of the creation and fall of Adam was moti-
vated by a theological need, namely, to demonstrate the futility
of the ancient mortuary cultus that seemed to menace the estab-
lishment of Yahwism.? In process of time, however, the exaltation
of Yahweh, as both an omnipotent and a just god, exposed the
inadequacy of the traditional Yahwist eschatology as a personal
faith—the Book ofJob eloquently testifies to the poignant nature of
the tension which that inadequacy could occasion to the sensitive
soul.? A solution was finally found by admitting the hope of a
post-mortem life, which, in accordance with the traditional concept
of human nature, entailed a physical resurrection.’ This idea, that
the dead would rise again with their bodies to a new life, because
of the essential ethnicism of Hebrew religion, inevitably took ona
corporate aspect, and as such it entered into the developing
apocalyptic. Consequently, belief in a resurrection of the dead
became associated with the achievement of Yahweh’s purpose in
history. This resurrection seems primarily to have been envisaged
as a revivification of dead Israelites, in order that all of the holy
nation might enjoy the final glorious vindication promised by
their god.* In later thought, and particularly in its Christian
elaboration, this final resurrection, however, was conceived as
including the whole of mankind. And with this resurrection was
linked, from the time of Daniel, the idea of a final divine judg-
ment as an essential constituent of the achievement of Yahweh’s
purpose. The scope of this judgment was also extended to em-
brace all men, and its event was heralded or followed by a uni-
versal cataclysm, so that the telos of Yahweh’s purpose was truly
the end of the present world-order.®
After the return from the Babylonian Exile, the final redaction of
the ancient Yahwist Heilsgeschichte took place, thus attesting both
1 See pp. 126-7. 2 Cf. Brandon, Man and his Destiny, pp. 131-5.
3 Cf. Brandon, op. cit., pp. 137-9.
4 See II Macc. xii. 43-4; Isa. xxvi. 19; Dan. xii. 2, 3.
5 E.g. Il Esdras vii. 32-44 (IV Esra vii. 26-44, in Die Apoc. u. Pseudepig.,
the influence of that work and the desire to make it even more
completely the authoritative exposition of the national conviction
that the God of Israel was the Lord of History. It would seem that
already the original Yahwist narrative had been fused with a
somewhat later tradition, usually designated the Elohist; then to
this composition was added the so-called Priestly record.? This
last addition meant, most notably, that the Yahwist account of the
creation of mankind now received, as a kind of prologue, the
impressive cosmogony that runs from Genesis i. I to ii. 4.3 The
Hebrew philosophy of history, accordingly, comes to compre-
hend the whole course of Time, from the very moment of the
world’s creation to its final catastrophic dénouement, and the whole
vast panorama of events is seen as the gradual unfolding of
Yahweh’s purpose, which has, as its goal, the final triumph of his
chosen people, Israel.
Thus, stemming from the primitive Yahwist’s appeal to the
past, as evidence of their god’s power and care, and given early
and definitive literary form in an inspiring narrative, the Hebrew
conception of history came to permeate the whole life and thought
of the nation. Time was seen, as a linear process, moving majesti-
cally forward, from its beginning in the divine act of creation to
the accomplishment of the divine purpose implicit in that act.4
ed. E. Kautzsch, II, pp. 370-1). Cf. R. H. Charles,A Critical History ofDoctrine of
a Future Life, p.342; W.O. E. Oesterley in New Commentary (Apocrypha), p. 37a.
Cf. Nikolainen, Der Auferstehungsglauben in der Bibel und ihrer Umwelt, I, pp.
132-3; Brandon, op. cit., pp. 138-140; Oesterley-Robinson, Hebrew Religion,
Pp- 342-51; Mowinckel, He That Cometh, pp. 270-79; M. Hengel, Die Zeloten,
pp- 314-15. On the question of Persian influences on Jewish eschatology see
below p. 146. 1Cf. Pfeiffer, Introduction to Old Testament, pp. 168-77.
* Cf. Pfeiffer, op. cit., pp. 188-209.
3 Cf. Brandon, Creation Legends, pp. 146-52.
4 According to Pedersen (L-II, p. 487), ‘For the Israelite time is not merely a
form or a frame. Time is charged with substance or, rather, it is identical with
its substance; time is the development of the very events’, cf. pp. 487-91. It is
more difficult to understand this scholar’s interpretation of the Hebrew ideas of
history and eternity: ‘History consists of dordth, each with their special stamp,
but all the generations are fused into a great whole, wherein experiences are
condensed. This concentrated time, into which all generations are fused, and
from which they spring, is called eternity, “dlam. Eternity is not the sum of all
Thus history was essentially teleology; but it was a teleology that

never shook itself free from its nationalist origins. For the primi-
tive conception of Yahweh, and of the chosen people in whose
destiny he was primarily (indeed almost exclusively) concerned,
remained, for ever, effective. It provided the dynamic of the
Jewish revolt against Rome, which brought catastrophe upon the
nation in A.D. 70;? in it lay, in turn, the secret ofJewry’s ability to
retain its identity through all the long centuries of tribulation
which followed that catastrophe; and it was the ultimate source
of inspiration to that movement which eventually led to the re-
establishment in A.D. 1948 of the Israelite state in the land of
Yahweh’s ancient promise. Nor has that been the sum of all that
this Yahwist Heilsgeschichte has accomplished; we have yet to
trace its mighty influence on Western thought, through its in-
corporation into Christian belief.
* * *
One other of the great religions of mankind involves a view of the

time-process which may, like that of the Hebrews, be described
as teleological. It is the complex of faith and practice that goes
the individual periods, nor even this sum with something added to it; it is
“time” without subdivision, that which lies behind it, and which displays itself
through all times’ (I-II, pp. 490-1). This definition of ‘dlam seems far too meta-
physical when such uses of it as n?ivn, n'ziv, nviy Sw are considered; for
the root meaning is ‘without beginning or end’, rather than another order of
reality. See also such expressions as TY) nviy? (Ps. ix. 6), ‘for ever and ever’;
M¥YTY (Ps. xlix. 20), HYIP (Isa. xiii. 20), DNS] MSY? (Isa. xxxiv. 10): here
again the essential idea seems to be that of unchanging quality or virtue. Cf.
M. Burrows in I.H.A.N.E., pp. 127-8. See also N. S. Snaith’s conception of
‘Horizontal Time’ (in Promise and Fulfilment, pp. 179-87); T. Boman, Hebrew
Thought compared with Greek, pp. 143-54;J.Barr, Biblical Words for Time, pp.
82-104, 153-62.
1 According to Josephus (War II. 118), the founder of the Zealots, Judas of
Galilee, maintained that payment of tribute to Rome was an act of disloyalty
to God: eic dadotacw évijye tots éntymeiovc, xaxilwy ei gpdgov te
“Popatoig teheiv domevodow xai peta tov Oedv oicovor Ovytods Seondtac.
Cf. M. Hengel, Die Zeloten, pp. 114-20, 143-6, 312-15; Brandon, The Fall
ofJerusalem, pp. 104-5, 154-5, 157-9.
under the name of Zoroastrianism. The problem of origins is even

greater here than in the study of Hebrew religion, owing both to
the intractable nature of the extant evidence and to the fact that
the subject has not attracted attention in any way commensurate
to that devoted to the ancient Hebrew writings.!
The completest account of the Zoroastrian Weltanschauung is
contained in certain documents dating from the period closely
following the Arab conquest of Iran (A.D. 652).2 This presenta-
tion is clearly an elaboration of earlier traditions, and it appears to
have been shaped partly by the theological controversy that was
waged in Iran during the Sassanian period (A.D. 226-652). How-
ever that may be, it is a remarkable conception and requires a
brief résumé here.
A time-scheme is employed in this conception which envisages
a consequential series of four trimillennia, during which the whole
drama of the struggle between Good and Evil is played out. Its
opening phases are succinctly stated in the Pahlavi Bundahishn:
‘Time was for twelve thousand years; and it says in revelation,
that three thousand years was the duration of the spiritual state,
where the creatures were unthinking, unmoving, and intangible;
and three thousand years was the duration of Gayémard, and the
Ox, in the world. As this was six thousand years the series of mil-
lennium reigns of Cancer, Leo, and Virgo had elapsed, because it
was six thousand years when the millennium reign came to
Libra, the adversary rushed in, and Gayémard lived thirty years
in tribulation.”
1M. Molé has recently declared (R.H.R., 162, p. 217) that ‘Iln’est pas possible
écrire une histoire du zoroastrisme comme on pourrait écrire une histoire de
Vislam, du christianisme ou du bouddhisme’.
2Cf. R. C. Zaehner, Zurvan, pp. 91-103.
3Cf. Zaehner, ibid., Dawn and Twilight of Zoroastrianism, pp. 175-247;
U. Bianchi, Zaman i Ohrmazd, 95-117, 154-89; J. Duchesne-Guillemin,
Symbolik des Parsismus, pp. 36-40; Molé, R.H.R., 162, pp. 187-91.
4 Bundahishn, XXXIV. 1-2, trans. E. W. West in S.B.E., vol. V, p. 149.
GAyémard(t) was the Primal Man, on the concept of whom see S. S. Hartmann,
Gayémart: Etude sur le syncrétisme dans Dancien Iran, pp. 37-445 Duchesne-
Guillemin, Ormazd et Ahriman, pp. 43, 112; Zaehner, Dawn and Twilight,
pp- 259-60, 262-4, cf. pp. 136-7; Brandon, Creation Legends, pp. 199-202.
The first of these trimillennia implies a primordial situation

which seems so obviously to derive from sophisticated specula-
tion concerning the origin of things that it appears unlikely to
represent early tradition. Thus, according to the Bundahishn,
‘Ohrmazd was on high in omniscience and goodness: for infinite
Time he was ever in the Light. That Light is the Space and place
of Ohrmazd: some call it the Endless Light ... Ahriman, slow in
knowledge, whose will is to smite, was deep down in the dark-
ness: [he was] and is, yet will not be. The will to smite is his all,
and darkness is his place: some call it the Endless Darkness.’ The
primordial situation, here envisaged as fundamentally dualistic,
is true to the ancient tradition of the Gathas.* But the equation of
Ohrmazd with infinite Time (zaman i akanarak) seems to indicate
a maturity of metaphysical reflection until we recall the evidence
already noticed for the early deification of Time in Iran.* The
actual identification of Ohrmazd with Zurvan akarana, i.e. In-
finite Time, may, however, represent orthodox Zoroastrian re-
action to the Zurvanite heresy of the Sassanian era.t Whether it
be or not, the important point for our study is that Iranian
thought conceived of a primordial situation where Time was in-
finite, though this infinity was that of endless sequence rather than
a timeless state of being.®
During the first three thousand years, Ohrmazd and Ahriman
developed the characteristic potentialities of their respective
natures, thus preparing the preconditions of their subsequent acts
of creation.® Foreseeing that Ahriman would oppose him cease-
lessly, Ohrmazd made “Time of the long Dominion’, i.e. Zurvan
daregh6-chvadhata, which was the essential prerequisite of the
existence of created being whereby he planned to ensnare and
destroy his adversary: ‘For Time of the long Dominion was the
1]. 2-3; trans. Zaehner, Zurvan, p. 312. Cf. M. Molé in Sources orientales, ,
pp- 315-16.
2 See below, p. 41. 3 See above, pp. 38-9.
4Cf. Zaehner, Zurvdn, pp. 197, 200, 203. See also M. Molé, R.H.R., 162,
pp. 184-01.
° Cf. Zaehner, Dawn and Twilight, p. 249.
§ Cf. Zaehner, Dawn and Twilight, pp. 250-1.
first creature that he fashioned forth. . . . From the infinite it was

fashioned finite; for from the original creation when creation was
created until the consummation when the Destructive Spirit (i.e.
Ahriman) is made powerless there is a term of twelve thousand
years which is finite.’ !
From the primordial trimillennia the temporal process is
accordingly envisaged as extending forward to a definite telos or
goal, which would be the destruction of Ahriman, the principle
of Evil. In turn, the intervening nine thousand years are seen as
the period of conflict between Ohrmazd and Ahriman, which,
grim though it is in many of its stages, is also the process of the
operation of Ohrmazd’s providence, for it embodies the working
out of his plan of salvation.” In this sense, the Iranian conception
of the cosmic process might be designated Heilsgeschichte; but it
differs most notably from the Hebrew interpretation of history as
the unfolding of the divine purpose. Thus, in the Bundahishn
account of the three trimillennia, the crucial incidents that mark
successive stages in the sacred history, such as the creation and
death of the Primal Man, Gayémard, and of the Primal Ox, the
creation and fall of the first human pair, and the birth of Sao-
shyans, the Saviour, are essentially mythological and no attempt
is made to give them a historical setting as is done with similar
mythical events in the Hebrew philosophy of history.* Zara-
thustra is briefly mentioned as he who delivered ‘the whole
religion’, but the mention comes only in a geographical context,*
although in another writing he is represented as having been born
‘in the middle period’, which lay three thousand years from the
days of Gayémard and three thousand years before the resurrec-
tion.® The specifically eschatological events of the overthrow of
1 Bundahishn, 1. 24; trans. Zaehner, Zurvan, p. 315; cf. Dawn and Twilight,
pp- 251-3.
2 Bundahishn, I. 20 (S.B.E., vol. V, p. 7).
3 Cf. Zaehner, Dawn and Twilight, pp. 261-8, 309-12.
4 Bundahishn, XXIX. 2 (S.B.E., vol. V, pp. 115-16). Similarly in the account
of Zarathustra in the Dinkard, VII, i. 41, v.8 (S.B.E., vol. xlvii, pp. 14-76)
there is no consciousness of the prophet’s significance in the scheme of
Ohrmazd’s providence.
5 Sar Dar, lxxxi. 4-5, in E.R.E., I, p. 206b.
Ahbriman, the resurrectionof the dead, the purgation of all by

molten metal, and the Frashkart or Final Rehabilitation of all
things, are necessarily placed in the future, i.e. in the twelfth mil-
lennium, as are also the corresponding episodes of the Jewish
scheme of divine providence.1
In this Iranian Weltanschauung there is a most remarkable pre-
occupation with Time, as we have noticed, and the chronological
scheme is closely linked with the signs of the zodiac.? Just how
ancient was this interpretation of the cosmic process, and what
factors operated in its inception and development, are matters
about which there is no certain knowledge, owing to the obscure
character and fragmentary condition of much of the surviving
documents. One thing at least does seem certain: the trimillennia
scheme was known as far back as the fourth century B.c., for the
Greek historian Theopompus (c. 378 B.c.) refers to either two or
three of these periods. Indeed what Theopompus says on the sub-
ject clearly shows that the cosmic struggle between the two
opposing deities was already regarded as a process leading to a
definitive telos: ‘according to the sages (rode udyouc), one god is
to overpower, and the other to be overpowered, each in turn
(4d péooc) for the space of three thousand years, and afterward
for another three thousand years they shall fight and war, and the
one shall undo the works of the other, and finally Hades ("Avénr)
shall pass away; then shall the people be happy, and neither shall
they need to have food nor shall they cast any shadow. And the
god, who has contrived to bring about all these things, shall then
have quiet and shall repose for a time, no long time indeed, but
for the god as much as would be a moderate time for a man to
sleep.’
1Cf. Zaehner, Dawn and Twilight, pp. 306-20; Molé, R.H.R., 162, pp.
212-17.
® Bundahishn, XXXIV. 1-6 (S.B.E., vol. V, 149-50). Cf. N. Sdderblom in
E.R.E., I, pp. 205a-206a, 209a; Zaehner, Dawn and Twilight, pp. 206, 238,
242, 250.
3 Plutarch, De Iside et Osiride, 370 B-c.; trans. F. C. Babbitt, Plutarch’s
Moralia (Loeb Classical Library), vol. V, p. 115. On the meaning of dvd pégoc,
see Sdderblom in E.R.E., V, p. 208a, who concludes that only two trimillennia
are concerned. The reference to the peoples having no need of food in the last
As we have already seen, the idea of the derivation of both

Good (Ohrmazd) and Evil (Ahriman) from Time can also be
traced back in Greek sources to the fourth century B.c.! Accord-
ingly, it would seem reasonable to suppose that the temporal
aspect, or extension, of cosmic dualism was a deeply rooted con-
cept of the Iranian mind. Whether it did originally stem from the
teaching of Zarathustra is not clear from the records of his teach-
ing preserved in the Gathas. That the prophet envisaged a be-
ginning of the struggle between the personifications of Good and
Evil, and an end which took the form of a judgment of individual
persons, associated possibly also with a universal conflagration, is
very evident.? However, when this earliest expression of Iranian
dualism is considered, it seems inevitable that such an evaluation
of the cosmic process must involve a conception of conflict which
is extended throughout the course of Time. Moreover, it would
appear on reflection that the temporal extension of such conflict
must necessarily follow one of three distinctive patterns. Either
the struggle must be an endless process, or it follows a cyclic pat-
tern or alternating rhythms, like the Chinese concept of Yin-
Yang,* or it moves steadily towards an end at which the conflict
will be finally resolved. This latter alternative does in fact repre-
sent a process which is not logically dualistic, since the very solu-
tion ends the dualism through the triumph of the one party and
defeat of the other. In this sense, therefore, Zoroastrianism, in
both its earliest and later expressions, was not an absolute dualism
but a teleology. In other words, the cosmic process is seen as em-
bodying the purpose of Ohrmazd, and its various stages consti-
tute decisive phases in the gradual, but inevitable, achievement of
that purpose. However, as we have already noted, the unfolding
age is particularly significant, since, according to the Bundahishn, XXX. 1-3,
mankind will gradually give up food before the coming of Saoshyans, the
Saviour. Cf. J. Bidez-F. Cumont, Les mages hellénisés, Il, pp. 72, 78, n. 22, 24.
1 See above, p. 38.
2 Yasna xxx. 2-5, xlv. 2~7. Cf. Brandon, Creation Legends, pp. 194-9; Man
and his Destiny, p. 277; Zaehner, Dawn and Twilight, pp. 58-60. Even if the
relevant Gathic passages are to be interpreted liturgically, as M. Molé suggests
(R.H.R. 162, p. 62), ‘la Rénovation aura lieu 4 la fin des temps’.
3 See above, p. 77, D- 2.
of this divine purpose was not identified with the course of human
history as it was known to the Iranians. Inscriptions of the
Achaemenian kings do indeed show some consciousness of divine
election,! and the Sassanian dynasty marked a revival of Zoro-
astrianism;? but Iranian thinkers never apparently attempted to
relate their nation’s history to the cosmic struggle between
Ohrmazd and Ahriman, as the Hebrew prophets interpreted the
fortunes of Israel in terms of Yahweh’s providence.
It had long been recognized that the Iranian Weltanschauung in-

fluenced the development of Jewish eschatology, and further
confirmation has come from the writings of the Jewish sect re-
covered at Qumr4n.* But this influence seems to have been con-
fined to speculation about the future of the world, and there is no
evidence that the Iranian conception of ‘Infinite Time’ and “Time
of the long Dominion’ affected either Jewish thought, or that of
Christianity which derived from it. The incorporation of this con-
ception into the theology of Mithraism we have already dis-
cussed,* and we may note here that its influence can also be traced
in Manichaeism.> However, owing to the Jewish origins of
Christianity, it has been the Hebrew interpretation of history as
1 Cf. G. G. Cameron in I.H.A.N.E., pp. 89, 90, 91, 93-4; Zaehner, Dawn and
Twilight, pp. 155-9.
2 Cf. Zaehner, Dawn and Twilight, pp. 175-8. In the sketch of Iranian history
given in the Dinkard, VII, vii-viii. 9 (S.B.E., vol. xlvii, pp. 82-96) no attempt
is made to relate these vicissitudes of the national fortune to the scheme of
Ohrmazd’s providence. Alexander, who overthrew the Achaemenian empire,
is indeed regarded as an agent of the demon Aeshm (VIL, vii. 7), but no com-
ment is made on the significance of his conquest of Iran. This apparent in-
difference contrasts notably with the attitude of the Hebrew prophets to their
Assyrian, Babylonian and Seleucid foes.
3 Cf. Ed. Meyer, Ursprung und Anfange des Christentums, II, Pp- 97, 106-11;
Ch. Guignebert, Le monde juif vers le temps de Jésus, pp. 139-41; Oesterley-
Robinson, Hebrew Religion, pp. 344-53; H. W. Huppenbauer, Der Mensch
zwischen zwei Welten, pp. 10-11, 26-44, 67-75, 80-8, 95-119; Duchesne-
Guillemin, The Western Response to Zoroaster, pp. 86-96.
° Cf. H. C. Puech, Le Manichéisme, pp. 158-9; Geo Widengren, Mani und
der Manichdismus, pp. 48-51, 61-2, 71-2.
the revelation of the divine purpose, and not the Iranian view of
Time, that has exercised the greater influence on human thought
as we have yet to see.!
1Tt may be noted that the Weltanschauung of Islam is based upon a pro-
vidential interpretation of history which is largely derived from Judaism and
Christianity. Commenting upon the early development of Islam, i.e. to about
750, in this connection, J. O. Obermann observes: ‘In this eventful era the idea
of history discernible among the adherents of Islam considered as a whole may
be defined as a complex of notions derived from wholly heterogeneous spheres:
the monotheistic and universalistic conception of the past as developed in the
cultural evolution of Judaism and Christianity, the particularistic, genealogical,
essentially factional conception inherent in pagan-nomadic society of the
northern Arabs; and the peculiar amalgamation of these conceptions as ex-
hibited in the teachings of Mohammed’ (in I.H.A.N.E., p. 281; see also pp.
307-8 on the significance of the Mugaddima f’'t-ta’rikh of Ibn Khaldin).
CHAPTER SIX
History asa Two-Phased Plan

in a Divine Teleology.
HRISTIANITY has often been described as the historical re-

Ge par excellence, and apologists have claimed that its
historical character attests its superiority to other religions. But in
what sense it is an ‘historical religion’ is rarely stated with clarity
and in detail. Generally one of two different aspects of Christianity,
each of which might reasonably be described as ‘historical’, is
meant: sometimes the two aspects are confused. On the one hand,
Christianity may fairly be regarded as ‘historical’ in view of its
constant and essential reference back to certain events which are
alleged to authenticate its claims. Thus it is claimed that Jesus of
Nazareth, who lived in Palestine during the reigns of the Roman
emperors Augustus and Tiberius, was the incarnated Son of God;
that his crucifixion, ordered by the Roman procurator Pontius
Pilate, was really a sacrifice made for the salvation of mankind;
that the alleged resurrection of the crucified Jesus and his ascen-
sion into the heavens confirmed both his divine character and
completed his work of salvation. These claims are obviously
theological in character, and they are based upon a number of a
priori assumptions of a theological nature; but, they are essentially
related to both an identifiable historical person and an identifiable
historical situation.t So fundamental to the structure of Christian
belief has been this historical reference that, from a very early
period, it has been embodied, quintessentially, in the official
creeds in the words, ‘suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified,
1 Cf. H.-J. Wendland, Geschichtsanschauung und Geschichtsbewusstsein im Neuen

Testament, pp. 7-8, 21-3; C. H. Dodd, History and the Gospel, pp. 18-38;
C. C.J. Webb, The Historical Element in Religion, p. 36; O. Cullmann, Christus
und die Zeit, pp. 15, 16-17, 19, 23-4; in Numen, I, pp. 120-35; S. G. F. Brandon
in Numen, Il, pp. 156-8.
148
HISTORY AS A TWO-PHASED PLAN 149
dead and buried’.+ Christianity may, however, also be designated

‘historical’, when it is seen as a soteriology, based upon a distinc-
tive interpretation of history. But what passes for history here is
not limited to the career of Jesus of Nazareth; it is the whole
sequence of events, from the Creation of the World to the Found-
ing of the Church, that is set forth in what are significantly
entitled the Old and the New Testaments. This aspect of Christi-
anity has been so affective historically that it has led to the estab-
lishment of a distinctive chronological system: the whole course
of Time being divided into two eras, designated respectively
‘before Christ’ and ‘anni Domini’, with the birth of Christ consti-
tuting the point of demarcation.” According to this interpretation,
history demonstrates the providence of God, not, as the Jews
believed, to achieve the destiny of a chosen people, but to accom-
plish the salvation of a fallen humanity. —
Whether Christianity be considered an historical religion in
either or both of these senses, its involvement in the problem of
historical significance is clearly an issue of fundamental concern.
It wili, accordingly, be the task of this chapter to examine the
earliest forms of this involvement, and to trace out the main lines
of its development.
An enquiry into the nature of the primitive Christians’ interest in

the historical factors or aspects of their faith at once encounters
the many complex problems involved in the study of the New
Testament. At first sight the most notable of the writings, which
make up this official corpus of what might be called the title deeds
of the faith, exhibit a strong historical character. Pride of place is
given to the Gospels, which appear to be narrative accounts of the
career of Jesus of Nazareth. These documents, although they re-
cord a number of miraculous happenings, place Jesus firmly in the
context of Palestinian life during the first three decades of the first
1 Already in an embryonic credal statement in I Timothy vi. 13 f. the reference
occurs ami Iovriov IAdrov. Cf. J. N. D. Kelly, Early Christian Creeds, pp. 20,
II4-I5, 119, 149-50.
2Cf Cullmann, Christus und die Zeit, pp. 13-15; L. Koep in R.A.C., Ill,
58-9.
L
century of the present era.1 References are made to persons and

situations identifiable from other historical sources. These
Gospels are succeeded, in the arrangement of the canon, by the
Acts of the Apostles, which maintains the apparent historical in-
terest implicit in the Gospels: the development of the movement
inaugurated by Jesus is traced from the time of his Ascension to
Paul’s coming to Rome—in other words, despite the recording
of some miracles, the impression given by this document is that
of a carefully composed historical account of the more significant
stages in the progress of Christianity, from its origins as a tiny
group of Jews devoted to Jesus to a world-faith established in the
metropolis of the Roman Empire.? None of the other writings
of the New Testament have this apparent historical character or
interest. With one exception, they have an epistolary form; the
majority being ascribed to Paul. This apostle is one of the main
figures in the narrative of the Acts, where he is portrayed as the
apostle par excellence, whose devoted labours were chiefly re-
sponsible for planting Christian communities throughout Asia
Minor and Greece. Paul’s letters are, however, notably deficient
in historical reference. They do indeed contain some valuable bio-
graphical material,* as well as some incidental mention of Paul’s
movements and those of his assistants; but the expositions given
in them of Christian belief are remarkable for their lack of refer-
1 The statement, Matt. ii. 1, that Jesus was born during the reign of Herod
(the Great) means that he was born before 4 B.c., the date of Herod’s death.
Cf. E. Klostermann, Das Matthdusevangelium, pp. 11-13, 18; F. Schmidtke in
R.A.C., Ill, 49-50. This earlier dating, as compared with that of Luke, does not
affect Matthew’s dating for the Crucifixion, i.e. during the procuratorship of
Pontius Pilate (26-36 a.D.).
2 E.g. of Jewish personages: Herod the Great, Archelaus, Herod Antipas,
Caiaphas; of Roman: Augustus, Quirinius, Tiberius, Pontius Pilate. Identifiable
historical situations are less numerous. Archelaus’s succession to Herod in
Judaea in 4 B.c. may be cited (Matt. ii. 22). Luke’s celebrated mention of the
census ordered by Augustus (ii. 1-2) has, however, become a notorious crux for
New Testament scholars; cf. F. X. Steinmetzer in R.A.C., II, 969-71.
3 Cf. The Beginnings of Christianity (ed. F. J. Foakes Jackson and K. Lake), II,
pp. 175£.; J. Weiss, Urchristentum, p. 25; Ch. Guignebert, Le Christ, pp. 58-9;
S. G. F. Brandon, The Fall ofJerusalem and the Christian Church, pp. 208-13.
4E.g. Gal. i. 11-41. 21.
HISTORY AS A TWO-PHASED PLAN Ist
ence to Jesus as an historical person in the historical setting so

vividly depicted in the Gospels. This apparent absence of historical
concern might be explained as fortuitous but for the fact that it is
off-set by a presentation of Jesus in an imagery and terminology,
remarkable alike for their esoteric and non-historical character.
The problem of this discrepancy between the Gospels’ pre-
sentation of Jesus and that of Paul is made the more serious and
perplexing by the fact that Paul’s writings antedate the earliest of
the Gospels by at least some ten to fifteen years. This means, in
effect, that Paul’s is the earliest account of Christianity that we
possess; however, the significance of his testimony is uncertain,
owing to the evidence that his own Epistles provide that his
authority as an exponent of the faith was being powerfully con-
tested within the Church. The issue involved here is so compli-
cated, besides being of the greatest importance for our under-
standing of the most vital stage of Christian Origins, that it will
require considerable investigation both of itself and of a number
of related topics.
We must, to this end, turn first to the Synoptic Gospels, which,
though later in composition than Paul’s Epistles, do most evi-
dently contain much early Palestinian tradition about Jesus and
the origins of the movement which he inspired. The original
form of this tradition is often difficult to discern, because it has
frequently been altered by subsequent interpretation or preserved
in a different context. However, it is possible to be reasonably
assured about certain matters. One of these, of great significance
for our subject, concerns the teaching ofJesus. He is stated to have
commenced his mission in Galilee with the message: “The time
(kawgdc) is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand: repent
ye.’* The statement indicates that Jesus thought and spoke in the
1 See below, pp. 159-71.
2T.e. taking the Galatian Epistle as dating about 49 and the Gospel of Mark
65-75.
aie i. 15. Cf. Guignebert, Jésus, pp. 394-5; M. Goguel, Life of Jesus,
pp. 311-12; Wendland, pp. 10, 69-70. “Das Charakteristische fiir den Kairos
ist, dass es sich hier um einen inhaltlich bestimmten Zeitpunkt handelt, . . .’;
Cullmann, Christus und die Zeit, p. 33, see also pp. 33-8,J.Barr, Biblical Words
for Time, pp. 20-81, 120-1.
I§2 HISTORY, TIME AND DEITY
tradition of Jewish apocalyptic, which in turn stemmed from the

characteristic message of the Yahwist prophets.? The traditional
note of urgency is sounded; the passage of Time is regarded as
significant; a moment of crisis is announced and proclaimed
definitive. Whatever the ‘kingdom (Baoieia) of God’ might
mean in this context,? its arrival was clearly conceived as the
achievement of a divine purpose.
The note of urgency in this first recorded utterance of Jesus is
echoed throughout the Gospel accounts of his actions and teach-
ing. Although it is generally impossible to distinguish what Jesus
actually taught from the earliest interpretations of his teaching
recorded in the Gospels, it is evident that the original disciples
expected that the order of things in Palestine, as they knew it,
would very soon be brought to an end by some signal interven-
tion of God.* This expectation was naturally inspired and coloured
by the Messianic hope that had long become an integral part of
the Jewish Weltanschauung.* As the political fortunes of Israel had
worsened, the belief strengthened that Yahweh would vindicate
his honour by a marvellous restoration of his chosen people. The
nature and manner of this restoration were never clearly defined,
since belief in its accomplishment was stated in the colourful
imagery and fervent utterance of prophets and apocalyptists. The
form it might take ranged from the restoration of Israel’s national
independence to the replacement of the present cosmic order by
a new world, created by God, with a heavenly Jerusalem as its
centre. The manner of its achievement varied correspondingly,
from the overthrow of the Roman government in Judaea to a
1 Cf. Wendland, pp. 10-12; Cullmann, pp. 31-2.
2 Cf. Guignebert, Jésus, pp. 395-428; Goguel, Life of Jesus, pp. 312-13;
Beginnings of Christianity, 1, pp. 269-82; T. W. Manson, The Teaching ofJesus,
pp. 118-41; V. Taylor, Gospel according to St. Mark, pp. 114-15, 166-7; J.
Klausner, Jesus of Nazareth, pp. 245-6; R. Bultmann, Theology of the New
Testament, I, pp. 4-8.
SE.g. Mk, xiii. 29-30. Cf. R. Bultmann, Die Geschichte der synoptischen
Tradition, p. 130, Ergainzungsheft, p. 19; Theology of the New Testament, I,
pp- 37-9; Taylor, p. 521.
4 Cf. S. Mowinckel, He That Cometh, pp. 261-450; T. W. Manson, Studies in
the Gospels and Epistles, pp. 124-45.
HISTORY AS A TWO-PHASED PLAN USM)
universal cataclysm in which the earth and the stellar bodies

would perish.1 Whatever the imagery used, this expectation, that
the existing order would soon be definitively changed, stemmed
from that Heilsgeschichte, in which every Jew was educated. As we
have seen in the preceding chapter, such an interpretation in-
volved a conception of Time as the gradual achievement of the
purpose of God, foretold, howbeit cryptically, in ancient promise
and prophecy.
The original Jewish Christians evidently shared in both these
conceptions of the achievement of the divine purpose. According
to the record of Acts, the disciples asked the Risen Jesus: “Lord,
wilt thou at this time restore the kingdom (facvdefav) unto
Israel?’, thereby implying a political fulfilment of the Messianic
hope.? On the other hand, the apocalyptic passages of the Synop-
tic Gospels indicate a belief that the present world-order will be
terminated by the coming of the Son of Man, attended by cosmic
catastrophe.? But, whatever the manner in which the end was
conceived, it was clearly regarded by the first Christians as immi-
nent,? and it was seen as the culmination of the sacred Heils-
geschichte, with which they were familiar from childhood.
Whether Jesus had claimed to be the Messiah remains uncertain;
but abundant evidence exists that he was so regarded by his first
followers.® If this belief had existed before his Crucifixion, as it
1 According to Josephus, Wars, vi. 310-15, the Jews were led into their fatal
resistance to Rome in 66-70 through a belief that their land would produce a
world-ruler; cf. Brandon, Fall ofJerusalem, p. 113. See also the implication of
Acts i. 6. For the linking of the Messiah’s coming and the end of the world see
Mk. xiii. 24-7; cf. Taylor, pp. 517-19. Cf. E. Schiirer, G.J.V., IL, pp. 532-7,
538-53.
2 Acts i. 6. Cf. Beginnings of Christianity, IV, p. 8; Mowinckel, pp. 293, 303,
320; Schiirer, G.J.V., I, pp. 538-44; M. Simon, Recherches d’Histoire judéo-
chrétienne, pp. 9-II.
3 Mk. xiii. 24-7; Matt., xxiv. 29-31, xxv. 31 f. Lk. xvii. 22-37, xxi. 25-8.
4 Mk. ix. 1, xiii. 29-30; Matt. x. 23. See also p. 152, n. 3 and Cullmann,
Christus und die Zeit, pp. 75-6. On the question of the origin of the primitive
Christian eschatology see W. G. Kiimmel in N.T.S., V (1958-9), pp. 113-26.
5 Perhaps the most significant evidence is the fact that Paul can already,
i.e. within some twenty years of the Crucifixion, use the term Christos, without
explanation, when writing to his Gentile converts—quite clearly the title, used
must surely have done, Jesus would have been recognized as the
agent divinely appointed to accomplish God’s promise to redeem
Israel. Such a recognition would suggest that Jesus was expected
to play the leading réle’in overthrowing the Roman rule in
Judaea. His Crucifixion by Pontius Pilate certainly indicates some
serious political involvement, although subsequent Christian
tradition has strenuously denied this, representing Jesus as keeping
carefully aloof from Israel’s cause against Rome. Into the funda-
mentally important, but exceedingly difficult, problem involved
here our present subject does not oblige us to enter.? Instead it will
suffice, first, to notice that the New Testament documents clearly
attest to the fact that, after the Crucifixion, the disciples of Jesus
expected him to return shortly, in great power and glory, to ful-
fil his Messianic office.? Now, this survival of belief in Jesus as the
Messiah, despite his Crucifixion, was truly remarkable, especially
since there was no contemporary expectation that the Messiah
would first be defeated and killed by the enemies of Israel. That
his disciples did indeed continue to regard Jesus as the Messiah is
undoubtedly to be explained as due to their conviction that their
Master had been raised from death. But, however profound was
this conviction, it would seem inevitable that his death by cruci-
fixion constituted a grave objection to his being the Messiah; for,
in connection with Jesus, was thoroughly established and familiar. See also Mk.
viii. 27-30 and synoptic parallels.
2 Cf. S. G. F. Brandon, ‘Jesus and the Zealots’, in the Annual ofLeeds University
Oriental Society, I (1959-61), pp. 11-25.
3 E.g. I Thess. iv. 16-17; Mk. xii. 26-7; Matt. xxiv. 30-1; Lk. xxii. 27. See
also the account of the death of James in the writings of Hegesippus (apud
Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History Ul, xxiii. 1-19), which probably preserves a
primitive Palestinian tradition; cf. Brandon, Fall ofJerusalem, pp. 97-8. Cf.
R. B. V. Scott in N.T.S., V, pp. 127-32.
4 Cf. J. Klausner, From Jesus to Paul, pp. 139-40; G. F. Moore, Judaism, I,
pp. 551-2; Schiirer, G.V.J., Il, pp. 553-6; J. Brierre-Narbonne, Le Messie souff-
rant dans la littérature rabbinique, pp. 1-2; Guignebert, Le monde juif vers le temps
de Jésus, pp. 191-8; Mowinckel, pp. 327-30. Even if the Qumrdn sectaries con-
ceived of a suffering Messiah, as has been suggested, it would but attest that
such an idea was not generally accepted. Cf. H. H. Rowley in B.J.R.L., vol. 44
(1961), pp. 127-8.
HISTORY AS A TWO-PHASED PLAN I5$
not only was the death of the Messiah not contemplated, but the
idea of a crucified Messiah was a skandalon, since crucifixion was
the accursed death of the Law.1 Consequently, even if their belief
in the Resurrection of Jesus helped to restore the disciples’ faith, it
was still necessary to account for his Crucifixion, if Jesus were to
be presented as the Messiah to other Jews. It was the attempt made
to meet this difficulty that seems to have provided the cause of the
original Christian preoccupation with the historical circumstances
of the life of Jesus.
The Gospel of Luke has fortunately preserved a clue to the way
in which the original disciples began to explain the problem of the
Crucifixion. In describing the doubt and perplexity of two par-
ticular, but representative, disciples a few days after the Cruci-
fixion, one of them is depicted as thus answering a question
concerning what made him and his companion look so sad:
‘Concerning Jesus of Nazareth, who was a prophet mighty in deed
and word before God and all the people, and how our chief
priests and rulers delivered him up to be condemned to death,
and crucified him. But we had hoped that he was the one to
redeem Israel.’ The unknown stranger who questions them, and
who, according to the narrative, was the Risen Jesus, is then
represented as reproving them: “O foolish men, and slow of heart
to believe all that the prophets have spoken! Was it not necessary
that the Christ (i.e. the Messiah) should suffer these things and
enter into his glory? And beginning with Moses and all the
prophets, he interpreted to them in all the scriptures the things
concerning himself.’* This account surely preserves a memory of
how the Crucifixion originally constituted an obstacle to accept-
ance ofJesus as the Messiah, and how that obstacle was overcome.
In accordance with Jewish custom, search was made for scriptural
warranty for the idea of a Suffering Messiah. By an ingenious
exegesis such confirmation was not difficult to find: the Suffering
Servant of Yahweh in the prophecies of Isaiah afforded a very
convenient prototype.*
1 Deuteronomy xxi. 22-3; Gal. iti. 13; I Cor. i. 22-3.
2 Lk. xxiv. 19-21 (R.S.V.). 3 xxiv. 25-7 (R.S.V.).
4Cf. M. Goguel, La naissance du Christianisme, pp. 61-3 (E.T., pp. 47-8);
It is evident, however, that the problem of the Crucifixion pro-
duced not only an apologetic based on scriptural precedents; it
caused also_a deep interest in the events that led up to the exe-
cution of Jesus. This is clearly attested by the fact that in each of
the Gospels a disproportionate space is given to narrating the
events of the last few days before the Crucifixion. The well-
ordered sequence of events in these narratives, despite certain dis-
crepancies, indicates that the memory of them was quickly con-
solidated into an established tradition.1 Although such interest in
so poignant a drama may rightly be deemed natural, it is probable
that apologetic concern was also a powerful factor. Since Jesus
was executed by the Romans, his death could be regarded as that
of a martyr for Israel, even though it made acceptance of his
Messiahship more difficult.2 The part which the Jewish legal and
ecclesiastical authorities had in his condemnation would indeed
have constituted a problem; but what was the extent of their
responsibility is uncertain; for we shall presently notice evidence
in the earliest of the Gospels of an attempt to shift responsibility
for the Crucifixion from the Romans to the Jews.*
It would appear, then, that both apologetic concern and natural
interest operated, from the very beginning of Christianity, to pre-
serve the memory of the events immediately leading to the Cruci-
fixion of Jesus. In what manner and how soon the memory of
them attained the form of a fixed tradition is unknown. It would
seem most probable that at first the tradition was oral. Whether
it was then maintained and passed on by liturgical recitation or in
instruction to new disciples is a subject for speculation only—it
would seem likely that, from the beginning, the celebration of
the Lord’s Supper would have involved some formal reference to
V. Taylor, Formation of the Gospel Tradition p. 61; Bultmann, Theology of the
New Testament, I, pp. 45-6; Brandon, Man and his Destiny in the Great Religions,
pp- 201-3.
1Cf. Taylor, Formation of the Gospel Tradition, pp. 44-62; Bultmann, Gesch.
d. Synopt. Trad., pp. 297-308, Erganzungsheft, p. 42.
* Cf. Bultmann, op. cit., p. 306, Erganzungsheft, p. 42; C. K. Barrett in New
Testament Essays (ed. A. J. B. Higgins), pp. 11-15; E. Lohmeyer in Congrés
d’Histoire du Christianisme (ed. P.-L. Couchoud), Il, pp. 121-37.
HISTORY AS A TWO-PHASED PLAN TSW,
the circumstances of its institution.! At what stage the so-called

Passion Narrative received a written form is not known.? The
Markan Gospel provides our earliest evidence of it. The author of
Luke refers to ‘many (who) have undertaken to compile a narra-
tive of the things which were accomplished among us’;? but
whether some other account of the Passion than that of Mark is
included here is not certain—Luke’s Passion Narrative shows a
certain independence from the Markan version.*
The preface to the Lukan Gospel, from which quotation has
just been made, deserves further attention, since mention is made
there of another factor of basic significance for our understanding
of the historical element in primitive Christianity. In the passage
concerned, Luke says that others had compiled their accounts of
Jesus, ‘just as they were delivered to us by those who from the
beginning (azx’ doyijc) were eyewitnesses (adtdatar) and ministers
of the word (éanoérar . . . tod Adyov)’.® It would, accordingly,
appear that there were in the primitive Christian community cer-
tain people who were recognized as ‘eyewitnesses’ of the life of
Jesus. Paul also refers to a group of persons who might be des-
cribed as ‘eyewitnesses’, but he cites them as witnesses only to
appearances of the Risen Jesus. However that may be, it is
1See p. 156, n. 1. Paul’s introductory words ("Ey@ ydg nagédaBov and tot
xugtov) to his directions about the celebration of the Lord’s Supper, I Cor. xi.
23, can be variously interpreted (cf. J. Weiss, Der erste Korintherbrief, pp. 283-4;
H. Lietzmann, An die Korinther, I-Il, p. 58); but whatever their meaning, the
fact remains that the raison d’étre of the rite involved a reference back to the
events of the Passion. Cf. M. Goguel, L’Eglise primitive, pp. 350-8.
2 Cf. Taylor, Formation of the Gospel Tradition, pp. 48-50.
3 Lk. i. 1. ‘énuyewetv may be used (as Acts xix. 13) of undertakings which
the speaker or writer criticizes adversely, but this criticism is not implied by the
word itself. . ., and is not to be understood here’, J. M. Creed, The Gospel
according to St. Luke, p. 3.
4 Cf. Creed, op. cit., p. lviii; Taylor, Formation of the Gospel Tradition, pp.
194-201.
5 Lk. i. 2. Cf. Creed, p. 4; Taylor, op. cit., pp. 38-43.
8 I Cor. xv. 3-8. It must be noted that Paul includes himself in this list, thus
apparently equating his own experience, donegel TH Extewpat, with that of
the original disciples. Cf. J. Munck, ‘Paulus Tanquam Abortivus’, in New
Testament Essays (ed. A. J. B. Higgins), pp. 180-93.
evident that a high value was set upon the testimony of those who
could claim that they had personally seen, and had presumably
heard, Jesus while he was on earth.
If, as we have seen, attention was concentrated upon the events
of the Passion, this does not mean that the original Christians had
little interest in the earlier period of Jesus’ career. Indeed the
Gospels witness to a lively concern in the actions and teaching of
Jesus before his last fatal journey to Jerusalem. On analysis a
variety of motives appear to have operated for the preservation
of these accounts: predominant among them was that of demon-
strating the supernatural power and authority of Jesus, thus
attesting his Messianic character.! That this should be so is easily
understandable, when it is recalled that the first missionary efforts
of the original Jewish Christians were directed towards winning
their fellow countrymen, and that the first converts for instruc-
tion were Jews. Hence, the obvious line for their propaganda to
take was that of showing how Jesus, by word and deed, had
proved that he was the Anointed of God for whose coming
Israel had hoped and waited.? It was natural, therefore, that such
demonstration should take a narrative form: incidents in the
career of Jesus were related to show that he was ‘not as other men
are’, but was indeed the Christ, the “Holy One of God’.? Con-
sequently, a tradition about Jesus was gradually established which
consisted mainly of stories about him, and in these a fair measure
of the original background was remembered, thus providing an
impression of historical concern.
The Church of Jerusalem, which comprised the original com-
munity of the Jewish disciples of Jesus, did not survive the Roman
destruction of Jerusalem in A.D. 70.4 Its records perished with it;
1E.g. Lk. vii. 18-23; cf. Creed, pp. 104-6. Cf. Bultmann, Gesch. d. synop.
Trad., pp. 233-46, Erganzungsheft, p. 32; Taylor, Formation of Gospel Tradition,
pp. 131-4.
2 Cf. Acts ii, 22-36, iii. 12-26, iv. 42. Cf. C. H. Dodd, The Apostolic Preaching,
pp. 14, 21-3; Goguel, La naissance du Christianisme, pp. 117-22.
8 E.g. Mk. i. 24, ii. 12, iii. 11-12, iv. 41, v. 6-8.
4 According to Eusebius and Epiphanius, the Jerusalem Christians survived
the fall of Jerusalem, having previously taken refuge in the city of Pella. On
the unreliable nature of this tradition see Brandon, Fall ofJerusalem, pp. 168-73.
HISTORY AS A TWO-PHASED PLAN I$9
but, from what we have been able to glean by our interrogation

of the Gospels, we can reasonably make out the main lines and
characteristic form of its doctrine. Jesus of Nazareth was recog-
nized as the Messiah of Israel. His Crucifixion by the Romans had
constituted a serious problem in this connection; but it had been
surmounted by an ingenious exegesis of the sacred scriptures.
Since his death had prevented his fulfilment of his Messianic réle,
i.e. the restoration of sovereignty to Israel, Jesus was expected
shortly to return to earth, this time with supernatural power and
glory, to accomplish the divine purpose. The idea of this pur-
pose derived from the traditional Heilsgeschichte, elaborated as
that had been from the Maccabaean period by apocalyptic specu-
lation. Preoccupation with the problem of the Crucifixion had
led to the early formation of a narrative account of its circum-
stances. Belief in the Messiahship ofJesus, and the desire to propa-
gate that belief among their fellow Jews, had caused the original
Jewish Christians also to formulate their memories of Jesus into
accounts of his deeds and words that attested his Messianic status.
Accordingly, the teaching of the Jerusalem Church was charac-
terized by its reference to the historical career of Jesus as authenti-
cating its exaltation of him as the promised Messiah of Israel.
We are now in a better position to evaluate the presentation of

Christianity in the Epistles of Paul. As we briefly noted at the
beginning of this chapter, Paul’s writings show a remarkable lack
of reference to both the chief historical events and circumstances
of the life ofJesus. At the most we learn from him that Jesus was of
the lineage of David, that at supper on the night before his death
he instituted a commemoration of his coming death,? that he was
crucified but was raised from death on the third day, being seen
by a number of disciples.* When cited together in this way, these
‘Whatever the fate of the Church of Jerusalem, it is significant that after a.D. 70
it ceases completely to have any part in the development of Christianity,
whereas before it had been the unchallenged source of authority in faith and
discipline. Cf. Fall ofJerusalem, chap. 9.
1 Cf, Brandon, Fall ofJerusalem, pp. 74-87. 2 Rom. i. 3.
31 Cor. xi. 23-5. 41 Cor. xv. 3-7.
references do indeed seem to cover all the essential events of the

historical tradition about Jesus, but their significance is really very
meagre. They represent all that can be culled from the consider-
able volume of Paul’s writings; and they are generally incidental
in character; their witness is submerged beneath a mass of esoteric
thinking and practical instruction that appears virtually unrelated
to the tradition of a historical Jesus, proclaimed by his original
disciples as the Messiah of Israel.t And that is not all: not only is
Paul’s reference to the historical Jesus very scant; he betrays a cer-
tain impatience about involvement with ‘Christ xatd odoxa’, i.e.
‘Christ according to (the) flesh’. By this expression Paul ob-
viously meant the historical Jesus of Nazareth. The passage in
which this expression occurs is one of crucial significance for our
understanding of Paul’s outlook, and it must be quoted here. Paul
writes to his Corinthian converts: ‘For the love of Christ controls
us, because we are convinced that one has died for all; therefore
all have died. And he died for all, that those who live might live
no longer for themselves but for him who for their sake (dé
aétéy) died and was raised. From now on (a6 tod viv), therefore,
we regard (oiéayev) no one from a human point of view (oddéva
. xata odoxa); even though we once regarded (éyrdéxayer)
Christ from a human point of view (xata odgxa Xguotdv), we
regard him thus no longer (viv odxéte yuwwdoxouev). Therefore,
if any one is in Christ, he is a new creation (xaw7) xtiotc); the old
(<a doyaia) has passed away, behold, the new (xawvd) has come.’
1Cf. Fall ofJerusalem, pp. 55-73; H. J. Schoeps, Paulus, pp. 48-51 (E.T.,
pp- 55-8); Bultmann, Theology of New Testament, I, pp. 188-9.
* II Cor. v. 14, 17 (R.S.V.). The expression xatd odgxa Xovotéy is admittedly
difficult of interpretation: H. Windisch, Der zweite Korintherbrief, pp. 186-8,
describes no less than six different interpretations—some are evidently inspired
by apologetical concern. W. Bauer (Griechisch-Deutsches Worterbuch z.d.
Schriften d. N.T.?, p. 1194-6), lists the expression under ‘die dussere Seite, wie
sie auch dem Auge des Unerlésten sichtbar ist, das Natiirliche, das Irdische’; he
defines it as Christus nach seiner natiirlichen Seite. See also his corresponding
definition under xatd, 637-7a. In the interpretation of the passage concerned
here, Paul’s qualification in v. 7 should not be overlooked: did alotewe yag
negutatobpev ob 61d eidovc. Cf. Lietzmann, An die Korinther, I-Il, pp. 124-5;
A. D. Nock, St. Paul, p.243; Klausner, From Jesus to Paul, pp. 313-15; A. Loisy,
In this passage, addressed to non-Jewish readers, Paul assigns to

Christ a significance such as the Messiah of Israel did not have for
Jews, and certainly could not have had for Gentiles. Instead of the
one who would return on the clouds of heaven ‘to restore the
kingdom to Israel’, and whose death was explained as a martyr-
dom for Israel, Christ is represented as having died for all mankind.
No reason is given here for his death; but it is clearly implied,
since the reference must be to the historical Crucifixion, that the
execution of Jesus as a revolutionary by the Romans, a tragic event
like many others in the history of Roman rule in Palestine, had a
transcendental significance. In some way, obviously beyond the
power of ordinary human perception, this historical event affected
Greeks and others living at Corinth, who presumably had not
known of it at the time of its happening or had any part in it—
affected them in such a manner that Paul could say that Christ had
died for their sake (sxée adtéy). But that is not all: the death of
Christ had effected a supernatural transformation of these Corin-
thians. According to Paul, because Christ had died for all (sé
ndytor), all had died (oi xdvtec dxéBavov). Since the Corinthians
were obviously still alive in the ordinary sense of the word,
their having died was clearly intended to describe some spiritual
Les mystéres paiens et le mystére chrétien, pp. 242-3; Guignebert, Jésus, pp. 25-6
35, 74; A. Schweitzer, Paul and his Interpreters, pp. 245-6; Goguel, La naissance
du Christianisme, pp. 254, 270-2; H. J. Schoeps, Theologie und Geschichte des
Judenchristentums, pp. 425-6; Brandon, Fall ofJerusalem, pp. 56-7; Bultmann,
Theology of New Testament, I, pp. 236-8; Manson, Studies in Gospels and
Epistles, p. 224. W. Schmithals (Z.N.T.W., 53, pp. 156-8) has recently (1962)
argued that Paul’s lack of concern with the historical Jesus is only part of a
greater problem, namely, the absence of interest in the historical Jesus in
Christian literature until Justin, and the little interest shown between the time
of Justin and Irenaeus. Schmithals does not notice that the tradition of the
historical Jesus emanated from the Jerusalem Church, with which Paul was in
antagonism. See below, pp. 163-72.
1 For the Jews, the Messiah was essentially concerned with the vindication of
Israel; so far as the Gentiles were concerned, he would judge them for their
injustice towards Israel. The idea of the Messiah of Israel would thus necessarily
have been repulsive to Gentiles; it could only have spiritual significance when
the word Christos had been lifted out of its original nationalistic context. Cf.
Brandon, Fall ofJerusalem, pp. 61-2, 63-73.
experience or status. An indication of the nature of this dying is

given in Paul’s later remark that Christ died so that ‘those who
live might live (¢ow) no longer for themselves (Eavtoic), but
for him who for their sake died and was raised (t@ dxée abtadv
dxobdvovt wat éyepbévtt)’. The nature of this mystical living
and dying is further illuminated by Paul’s subsequent statement
that, ‘if anyone is in Christ (éy Xovot@), he is a new creation’.
In this passage Paul is clearly referring to an experience which,
for his Corinthian converts, had begun in the past and now con-
stituted a state of being which was theirs at the moment of his
writing. How this experience was understood to have begun we
are surely informed by Paul’s account of baptism in his Epistle to
the Romans (vi. 3-9), which we have already studied at length as a
most notable instance of ‘Salvation by the Ritual Perpetuation of
the Past’.2 According to Paul, the ritual of baptism united the
Christian with Christ in his death, so that he might also be united
with Christ in his Resurrection. As Paul describes the process, “We
are buried therefore with him through baptism into death; that
like as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the
Father, so we also might walk in newness of life (é xauwdtyte
Cwic).’* He further explains that this mystical dying with Christ
means that ‘we shall also live with him (ové7joouev ait)’.4Thus
it appears that Paul taught that the death of Jesus, which, as an
historical event, had taken place some twenty years before outside
the walls of Jerusalem, could be shared or participated in by men
and women, through the action of baptism; moreover, that they
would thereby be so transformed that they could be described as
‘walking in newness of life’, as being ‘in Christ’, or as ‘a new
creation’.®
As we noted in the earlier chapter, there is no evidence of such
an interpretation of baptism being current in Palestine; according
*Cf. Goguel, La naissance du Christianisme, pp. 252-9; Bultmann, Das
Urchristentum im Rahmen der antiken Religionen, pp. 219-22, in N.T.S., I, pp- 13,
16; A. Schweitzer, The Mysticism of Paul, pp. 109-130.
2 See above, pp. 26-8. 3 Rom. vi. 4.
4 Rom. vi. 8.
° Cf. A. Schweitzer, The Mysticism of Paul, pp. 118-20. See above, pp. 161-2.
to both Jewish and Jewish Christian usage, the rite had a puri-
ficatory significance of an ethical kind, symbolizing penitence and
the resolution to amend one’s life.1 It would, accordingly, seem
that Paul had given it a new meaning—indeed emphasis upon
newness runs throughout both passages of the Roman and
Corinthian Epistles, which we have been considering: Paul’s con-
verts walk ‘in newness of life’, being ‘a new creation’.
Now, it is interesting to note that Paul brings the Corinthian
passage to an end with the comment that ‘the old has passed away,
behold, the new has come’. This comment follows closely on his
statement about no longer regarding ‘Christ xara odgxa’. In other
words, Paul tells his converts that, because of this new mystical
living ‘in Christ’, they were no longer dependent upon know-
ledge of the historical Jesus. Since it is improbable that any of
Paul’s converts had any actual knowledge of Jesus during his life-
time in Palestine, what ‘Christ xara odexa’ means in this context
must surely be the tradition about Jesus which was mediated by
the original Jewish disciples, those who could claim to have been
either his apostles or “eyewitnesses’ of his life in Galilee and
Judaea.?
This virtual repudiation of the historical tradition as not essen-
tial to the new life in Christ, which Paul claimed that he and his
converts experienced, is especially significant when we recall that
Paul was not himself an original disciple of Jesus but had joined
the Church sometime after the Resurrection.? This fact ob-
viously put Paul at a disadvantage in relation to the original
apostles, and he seems to have been very sensitive about the mat-
ter. In his Epistle to his converts in Galatia, where emissaries from
the Jerusalem Church were evidently undermining his position,
he felt obliged to defend the authority of his own teaching. He
does this, significantly, by asserting that his gospel was not
‘according to man’ (xatd é0ouzov), nor had he received it ‘from
man’ (aga dv0ednov).4 In contradistinction, he declares that ‘it
See p20.
2Cf. J. Klausner, Jesus of Nazareth, pp. 63-4; Guignebert, Jésus, pp. 25-6;
Schoeps, Paulus, pp. 48-5.
3 Gal. i. 13-23; Acts viii. 1-3, ix. I-30. 4 Gal. i. 11-12.
came through a revelation of Jesus Christ’.1 He stresses, moreover,

that after his conversion, ‘I did not confer with flesh and blood,
nor did I go up to Jerusalem to those who were apostles before me,
but I went away into Arabia; and again, I returned to Damascus.
Then after three years I went up to Jerusalem to visit Cephas, and
remained with him fifteen days. But I saw none of the other
apostles except James, the Lord’s brother.’? This long and
detailed account was clearly intended to prove his independence
of the Jerusalem Christians at the critical period of his conversion.
Despite this assertion of independence, it is obvious, however,
that Paul must have derived his knowledge of the essential facts
about Jesus from those who were apostles before him or from
those who knew the original tradition. Paul does in fact once
admit this, in what was probably an unguarded moment, when
he reminds his Corinthian converts that the credo, which he had
delivered to them, he had himself also received.? However that
may be, it is evident that Paul claimed that what was essential in
his message had come not from the original tradition of the
Jerusalem community of disciples, but had been revealed to him
directly by Christ and that it was something new.
It was new because it was different from what the Jerusalem
Christians taught. This is clearly attested by Paul in two different
Epistles. Writing to his converts in Galatia, he reproves them for
deserting his gospel (edayyéduov) for what he calls ‘another
gospel’ (étegov ebayyédvov), which is “contrary to’ (zag’ 6) his.4
His Corinthian converts he also admonishes, because they had
welcomed those who preached ‘another Jesus’ (dAAov *Inoodr),
1 Gal. i, 12. Cf. H. Schlier, Der Brief an die Galater, pp. 43-8. ‘Sein Apostolat
sei nicht aus menschlicher Bevollmachtigung erwachsen (odx dx’ avOodnwyv obde
6v dvOgcénov), sondern einzig aus dem Auftrag Jesu Christi und seines géttlichen
Vaters (Gal. i. 1)’, Schoeps, Paulus, p. 67.
? Gal. i. 16-17 (R.S.V.). Cf. Schlier, pp. 57-8; Brandon, Man and his Destiny,
pp. 211-12.
3 I Cor. xv. 3: nagédwxa ydg vpiv év apdrouc, 6 xal magédaBor. ‘hier fehle
bezeichnenderweise do tod xvtov [as in xi. 23], denn Paulus gibt das Wissen
der Urgemeinde und fiigt sein eigenes hinzu’, Lietzmann, Korinther, I-II, p. 78.
4 Gal. i. 6-8. Cf. Schlier, pp. 37-40; Brandon, Man and his Destiny, p. 196,
n. 1; Manson, Studies in Gospels and Epistles, p. 170.
and had received a “different spirit’ (veda étegov) and a ‘dif

ferent gospel’ (edayyédoy éregov) from that which Paul had
preached.
From these remarkable statements it is evident that Paul’s ver-
sion of the faith was profoundly different from that of the Jeru-
salem Christians, the fact being recognized both by himself and
by those of the Mother Church who sought to counteract his
teaching. The ‘other Jesus’ and the “different gospel’, which these
opponents sought to propagate among Paul’s converts, can only
be the ‘historical Jesus’ (Paul’s “Christ ~atd odgxa’) and the
presentation of him as the Messiah of Israel in the manner current
in Judaea, as we have seen. Paul was clearly scornful of this tradi-
tion, in which he had had no part, and he sought to dismiss it as
the doyaia, the ‘old things’, that had passed away. In its place he
proclaimed, as the gospel divinely given to him for the evan-
gelization of the Gentiles, the spiritually apprehended Christ, the
significance of whose death infinitely transcended the explanation
of the original disciples, being the means whereby all men might
enter into a new kind of life.
This difference of doctrine is most notably apparent in Paul’s
interpretation of the Crucifixion. We have already seen that Paul
spoke of the Christ’s having, in some way, died for all men. In a
passage in his First Epistle to the Corinthians he gives what appears
to be his most explicit account of how the Crucifixion had, in his
estimate, this saving efficacy. He comes to his statement here,
after telling his Corinthian converts that, when he first came to
them, he had decided (éxowa) ‘to know (eidévav) nothing among
you except Jesus Christ and him crucified’.* This limitation, which
Paul had thus put upon himself, is certainly curious. It seems to
11 Cor. xi. 3-4. Cf. A. Menzies, The Second Epistle to the Corinthians, p. 78;
Manson, p. 215.
2 Cf, Brandon, Fall ofJerusalem, pp. 54-73; Man and his Destiny, pp. 196-7,
art f.; see also his review of J. Munck’s Paul and the Salvation of Mankind in
The Hibbert Journal, LVII (1960), pp. 378-86; Schoeps, Paulus, pp. 69-77;
A. A. T. Ehrhardt in Harvard Theological Review, LV (1962), pp. 77-8.
31 Cor. ii. 6-8. Cf. Ed. Meyer, Ursprung und Anfange des Christentums, MI,
pp- 350-I.
AT Cort. 2:
M
follow from his concern, expressed at the beginning of his letter,

about disputes which had been going on in the Christian com-
munity at Corinth. These disputes involved, significantly, parties
claiming severally to represent Paul, Apollos, Cephas, and Christ.
The identification of these parties constitutes a problem which
generations of scholars have discussed without any generally
agreed conclusion. But on one point we can at least be certain,
namely, that Paul’s authority was being questioned in the name of
Cephas or Peter, who was the leader of the original apostles and
one of the chief figures in the Church of Jerusalem. It is surely
significant, therefore, that Paul in this context emphasizes that in
his evangelization of the Corinthians, he had concentrated on
preaching ‘Christ crucified’, which, he says, was a ‘stumbling
block to Jews’.2 Now, there is much reason for thinking that the
Jewish Christians, although they had elaborated an apologetic to
prove that the Crucifixion did not negate their claim that Jesus
was the Messiah, did not stress the fact of his death—their empha-
sis lay upon his glorious return to fulfil his Messianic réle.® If
Paul, then, concentrated on preaching “Christ crucified’, it is
reasonable to think that here was another point upon which he
seriously differed from the Jerusalem Christians.
It is in the lightof this situation that we must, accordingly,
evaluate what Paul says about the Crucifixion in the passage, to
which reference has been made. He writes to his converts: “Yet
among the mature (tede/oic) we do impart wisdom, although it
is not a wisdom of this age (tod aidvog todtov) or of the rulers
(tv doxdvtwy) of this age, who are doomed to pass away. But
we impart a secret and hidden wisdom of God, which God
decreed before the ages for our glorification. None of the rulers
TT Cor. i. 12-13. Cf. Lietzmann, An die Korinther I-II, pp. 6-7; Brandon,
Fall ofJerusalem, pp. 139-40; Manson, Studies in Gospels and Epistles, pp. 160-1,
193 f.
1 Cor, i. 22-3. Cf. A. Deissmann, Paulus, pp. 153, 155-6.
° Cf. Brandon, Fall ofJerusalem, pp. 74-8; Man and his Destiny, pp. 201-4;
Bultmann, Theology ofthe New Testament, I, pp. 42-7; Dodd, Apostolic Preaching,
p. 25: “The Jerusalem kerygma does not assert that Christ died for our sins. The
result of the life, death, and resurrection of Christ is the forgiveness of sins,
but this forgiveness is not specifically connected with His death.’
of this age understood this; for if they had, they would not have
crucified the Lord of glory.”!
To grasp the proper significance of this statement, we must
remember that those to whom Paul was writing did not possess the
Gospels, with their factual accounts of the Crucifixion—none was
yet written. These people had been converted by Paul, who had
not himself witnessed the event,? who claimed that his ‘gospel’
had not come ‘from man’ but from God, and who rejected know-
ledge of “Christ xara odoxa’ for that of a transcendental Christ,
mystically apprehended. Consequently, although this statement
may seem on a cursory reading to refer to the Crucifixion as a
historical event, on closer examination of the terminology em-
ployed it quickly becomes evident that Paul is not talking xata
odoxa. Thus, the expression ‘rulers (archontes) of this age’ does not
mean the Roman and Jewish authorities who, according to the
Gospels, were responsible for the Crucifixion of Jesus. Instead, it
denotes the daemonic powers who, in the contemporary astralism
and Gnostic thought, were believed to inhabit the planets and
control the destinies of men.* Accordingly, in this statement
Paul attributes the Crucifixion, not to Pontius Pilate and the
Jewish leaders, but to these planetary powers. And that is not all:
apparently these daemonic beings were deceived by God into
crucifying the Lord of glory. The fact that they would not have
done so, if they had known God’s intention, must surely imply
that they were deceived to their own disadvantage.* What this
11 Cor. ii. 6-8 (R.S.V.). Cf. Brandon, Man and his Destiny, pp. 213-14.
2 See above, p. 163, n. 3.
3Cf. M. Dibelius in R.A.C., I, 631-3 (‘Archonten’); Lietzmann, An die
Korinther I-II, pp. 11-13; A.J. Festugiére, La Révélation d’Hermes Trismégiste,
I, pp. 89-96; J. Seznec, La survivance des dieux antiques, pp. 35-46; Schoeps,
Paulus, p. 9; Bultmann, Urchristentum, pp. 211-12; see pp. 49-54 above.
4 Der gnostische Mythos liegt hinter den andeutenden Satzen des Paulus
von der geheimnisvollen géttlichen Weisheit, die “Archonten dieses Acon”’
nicht erkannt haben; sie hitten sonst den Herrn der Herrlichkeit nicht ans
Kreuz gebracht; das heisst: in seiner Verkleidung war er ihnen unerkennbar, so
dass sie sich durch seine Kreuzigung selbst ihr Verderben bereiteten’ (I Kor. 2,
8 f.), Bultmann, Urchristentum, p. 219 (E.T., p. 233). Cf. M. Werner, Die
Entstehung des christlichen Dogmas, p. 238 (E.T., p. 95).
disadvantage was Paul does not say here; but it was clearly con-
nected with his interpretation that Christ had died for all men,
and that, through his dying, men could gain a new life.
We see, then, that Paul interpreted the Crucifixion to his con-
verts as the critical event in a divine plan for mankind’s salvation.
This plan, moreover, is envisaged as comprehending a series of
aeons, since it was ‘before the acons’ or ages (96 tH aidvev) that
God had conceived the way and means of the salvation of man.1
The mysterious ‘Lord of glory’, whom the daemonic powers had
been deceived into crucifying, is surely to be identified with the
historical Jesus of Nazareth. But, if he is so identified, then Paul
evidently regarded Jesus as the incarnation of a divine pre-
existent being; for the passage seems to imply that the “Lord of
glory’ had existed ‘before the aeons’.
How mankind came to be in need of salvation from the
planetary powers is not explained here; but it is clear, from other
references in his Epistles, that Paul shared in the belief, widely
prevalent in the Graeco-Roman world at this period, that the
human race, through the descent or fall of its progenitor from
his original exalted state, had become enslaved to the daemonic
forces that ruled this lower world from their abodes in the stars
and planets.2 How men were delivered from this enslavement,
and all the evil it involved, by the transaction that Paul outlines
in this passage is also not explained. It seems to be implied that
these powers (archontes), through their error in crucifying the
Lord of glory, had in some way lost or forfeited their control
over mankind.?
The importance of this passage for understanding Paul’s theo-
logy is, accordingly, fundamental. It shows that Paul had lifted
1“Das NT gebraucht aidéy in mannigfachen Wendungen, die fast simtlich
der Weltzeit, die durch Schépfung u. Ende begrenzt ist, u. im Sinne der
gottlichen Ewigkeit’, H. Sasse in R.A.C., I, 203, who also sees the influence of
the Iranian concepts of zrvan dareghd-chvadhata and zrvan akarana. See above,
pp. 53-4. Cf. W. L. Knox, St. Paul and the Church of the Gentiles, pp. 94-5;
Der Kleine Pauly, 1, 187-8.
2 Cf. Brandon, Man and his Destiny, pp. 190-2, where reference is made
particularly to Hermetic literature; see also above, pp. 50-2, 54.
5 See p. 167, n .4 above. Cf. Brandon, op. cit. pp. 213-16.
the Crucifixion completely out of its historical context, and

interpreted it as marking the final achievement of a divine plan,
conceived before the aeons, for the salvation of mankind from its
enslavement to the daemonic powers that ruled the world. The
agents of the Crucifixion were these deluded powers: nothing is
said of Pilate and the Jewish leaders, who had been the agents of
the historical crucifixion of Jesus. And of the Crucified One
nothing is said of his being the prophet of Nazareth, who was
recognized as the Messiah of Israel; instead, a pre-existent, super-
natural being, designated the ‘Lord of glory’, is portrayed. There
can, of course, be no doubt that Paul identified the esoteric
Crucifixion of the Lord of glory with the historical crucifixion
of Jesus of Nazareth. But quite clearly for him the historical event
paled into insignificance, when, according to his insight, the true,
i.e. soteriological, significance of the Crucifixion was grasped.
Moreover, for Paul this significance also transformed his whole
evaluation of Time. Although he formally accepts, and sometimes
thinks in terms of, the traditional eschatology concerning the
Second Coming of Christ, the new resurrected life in Christ was
a present, not a future, experience. As we have seen, through his
doctrine of baptism, he conceived of the Christian as one who had
died to his former self, becoming a new creation by his mystical
integration with the transcendental Christ.
Paul was a seminal thinker; he was, moreover, pioneering the
first Christian theology. He was, however, not a systematic
thinker—his situation scarcely gave him opportunity for that. It
is not surprising, therefore, to find him in another Epistle out-
lining a different account of the situation from which mankind
needed to be saved. This account, addressed to the Christian com-
munity in Rome, is of particular interest to us in that it contains a
brief philosophy of history that differs strikingly from that con-
tained in the traditional Hebrew Heilsgeschichte. Paul contem-
plates mankind as comprising two divisions: Jews and Gentiles.
He deals with the Gentiles first.1 Although they had not been
given the divine Law, which was the proud boast of the Jews,
1 Rom. i. 18-32. Cf. Cullmann, Christus und die Zeit, pp. 160-1; Schoeps,
Paulus, pp. 200, 236.
God had not left them without guidance. The universe itself
should have afforded sufficient spiritual illumination: “Ever since
the creation of the world his (God’s) invisible nature, namely, his
eternal power and deity, has been clearly perceived in the things
that have been made. But they failed to learn; ‘for although
they knew God, they did not honour him as God or give thanks
to him, but they became futile in their thinking and their senseless
minds were darkened’. Evidence of this failure Paul finds in
pagan idolatry, from which in turn stemmed the moral degrada-
tion of pagan society that was then only too apparent.* He then
turns to the Jews. Despite their being the Elect People of God and
recipients of His Law, they also had failed.* Hence he concludes:
‘For there is no distinction; since all have sinned and fall short of
the glory of God, they are justified by his grace as a gift, through
the redemption which is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward
as an expiation by his blood, to be received by faith.”
This interpretation of history was truly revolutionary, because
it negated the Jewish claim to a superior spiritual status. Jew or
Gentile, the whole human race was in the same state of con-
demnation, and all needed a common saviour. Thus Jesus is pro-
claimed as the divinely appointed saviour of all men; nothing is
said about his being the Messiah who was to restore the kingdom
to Israel. Although this briefly sketched soteriology does not
appear so esoteric in its concepts as that in the Corinthian Epistle,
it is equally deficient in historical reference. In saying that God
had ‘put forward’ (mgoé0ero) Christ Jesus ‘as an expiation
(‘Aaotreuor) by his blood’,® Paul is presumably referring to the
Crucifixion; but, in so doing, he is in effect investing the historical
event with a transcendental significance as in the I Corinthians
passage. In other words, he disregards the fact that Jesus had been
crucified, on a charge of sedition, by the Roman governor of
Judaea, and asserts that his death was due to God. How God con-
trived to make the death of Jesus an expiation for the sins of
' Rom. i. 20. Cf. W. Sanday and A. C. Headlam, Epistle to the Romans, p- 43.
2 Rom, i. 21. 3 Rom. i. 23.
4 Rom. ii. 17-24. ° Rom. iti. 22-25 (R.S.V.).
° Cf. Sanday-Headlam, pp. 87-8.
mankind Paul does not explain; he seems to be employing a

different imagery from that used in his mythos of salvation in the
Corinthian Epistle, where he suggests that God had deceived the
archontes into crucifying Jesus. However that may be, what is
significant in terms of our enquiry, is that in both instances Paul
has lifted the Crucifixion of Jesus completely out of its historical
context and evaluated it as the decisive moment in a divine plan
for the salvation of mankind. Quite clearly the historical circum-
stances of the actual event were irrelevant to Paul. The attitude
of mind thereby implied is consistent, as we have seen, with his
impatience towards the tradition concerning the Christ xata
odgxa, of which those who were apostles before him were the
custodians and authorities.
There is another aspect of Paul’s thought which has a consider-
able importance for our subject. As a Jew, he was much grieved
and perplexed by the fact that the great majority of his race re-
fused to accept Christianity. How was this fact to be explained
in the light of the ancient promise that Israel was God’s Elect
People? Paul faces the problem: ‘has God rejected his people?”
Unable to believe that God would turn back on His promise, but
unable also to ignore the disturbing fact of his compatriots’
obduracy, Paul sought an answer along two lines. He invoked
the old prophetic idea of a Godly Remnant, which never aposta-
tized, as the true Israel, and with it he identified those Jews who
had become Christians.2 To explain the conversion of Gentiles,
he cited a prophecy of Hosea: “Those who were not my people I
will call “my people”.’* Hence he was able to formulate an
apologetic, according to which the promises of the ancient
Heilsgeschichte were maintained by identifying the true Israel with
the Church, i.e. with the company of those Jews and Gentiles who
had accepted Christianity. This identification, thoroughly rab-
binical in its logic, was essentially a piece of ad hoc apologetic,
fabricated by Paul to meet what he saw as an embarrassing prob-
lem. However, it was destined to have an effect far beyond the
1 Rom. xi. 1; cf. ix. 1 f. Cf. Schoeps, Paulus, pp. 248-59.
2 Rom. ix. 27, xi. 1-5. Cf. Sanday-Headlam, pp. 307-13.
3 Rom. ix. 22-6. Cf. Sanday-Headlam, pp. 260-4; Schoeps, Paulus, pp, 254-5.
situation which evoked it; for it was to provide the justification

for Christianity’s subsequent claim that it was the true heir to the
holy scriptures of Israel, and that the events recorded therein
constituted the praeparatio evangelica, or the divinely guided pre-
lude, to those signal acts of God from which the Church took its
rise,
We see, then, from this necessarily involved study, that Paul,
within some twenty years of the Crucifixion, was the exponent
of an interpretation of the career of Jesus which differed radi-
cally from that taught by the original Jewish disciples and eye-
witnesses. Whereas the latter treasured their memories of Jesus,
making them the basis of their claim that Jesus was the Messiah of
Israel, who would soon return to save his people, Paul virtually
rejected this view. To him the life of the historical Jesus was only
the brief incidental manifestation in space and time of a divine
plan for mankind’s salvation. What was essential in his view was
not the historical circumstances of the Saviour’s career; it was the
fact, as he believed, that, by mystical identification with the
Crucified and Risen Christ, the Christian was transformed into a
new being and state of life.
Paul’s Letters reveal a deep and serious conflict between himself

and the leaders of the Mother Church at Jerusalem. From their
point of view, Paul’s interpretation was not only a travesty
of the true faith, of which they were the guardians, but it
had also dangerous possibilities. The logic of Paul’s soteriology
negated the Jewish claim to a superior spiritual status vis-a-vis
the Gentiles. Reports reached Jerusalem that Paul was undermin-
ing the Law, while the Jewish Christians there were striving to
prove their zealous orthodoxy and thus recommend their faith
to their compatriots.” Paul’s version of the faith was, accordingly,
disavowed and his authority as an accredited exponent of it re-
jected. This could be effectively done by the Jerusalem Christians,
since Paul had not been one of the original disciples of Jesus, still
less an apostle commissioned by him. On the other hand, Paul’s
1See p. 191 below.
2 Acts xxi. 20-1. Cf. Brandon, Fall ofJerusalem, pp. 149, 150-1.
Own position was inherently weak; for not only were his ante-
cedents doubtful, but he could not reasonably repudiate the
authority of the Jerusalem leaders as apostles and eye-witnesses.!
At the most, as we have seen, Paul could only minimize the im-
portance of knowledge of the historical Jesus and exalt that of the
transcendental Saviour, which was spiritually apprehended. But
this distinction would be difficult for his converts to appreciate,
when an original apostle, as, for example, Peter at Corinth, told
them of the Jesus whom he had actually seen and heard—an
apostle, too, who could have made it painfully clear that Paul had
had no part in such unique experience.
There is a considerable body of evidence indicating a temporary
eclipse of Paul’s reputation which may well coincide with his
arrest, in compromising circumstances, in the Temple at Jeru-
salem.” From that time, about the year 55, until his death, Paul
was probably out of direct contact with his churches, the mem-
bers of which were then subject to the unopposed propaganda of
the Jerusalem Christians.? This situation would have continued
until what was to prove the fateful year 66: some memory of
what happened during this period is undoubtedly preserved in
the words which the author of Acts places in Paul’s mouth when
he bids farewell to the elders of the church at Ephesus on the
occasion of his last, unfortunate, journey to Jerusalem. Thus Paul
is represented as saying: ‘And now, behold, I know that all you
among whom I have gone about preaching the kingdom will see
my face no more .. . I know that after my departure fierce wolves
will come in among you, not sparing the flock; and from among
your own selves will arise men speaking perverse things, to draw
away the disciples after them.’ This state of affairs would neces-
sarily have ended in 66, for in that year the Jewish nationalists
1Cf. Fall ofJerusalem, pp. 136-49.
2 Most notable in this connection is the state of the Corpus Paulinum: cf. Fall
ofJerusalem, pp. 214-15, see also pp. 150-1.
3 Cf. Fall ofJerusalem, pp. 152-3.
4 Acts xx. 25, 29-30. W. D. Davies has recently (The Setting of the Sermon on
the Mount, 1964, pp. 317-23) sought to refute the view stated in the text here,
that Paul’s reputation suffered an eclipse and was rehabilitated after a.D. 70.
It is, however, very significant that he is silent about this passage in Acts, making
in Palestine raised the standard of revolt against Rome and a

disastrous war began, which was destined to end in 70 with the
destruction of Jerusalem and the overthrow of the Jewish nation.
That catastrophe the Mother Church atJerusalem did not survive."
After a.D. 70 the infant Gentile churches were, consequently,
faced with a new and disturbing situation. The obliteration of the
Mother Church deprived them of their original source of tradi-
tion and authority. By this time they would have become familiar,
through emissaries from Jerusalem, with the tradition of the
historical Jesus, and without doubt its narrative form had proved
attractive. But in many communities memories of Paul’s teaching
would surely have been preserved, and its universalistic character
was calculated to grow in significance in view of the disaster that
had befallen Israel—it would have seemed as though the judg-
ment of God had fallen upon the nation that had rejected Jesus
and done him to death.? With the perplexity and doubt which
thus resulted from finding themselves suddenly bereft of their
centre of faith and authority went two other disturbing factors.
The destruction of Jerusalem, and the many disasters which befell
the Roman Empire at this time, had excited eschatological ex-
pectations, causing much unhealthy speculation about the immi-
nence of Christ’s Second Coming.® Further, the atrocities of the
Jewish war against Rome had stirred a general hatred towards the
Jews and all things Jewish.* The fact that Christianity had stemmed
no attempt whatever to account for its evidence against the case he seeks to
make. See the present writer’s critique of Professor Davies’s thesis in his article
“Matthaean Christianity’, in The Modern Churchman, VIII (1964-5).
1Cf. Fall ofJerusalem, chaps. 8 and 9.
? Such a view finds expression in Matt. xxvii. 24-5; Lk. xxi. 20-4. Cf. Fall of
Jerusalem, pp. 206-7, 227-30.
3 Mk. xiii. 4-23. Cf. Brandon in N.T.S., VII (1960-1), pp. 136-7.
4 Josephus refers to the hatred felt towards the Jews in the preface of his
Wars of the Jews (I, 2). Tacitus (Hist., V. 4-5), in his scurrilous account of the
Jews and their customs, surely reflects the popular feeling towards them at this
time. Cf. Fall ofJerusalem, p. 158 and the references there given; A. Piganiol,
Histoire de Rome, p. 281; J. Carcopino, La vie quotidienne a Rome, p. 163;
T. Mommsen, Das Weltreich der Caesaren, pp. 390-1; A. Peretti, La Sibilla
babilonese, pp. 18-20.
HISTORY AS A TWO-PHASED PLAN I75
from Judaea, and that Jesus had actually been executed as a

Jewish revolutionary, placed Christians in a potentially danger-
ous situation. It was urgently necessary to show that, despite
its Jewish origins, Christianity was not essentially Jewish, and
that Christians were in no way ‘fellow-travellers’ with Jewish
nationalism.
An attempt which was made, shortly after a.p. 70, to meet this
complex and difficult situation, had the effect of setting the pat-
tern for all subsequent Christian thought, imparting to it its
apparent historical character. This attempt was called forth by the
peculiar circumstances in which the Christian community at
Rome found itself at this time. The Jewish war and its outcome
were vividly brought home to the population of the capital by
the elaborately presented triumph which was staged there in the
year 71 in honour cf the Emperor Vespasian and his son Titus,
who had led the Roman armies to victory inJudaea.! No Chris-
tian who viewed this spectacle, and many must surely have done
so, could have remained unmoved by its significance for his faith.
For the Jewish rebels who were paraded through the streets, the
objects of Roman derision and vengeance, must uncomfortably
have reminded Christians of the fact that Jesus had himself
been executed as a rebel against the Roman government of
Judaea.?
Confronted thus with a situation fraught with painful questions
and dangerous possibilities, a member of the Christian church in
Rome undertook to provide his fellow-believers with an account
of the origins of their faith which would reassure them on these
disturbing issues. The Gospel of Mark is the memorial of his pious
devotion and considerable literary ability. The occasion of his
1 Josephus, Wars, VII, 116-62. Cf. Brandon in N.T.S., VII, pp. 127-8.
2Cf. Mk. xv. 1-26; Matt. xxvii. 15-37; Lk. xxiii. 1-5, 24-5, 36-8. The
celebrated statement of Tacitus (Annales, XV. 44) is significant in this context:
“Auctor nominis euis Christus Tiberio imperitante per procuratorem Pontium
Pilatem supplicio adfectus erat.’
3 The significance of the Markan Gospel, as interpreted here, is discussed at
length, with full documentation, by the author in articles entitled “The Date of
the Markan Gospel’, in N.T.S., VII (1960-1), pp. 126-41, and “The Apologetical
Factor in the Markan Gospel’, in Studia Evangelica, II (1964), pp. 34-46.
writing is clearly revealed by his preoccupation with two topics

which otherwise would be inexplicable, namely, with the ques-
tion of the Jewish payment of tribute to Rome and the significance
of the curtain that veiled-the inner sanctuary of the Temple at
Jerusalem.? Whether the Jews should pay tribute could have been
a subject of interest to the Roman Christians at one time only, i.e.
when the issue was brought dramatically to their attention by the
Jewish revolt. Similarly, the Temple curtain could only have be-
come a matter of interest, indeed of knowledge, to them on but
one occasion—when these magnificent hangings were displayed,
together with other of the Temple spoils, in the Flavian triumph.?
The immediate pertinency of these topics is cleverly utilized by
the author of Mark. He represents Jesus as having been questioned
about the tribute by enemies, eager to compromise him, but as
adroitly refusing to align himself with the Jewish nationalists.®
The despoiling of the Temple hangings by the Romans, sym-
bolizing as it did the ruin of the Jewish national cultus, suggested
the rending of the Temple veil at the moment of Jesus’ death,
thereby proclaiming the end of the Old Covenant and the begin-
1Tt is significant that the Tribute Money episode (Mk. xii. 13-17) follows
on immediately after the parable of the Wicked Husbandmen, which foretold
the divine punishment that would befall Israel and the passing of Israel’s
heritage to the Gentiles. According to Bultmann (Gesch. d. synop. Trad.,
Erganzsheft, p. 28), “Das Stiick ist Gemeindebildung, eine allegorisierende
Darstellung der Heilsgeschichte.’ For the rending of the Temple Veil see Mk.
xvi. 38. See the next two notes.
2 Josephus, Wars, vii. 162. These purple curtains were deposited in the
imperial palace after the triumph. Cf. Brandon in N.T.S., VII, p. 132.
3 Cf. Brandon in N.T.S., VII, pp. 139-40. It is possible that Mark has given
an original saying of Jesus (xii. 17), which actually repudiated the payment
of the Tribute, a new and innocuous interpretation by his explanation in verse
13, introducing the episode, that the Pharisees and Herodians sought ‘to entrap
him (Jesus) in his talk’. Cf. Bultmann, Gesch. d. synop. Trad., p. 25; Brandon in
The Modern Churchman, Il (new series), pp. 168-9. On the general significance
of the Tribute Money episode see also Fall ofJerusalem, pp. 104, 188, 191-2.
Another sure indication of the date and apologetical purpose of the Markan
Gospel is the suppression of the fact that one of Jesus’ disciples was a Zealot,
i.e. a member of the extreme nationalist party of the Jews: cf. Brandon in
N.T.S., VII, pp. 140-1.
ning of the New, and also a divine anticipation of what the armies
of Titus had effected.1
But such indications of contemporary relevance are incidental
to the main purpose of the Markan Gospel. This was twofold: to
show that Christianity, although Jewish in origin, was essentially
independent of Judaism, and that Jesus transcended the Jewish
conception of Messiahship by virtue of his being the divine
Saviour.”
To achieve these ends the author of Mark was faced with one
supreme obstacle, namely, the execution of Jesus as a rebel by the
Romans. Quite clearly the fact was too well known to be contra-
dicted; the embarrassment it constituted could only be explained
away. This he undertook to do by shifting the responsibility for
the Crucifixion from the Romans to the Jews. Accordingly, he
shows that, from an early point in his ministry, the Jewish leaders
determined to destroy Jesus.? He develops this theme to the truly
ludicrous point of representing the Roman governor feebly trying
to save Jesus from the Jews by, foolishly, making them choose
between Jesus and the nationalist hero Barabbas.4
This anti-Jewish theme is not confined to depicting the Jewish
leaders as wickedly plotting the death of Jesus. The Markan
writer also shows that not only did the Jewish people support
their leaders in destroying Jesus,® but even Jesus’ own family and
disciples misunderstood and opposed him. This latter feature of
the Gospel ofMark is indeed surprising, but it is consistent with its
obviously apologetic theme. The original disciples had presented
Jesus as the Messiah of Israel, a concept that by A.D. 71 was very
suspect; Mark represents Jesus rebuking Peter for his failure to see,
1 ‘The reference to the rending of the Temple veil appears to be a legendary
addition doctrinal in origin’, Taylor, Gospel according to St. Mark, p. 596. Cf.
Bultmann, Gesch. d. synop. Trad., pp. 305-6; Brandon in N.T.S., VII, pp.
131-2.
2 Cf. Brandon, ‘The Apologetical Factor in the Markan Gospel’, in Studia
Evangelica, Il (ed. F. L. Cross); Fall ofJerusalem, chap. 10.
3 Mk. iii. 6, viii. 31, Xii. 12, Xiv. IO-II.
4 Mk. xv. 6-15. Cf. Brandon in Studia Evangelica, Il, pp. 43-4. See also
P. Winter, On the Trial ofJesus, pp. 90-9.
5 xv. II-15.
beyond the nationalist figure of the Messiah, the dying Saviour of

mankind.1 James, the brother of Jesus, had been the leader of the
Church at Jerusalem;? Mark suggests that he, together with other
members ofhis family, had tried to restrain Jesus, thinking him to
be insane.? In response to this misunderstanding and hostility,
Jesus is shown as separating himself from all ties of family and
race.‘ In other words, Mark depicts Jesus, though born a
Jew, as
rejected by, and in turn rejecting, the Jewish leaders, the Jewish
people, and his own family. His death is caused by Jewish rancour,
which overcomes Roman humanity; in his extremity he is
abandoned and denied by his Jewish disciples.> And the climax to
this damning account of Jewish hatred and malice comes with the
description of Jesus’ death on Calvary. According to Mark, as
Jesus died upon the cross to the taunts of the Jewish priests: “He
saved others; himself he cannot save’, the Roman centurion
exclaimed: “Truly this man was the Son of God!’6
Thus the author of Mark showed his fellow-Christians in Rome
that the first human being to recognize the divine nature of Jesus
was a Gentile. Moreover, that he perceived this at the very mo-
ment that Jesus died to save mankind. The Jews instead, far from
apprehending anything of this, had been responsible for the
Crucifixion. Even the original disciples could see in Jesus only the
Messiah of their nation, and they had deserted him when he came
to suffer as the Saviour of all men. Hence, at this critical time, the
1 viii. 29-32. Cf. Cullmann, Petrus?, p. 200, in New Testament Essays (ed.
A. J. B. Higgins), pp. 94-105; Brandon, Fall ofJerusalem, pp. 196-7, 232, in
Studia Evangelica, Ul, pp. 48-9.
* Gal. i. 19, ii. 9, 12; Acts xv. 13 £, xxi. 18. Cf. Fall ofJerusalem, pp. 5, 20,
27-8, 47-53, 95-100, IIO-14, 209.
Si. 21. Cf. E. Klostermann, Das Markusevangelium, pp. 42, 44; Taylor,
Gospel According to St. Mark, pp. 236, 246; Brandon in Studia Evangelica, Ul,
p- 48.
4 iii. 31-5; vi. I-5.
° xiv. $0, 66-72. Cf. T. A. Burkill, ‘L’antisémitisme dans l’évangile selon
saint Marc’, in R.H.R., CLIV (1958), pp. 10-31.
§xv. 39. Cf Brandon, Fall of Jerusalem, pp. 194, 201, 204-5, in Studia
Evangelica, ll, p. 44. The omission of the definite article in the centurion’s
words (vid¢ Ae08 yy) is not significant here, because Mark obviously regarded
the words as attesting the divinity of Jesus; cf. Taylor, p. 597.
Roman Christians were reassured about Jesus’ death as a rebel

against Rome and also concerning the Jewish origins of their
religion. Jesus was shown, essentially detached from his Jewish
backeround, as the divine Saviour, whose true character was first
perceived by a Gentile—the Roman centurion on the hill of
Calvary.
What the author of the Markan Gospel thus achieved, to meet
the difficult situation in which he and his fellow-Christians found
themselves, was to be of the greatest consequence for the future
of Christianity. In effect Mark had fused the tradition of the his-
torical Jesus with Paul’s presentation ofJesus as the divine Saviour
of mankind. Although, as we have seen, a definite apologetical
purpose inspired the composition of the work, the original narra-
tive tradition was skilfully utilized so that Jesus was set firmly and
vividly against his historical background. Moreover, and perhaps
most important of all, because of the need felt to explain Jesus’
condemnation for sedition as due to Jewish malice, a circum-
stantial account is given of the events leading up to the Crucifixion.
Consequently, this happening, which was to be the fundamental
datum of Christian theology, was firmly anchored in its historical
context. Instead of being viewed, as by Paul, primarily as the
decisive point in an esoteric mythos of salvation, it became so
essentially attached to its historical occasion that the name of
Pontius Pilate has for ever since been associated with it in the
Church’s creeds.
The Gospel ofMark provided a precedent which other Christian
writers were to follow, namely, of presenting Jesus as the divine
Saviour in the historical context of his life in Palestine. For the
purpose of our study, it will suffice to notice features of the other
Gospels which add notably to the historical presentation that
Mark had pioneered.
The Gospels ofMatthew and Luke show that already, i.e. by the
last two decades of the first century, interest in the life of the his-
torical Jesus was such that accounts were wanted of his birth
and infancy, which were lacking in Mark. The accounts which
these evangelists supply, though full of supernatural happenings,
are carefully related to historical contexts, howbeit mutually
contradictory. Both Gospels also significantly develop the Story of

the Empty Tomb, which had been rather enigmatically treated by
Mark.2 Luke uses it, or rather,the account of the Risen Jesus that is
dependent upon it, as evidence of the reality of the Resurrection
of Jesus. Thus, as if to dismiss any suggestion that the appearances
of the Risen Jesus were of a visionary character, he graphically
depicts the physical aspect. He tells how the disciples, on seeing
Jesus, thought that they beheld a spirit. Jesus reassures them, say-
ing, ‘See my hands and my feet, that it is I myself; handle me, and
see; for a spirit has not flesh and bones as you see that I have.’ To
reinforce the evidence of this invitation, Luke relates that, when
the disciples still hesitated, Jesus had asked: ‘““Have you anything
here to eat?”’ They gave him a piece of broiled fish, and he took it
and ate before them.’* With this appeal to what is presented as
evidence of a most tangible kind we may set Matthew’s contribu-
tion. The author of this Gospel was obviously concerned to refute
a Jewish explanation of the alleged Resurrection of Jesus: that the
tomb was found empty, because the disciples had stolen his body.
Accordingly, he asserts that this was a story which the Jewish
authorities bribed the Roman guard to put about in place of the
true reason for the Tomb’s emptiness.*
These accounts, each in its own particular way designed to
prove the factual truth of the Resurrection, attest the change that
1 Matt. (ii. 1) places the birth of Jesus in the reign of Herod the Great (i.e.
ante 4 B.c.), while Luke (ii. 2) dates it for the year a.p. 6. On the difficulties
caused by Luke’s dating cf. F. X. Steinmetzer in R.A.C., II, 969-72; G. W. H.
Lampe in Peake’s Commentary”, 720a-c.
* Mk. xvi. 8. Cf. Taylor, Gospel according to St Mark, pp. 609-15.
3 Lk. xxiv. 36-43. The conception of the Risen Christ here, although the
material reality of his being is specially stressed, stems from the Hebrew concep-
tion of man as a psycho-physical organism. Cf. Brandon, Man and his Destiny,
pp- 207-8.
* Matt. xxviii. 11-15; see also xxvii. 62-6, xxviii. 4. Cf. E. Lohmeyer u.
W. Schmauch, Das Evangelium des Matthdus, p..411 (1); G. D. Kilpatrick,
Origins of Gospel according to St. Matthew, pp. 47-8, 96. ‘C’est seulement dans
Pévangile de Matthieu (27, 62-66), c’est-A-dire un demi-siécle aprés la naissance
de la foi 4 la resurrection, qu'il y a trace d’une discussion, d’ailleurs toute
théorique, sur le tombeau vide, entre Juifs et Chrétiens’, Goguel, La naissance du
Christianisme, p. 49.
had come about in the Christian conviction that Jesus had risen
from the dead. When Paul had been faced with the need of prov-
ing the truth of the Resurrection, the story of the Empty Tomb
was apparently unknown—or, perhaps more significantly, if he
did know of it, he did not appeal to its evidence. Instead, he in-
vokes the testimony of personal experience. He does this in two
ways: by citing a list of persons to whom the Risen Jesus had
appeared (é~67), among whom Paul includes himself; by appeal-
ing to his own conviction and that of his converts that Christ was
indeed a living reality in their lives.? In other words, by the time
that Luke and Matthew wrote, Christians were then turning to
what they took to be the evidence of historical fact for their belief
in Christ’s Resurrection rather than to their own inner experience
as Paul and his converts had done.
The author of the Gospel of Luke makes a considerable display
of his concern to render an accurate account of the career of
Jesus. In his preface he claims ‘to write an orderly account’,
‘having followed all things closely for some time past’.? He care-
fully dates the birth of Jesus by relating it to an enrolment
ordered by the Emperor Augustus, when Quirinius was governor
of Syria.t The beginning of Jesus’ public ministry is even more
precisely cross-dated: it is the fifteenth year of Tiberius Caesar,
when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judaea, reference being
made also to other contemporary rulers and the Jewish high-
priests.® Such professed concern for chronological detail is
1] Cor. xv. 3-8. See above, p. 157, n. 6.
21 Cor. xv. 12-20. Cf. Schweitzer, Mysticism of St. Paul, pp. 111-12.
3 Lk. i. 3: “The word (xagyxodovdnxdt1) does not itself mean “to investi-
gate”, but if one who is not himself aétdzrns is said to have followed accurately
a course of events, investigation must be implied’, Creed, Gospel according to
St. Luke, pp. 4-5. ‘Der Prolog erweist, dass der Verfasser die tibliche literarische
Bildung der hellenistischromischen Zeit besitzt und fiir sein Werk einen Platz
in der Literatur beansprucht’, Meyer, Ursprung, I, p. 8, see also pp. 9-11. Cf.
E. Dinkler in I.H.A.N.E., pp. 195-7.
41k. ii. 2. See p. 180, n. 1, above.
5 Lk. iii, 1-2. ‘Luke explains historical events on the line of cause and effect.
He recognizes immanent contingencies and thus inaugurates a “history of
salvation”. The secularization of history in Christian theology begins with Luke.
And secularization means also universalism. The event of Christ Jesus is fixed
N
exceptional in the New Testament; but the Lukan writings, 1.e.

the Gospel and the Acts of the Apostles, have certainly contributed
greatly to the impression that historical concern characterizes the
foundational documents of Christianity.
The Gospel of John, which stands apart from the Synoptic
Gospels, however, agrees with them in setting Jesus firmly in his
historical context. But it differs from them not only by reason of
the long mystical monologues which it attributes to Jesus; it sur-
passes them also in their exaltation of Jesus as one divinely con-
ceived and virgin-born. For, in its prologue, Jesus is assigned a
status that virtually equates him with God; indeed, as the divine
Logos, the historical Jesus is actually identified with the Creator
of the world.
We noted earlier that what appears to be the most authentic sum-

mary of the message of Jesus emphasizes the decisive nature of the
times.? The expectation that Jesus, in his rdle of Messiah, would
accomplish the divine promise to save Israel, survived his Cruci-
fixion, taking the form of a belief that he would soon return, this
time in power and great glory, to fulfil his eschatological office.‘
The Markan Gospel reveals that the events leading up to the
destruction of Jerusalem in A.D. 70 had greatly excited eschato-
logical hopes. However, when the Gospel was written, some
sense of anticlimax was evidently being felt. Mighty signs and
wonders had recently pointed to the imminence of Christ’s return;®
yet that longed-for event still failed to materialize. The author of
Mark, in dealing with the situation, was clearly convinced that
what had happened presaged the imminent coming of Christ and
the end of the existing order;’ but he was also concerned to re-
into a chronology, connected with secular occurrences (Luke 1: 5, 2: 1-3,

3:14, etc.)’, Dinkler in op. cit., p. 197. Cf. J. Manek in N.T.S., VI, pp. 49-50.
1 John xi. 47-51, xviii. 13-14, 28-38, xix. 12-22. Cf. Brandon, Fall of
Jerusalem, pp. 124-5.
2 John i. 1-11, 14. Cf. Dinkler in ILA.N.E., pp. 202-5. 2 See prise:
4 See pp. 154, 159. 5 Mk. xiii. 1-31.
§ xiii. 7-8. Cf. Brandon in N.T.S., VII, pp. 133-4, 136-7.
? xiii. 8, 14, 22-315
strain speculation that might be dangerous and to allow for the

apparent delay of the final dénouement.1 Hence, in addition to
making the qualification that ‘the gospel must first be preached
to all nations’, he uttered the warning, as coming from Jesus him-
self: “But of that day or that hour no one knows, not even the
angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. Take heed,
watch; for you do not know when the time will come.’3
The delay of the Parousia or Return of Christ meant that the
Church had gradually to adjust its view of the divine purpose as
manifest in the time-process. Instead of expecting the imminent
end of the present world-order, Christians found themselves
obliged to contemplate an indefinite extension of that order into
the future. Belief in the ultimate Return of Christ and the end of
the world was never abandoned; but it steadily lost the dominant
place that it had for the first generations. The process of re-
adjustment had profound consequences for Christianity: in par-
ticular its Weltanschauung, in both its personal and communal
aspects, underwent a radical change.*
1 xi. 4-6, 21-3.
* xiii. 10. Cf. Fall ofJerusalem, p. 203; Bultmann, Theology of the New Testa-
ment, I, p. 103; H. Conzelmann in Z.N.T.W., 50, p. 219.
3 xiii. 32-3. Cf. Brandon in N.T.S., VII, pp. 137-8.
4 See Lk. xvii. 20-1: “The Kingdom of God cometh not with observation
(ueta xagatyoycews) ... for, lo, the kingdom of God is within you (éytd¢
duav éotiy).’ This statement has been interpreted as indicating a process of
“de-eschatologization’, whereby the Parousia hope was given a completely
spiritual content: cf. Creed, St. Luke, pp. 218-19, also pp. Ixxii-iii; B. H.
Streeter, Four Gospels, p. 290; T. H. Manson, Teaching ofJesus, p. 123. For other
interpretations cf. Guignebert, Jésus, pp. 411-14; Dinkler in LH.A.N.E.,
p- 176, n. 8; A. Riistow in Z.N.T.W., 51, pp. 207-24. According to John xvi.
5-14, the Parousia hope seems to be supplanted by the giving of the Holy
Spirit to the faithful. Cf. Goguel, La naissance du Christianisme, p. 390. InJohn,
‘There is no waiting for any telos, for any development in time; nor is there any
reflection about time’, Dinkler, op. cit., p. 204. Cf Dodd, The Fourth Gospel,
pp- 414-15. ‘Wie er [John] fiir seine Theologie keinen Riickblick auf die
Geschichte Israels (als Heilsgeschichte) braucht, so keinen zeitlichen Ausblick
nach vorne. Weltereignisse sind ftir das Heil bedeutungslos’, H. Conzelmann in
R.G.G., Il, p. 670. On the significance of the problem caused by the delay of
the Parousia see M. Werner, Die Entstehung des Christlichen Dogmas, pp. 105-15
(E.T., The Formation of Christian Dogma, pp. 40-4).
As we have seen, Paul had envisaged the post-baptismal life of

a Christian as a new life in Christ. Expecting that ‘the Lord is at
hand’, he did not contemplate that generations of Christians
would live‘and die before the Parousia brought the resurrection
of the dead and the consummation of all things. Belief in the im-
minence of the end of the world meant, accordingly, that the
Christian view of life was a short-term one, and no problem was
sensed concerning either the individual’s having to live this new
life of grace for years amid the temptations of this world, or of
the state of the dead before the Final Judgment.? There is indeed
some evidence of belief that the soul’s eternal destiny would be
decided immediately after death;? but more typical was the out-
look expressed by Paul, when dealing with a question of his
Thessalonian converts about the fate of those Christians who had
already died. Clearly convinced that no long interval would
elapse, he reassures them: ‘the dead in Christ will rise first; then
we who are alive, who are left, shall be caught up together with
them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air; and so we shall
always be with the Lord.”
The delay of the Parousia, therefore, meant that provision had
to be made for the continuation of the Christian’s life, after
baptism, until it ended in death. Consequently the Church began
to see its rdle no longer as that of the body of those now born in
Christ and awaiting his imminent Return. Despite their baptismal
transformation, the faithful would need careful prolonged tend-
ing; for they had a life to live in this world, and if they were to be
kept from its temptations and grow in grace, they must have
constant spiritual guidance and help. Gradually, therefore, from
being the company of those urgently expecting the return of their
Lord, the Church grew into an institution, organized to minister
to its members from cradle to grave. A sacred hierarchy was
1 See pp. 161-2.
2 Cf. Mk. xiii. 29-31; Matt. x. 23.
3 Lk, xvi. 19-31, xxili. 43: cf. Brandon, Man and his Destiny, pp. 209-Io.
41 Thess. iv. 13-18. Cf. Meyer, Ursprung, Ill, pp. 239, 267-8; K. Lake,
Earlier Epistles of St Paul, pp. 91-3; Schweitzer, Mysticism of Paul, pp. 84-92;
W. D. Davies. Paul and Rabbinic Judaism, pp. 290-1.
evolved, endowed with authority to strengthen the faithful

spiritually by sacraments, and to instruct them in a doctrine which
was steadily elaborated to cover all aspects of the relations of God
and Man.1
Corresponding to this change of view about the Christian’s life
in this world, a new evaluation of the post-mortem life emerged. If
the dead had to wait indefinitely for their resurrection and the
judgment that would determine their eternal destiny, where or in
what condition were they in the meantime? Their bodies ob-
viously lay in the earth awaiting their ultimate reconstitution; but
what of their immortal souls? With the fading of the Pauline idea
that the Christian, through baptism, was already raised to a new
life that was shortly to be consummated by the Parousia of Christ,
the Church began to take over, from Hebrew and Greek escha-
tology, the idea of a place of expiation or purgation, to which
souls departed at death.? This conception could be conveniently
integrated with the new philosophy of history by which, as we
shall see, the Church gradually replaced the primitive short-
termed interpretation of God’s purpose.? The individual Chris-
tian was enabled thereby to see his own destiny in the context of
the divine plan of salvation, which extended from the Fall of
Adam to the Final Judgment, consequent on the Second Coming
of Christ. The quality of his span of life in this world determined
his future after death. This future had two phases: in the first, of
unknown but limited duration, he would suffer for the venial
sins he had committed; in the second, inaugurated by the Last
1Cf. Werner, Die Entstehung, pp. 636-66 (E.T., pp. 269-82).
2 Certain statements of Paul might be interpreted as implying belief in an
intermediate state in which the dead remained until the Final Judgment:
whether Paul would have admitted such implications may be doubted. Cf.
J. N. Sevenster, ‘Einige Bemerkungen iiber den “Zwischenzustand” bei
Paulus’, in N.T.S., I, pp. 291-6. According to A. Struiber (Refrigerium Interim,
p- 201), belief in a physical resurrection necessitated belief in a ‘Zwischenzu-
stand’. Cf. A. Parrot, Le ‘Refrigerium’ dans l'au-dela, pp. 128-9, pp. 124-6,
150-65; J. A. Fischer, Studium zum Todesgedanken in der alten Kirche, 1, pp.
226-315; I. A. Richmond, Archaeology and the After-Life in Pagan and Christian
Imagery, pp. 49-50; F. Schmidt-Clausing, R.G.G.°, II, 892-4.
3 See pp. 195-7.
Judgment, he would enter into eternal bliss, unless his sins had
been such that he merited eternal damnation.1
Of the other side of the adjustment of outlook, which the dis-
appointment of the original Parousia hope necessitated, we have
already noticed the first stage. When Mark made the Parousia
dependent upon the preaching of the gospel to all nations, the
Church was given a convenient lien upon the future. The Church
had a mission in a world that was not to be immediately destroyed,
and the achievement of that mission would take time.? Hence the
idea of an age of evangelical endeavour was adumbrated which
was powerfully to affect the Christian interpretation of the divine
purpose as manifested in history. Paul had already defined the
chronological significance of the Incarnation as ‘when the fulness
of the time (t6 zArjowpa tod Xedvov) came, God sent forth his Son,
born of a woman’,® thus investing the birth of Jesus with a
unique temporal distinction. Some appreciation of this distinction
probably moved Luke also to attempt, as we have seen, a precise
synchronization of the birth of Jesus and of the start of his
public ministry. When the delay of the Parousia began to require
the contemplation of the Church’s mission being extended in-
definitely in time, this new era had to be related to the unique
chronological significance with which the life of Jesus had become
invested. Some indication of the fresh evaluation that gradually
took place during this period seems to be given in the Epistle to the
1Cf. G. G. Coulton, Five Centuries of Religion, I, pp. 66-77, 445-49; Medi-
aeval Panorama, pp. 212-22; K. E. Kirk, The Vision of God, pp. 513-14; E. Male,
The Gothic Image, pp. 355-89; M.-M. Gorce in H.G.R., IV, pp. 10-14; Brandon,
“The Judgment of the Dead’, in History Today, XIV (1964).
? Whatever be the origin of the parable of the Mustard Seed (Mk. iv. 30-2;
Mt. xiii. 31 f.; Lk. xiii. 18 f.), its suggestion of the gradual growth must have
assisted the Church’s orientation of outlook. Cf. Taylor, St Mark, pp 268-9.
See also Mt. xiii. 33; Lk. xiii. 20. Cf Cullmann, Christus und die Zeit, pp-
138-49.
3 Gal. iv. 4. “Der Begriff zArjgwpua tot yodvov ist eindeutig dahin zu fassen,
dass er den Augenblick meint, in dem der Xodvo¢ voll wurde, die Zeit im Sinne
des Zeitverlaufes zu ihrem vollen Mass, d. h. zu ihrem Ende kam’, Schlier,
Galaterbrief, p. 194, cf. pp. 194-6. Cf. Barr, p. 22.
4 Seep. 181.
Hebrews, a document dating probably from the last decades of the

first century.t Thus the opening verses outline the way in which
Christians then looked back to the unique event which sanctioned
their interpretation of life: “In many and various ways God spoke
of old to our fathers by the prophets; but in these last days (é7’
éaydtov tov Hueody tovtwr) he has spoken to us by a Son, whom
he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created
the world . . When he (the Son) had made purification for sins,
he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high... ’? The
author of the Epistle is thinking in terms of the Hebrew ritual of
sacrifice, identifying Jesus with both the Victim and the High
Priest. Significantly, he conceives of the divine High Priest,
having completed the immolation of himself, seated in heaven
beside God, where he is ever present to intercede for his faithful.
The priests of the Old Covenant were- mortal, but this High
Priest ‘holds his priesthood permanently, because he continues for
ever. Consequently he is able for all time (cis t6 xartedéc) to save
those who draw near to God through him, since he always
(xévtote) lives to make intercession for them’.* The situation en-
visaged here is far removed from that primitive expectancy of the
immanent Return of Christ to bring the present order of things to
an end. Instead, Christ is seen as the divine Redeemer, ever plead-
ing his sacrifice in the courts of heaven, for succeeding generations
of his faithful living out their lives in the world below.
With this forward extension of the Christian outlook, so that
the Church was seen as pursuing its mission far into the future,
there went an exaltation of the Church as an institution. Already
by the end of the first century the Church was being conceived as
a divinely founded entity, having its own life and endowed with
inviolability. Thus the Matthaean Gospel had expanded the
Markan account of Peter’s recognition of the Messiahship of Jesus
by adding to the reply of Jesus: “And I also say unto thee, that
1 Cf. FE. FE. Bruce in Peake’s Commentary”, 880b.
2 Heb. i. 1-4 (R.S.V.).
3 Heb. iii. 1 f., ix. 11 f.
4 Heb. vii. 23-5. Cf. Bruce, op. cit., 884f.; Dinkler in LH.A.N.E., pp.
197-9; J. Manek in N.T.S., VI, p. St.
thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the
gates of Hades shall not prevail against it.’ In the Epistle to the
Ephesians the Church is actually hypostatized: “Christ loved the
Church and*gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her,
having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, that
he might present the Church to himself in splendour, without
spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and
without blemish.” After being thus depicted here and in the
Revelation ofJohn? as the mystic Bride of Christ, it is not surprising
to find the second-century Shepherd of Hermas declaring that
the Church ‘was created before all things . . . and for her sake
the world was framed’.* Although much of this is admittedly the
language of mysticism, what is important is the fact that, in the
eyes of Christians, the Church was no longer the temporary com-
munity of Christians awaiting, in a world about to perish, the
Return of their Lord. Instead, it was seen as the mystic Body of
Christ, having its own corporate being and mission, having been
divinely founded here on earth to achieve God’s plan of salvation
—a task which it would fulfil, century after century, until God
determined that there should ‘be time no more’ and so brought
the world to its end.®
As the Parousia hope faded and the Church settled to its task,
many new problems demanded solution: some inevitably came
from the need to construct a systematic statement of the faith
1 Matt. xvi. 18. Cf. Bultmann, Gesch. d. synop. Trad., pp. 147-50, Ergin-
zungsheft, pp. 21-2; Cullmann, Petrus, pp. 217 f. (E.T. pp. 186 f.).
2 Eph. v. 25-7.
9 Rev. xxii. 17 (xxi. 2); cf. R. H. Charles, Revelation (I.C.C.), I, pp. 179-80.
* Hermas, Vision 2. iv. 1, inJ. B. Lightfoot, The Apostolic Fathers (ed. J. R.
Harmer), pp. 302, 409.
5 Rev. x. 6: Xgdvoc obxéte Eotat. Xedvog here undoubtedly means an interval
of time, so that the correct rendering would be ‘there shall be no more delay’.
However, it has been understood in a more metaphysical sense, as by Bede:
‘mutabilis saecularium temporum varietas cessabit’ (Explanatio Apocalypsis,
Migne, Patrologia Latina, XCV). Cf. Werner, Entstehung, pp. 636-66 (E.T., pp.
269-82); A. A. T. Ehrhardt, Politische Metaphysik, Il, pp. 44-69;J.F. Bethune-
Baker, Early History of Christian Doctrine, pp. 356-72; Barr, pp. 75-6.
to replace the amorphous and diverse traditions then current;!

others arose from contact with the surrounding world of pagan
society.
As we have seen, in making Christianity a salvation-religion of
universal significance, Paul had constructed a mythos that had but
a tenuous connection with the historical Jesus of Nazareth. In con-
ceiving of a pre-existent divine being descending to earth and
assuming human form in such a manner as to deceive the planetary
powers that had enslaved mankind, Paul was employing ideas
current in Gnosticism and Hermeticism.? It was not surprising,
therefore, that others were soon found in the Church who
developed Paul’s interpretation further along such lines. For
example, Cerinthus maintained that ‘after his (Jesus’) Baptism
there descended on him from that Royalty which is above all,
Christ in the figure of a Dove, and that he then declared the un-
known Father, and did mighty works, but that in the end Christ
again soared back from Jesus, and that Jesus suffered and rose
again, but Christ remained impassible, as being spiritual’.? To the
Gnostic the idea of the incarnation of a divine being, come from
the highest heaven, could be tolerable only if there was no essen-
tial union of the spiritual with the material.t Hence a distinction
had to be made between the historical Jesus and the divine being
who was conjoined in some manner with him. Sensing the danger
implicit in such a distinction (for, if Christ did not really suffer in
the flesh, the flesh could not be redeemed), other Christians
asserted the historical reality of the Incarnation and Crucifixion
of the Son of God. Thus Ignatius, bishop of Antioch (c. 110-17),
is found condemning what came to be known as the heresy of
Docetism: ‘Be ye deaf, therefore, when any man speaketh to you
1Cf, Werner, Entstehung, pp. 105-38 (E.T., pp. 40-55); Dinkler in
.H.A.N.E., pp. 199-202.
2 Cf. Brandon, Man and his Destiny, pp. 190-2.
3 Irenaeus, Adv. Haereses, I, xxvi. 1, 2; in B. J. Kidd, Documents Illustrative of
the History of the Church, 1, p. 121: see also Irenaeus, op. cit., I. xxiv. 4, on
Basilides’ teaching that Jesus took the form of Simon of Cyrene, so that Simon
was crucified in his stead (cf. Kidd, Documents, I, p. 120).
4 Cf R. McL. Wilson, The Gnostic Problem, pp. 132, 134, 208; H.-C. Puech in
Man and Time, p. 79; G. Quispel, Gnosis als Weltreligion, p. 77.
apart from (zweilc) Jesus Christ, who was of the race of David,
who was the Son of Mary, who was truly (4479@¢) born and ate
and drank, who was truly (a4n6@c) persecuted under Pontius
Pilate, was~truly (4476ac) crucified and died in the sight of
those in heaven and those on earth and those under the earth;
who moreover was truly (dAj0@c) raised from the dead, His
Father having raised Him, who in the like fashion will so raise us
also who believe on Him...”
The Church’s encounter with Gnosticism had another impor-
tant consequence, besides inducing its insistence on the historical
reality of the Incarnation and Crucifixion of Christ. The Gnostic
concern to maintain a radical distinction between spirit and
matter, judging the latter to be essentially evil, led to the attri-
bution of the creation of this world to a wicked Demiurge. It was
undoubtedly in accordance with this tradition that Marcion, an
important figure in Early Christianity, distinguished between a
Supreme Deity and the God of the Old Testament, who was the
creator of this lower material world.? Although Mark, as we have
seen, had earlier sought to show that Jesus was not essentially
associated with his Jewish background, and despite an increasing
anti-Semitism in the Church, Christians were not, however, pre-
pared thus to repudiate the Old Testament, since it was the
sacred prolegomena to their own faith. Hence Irenaeus (c. 180-90)
in his Adversus Haereses writes in condemnation of Marcion: “And
Marcion of Pontus came in his (Cerdon’s) place, and extended his
school, shamelessly blaspheming Him who is called God by the
Law and the Prophets; affirming Him to be an evil-doer, and fond
of wars, and inconstant also in His judgment, and contrary to
Himself: and as for Jesus, that he came from that Father who is
above the god who made the world, into Judaea in the time of
Pontius Pilate the Governor, who was Tiberius Caesar’s Pro-
curator, and was manifest in human form to the inhabitants of
Judaea, to do away the Prophets and the Law and all the works of
TTgnatius, Epistle to the Trallians, ix. in Lightfoot, Apostolic Fathers, p. 118,
148.
* Cf. E. C. Blackman, Marcion and his Influence, pp. 113-24; Leitzmann,
Gesch. d. Alten Kirche, 1, pp. 267-70.
HISTORY AS A TWO-PHASED PLAN I9QI
that God who made the world, whom he also calls Ruler of the
world.”
Indeed, far from repudiating the Old Testament and the God of
Israel, the Church began more confidently to proclaim itself the
rightful heir of God’s promises to Israel. Paul had already pro-
vided, as we have seen, a convenient basis for this claim, when he
identified the Church with the true Israel.2 Evidence of the in-
creasing assurance of the Church in this matter is to be found,
succinctly stated, in the second-century Epistle of Barnabas. The
author refers to the Jews as those ‘who pile up sin upon sin, saying
that our covenant remains to them also. Ours it is; but they lost it
in this way for ever (cic réAoc dndbdecar adtyjy), when Moses had
just received it.’* The idea of a divine covenant, lost by the Jews
and inherited by the Christians, which occurs here, becomes, in a
slightly different form, a fundamental concept of the Christian
Weltanschauung. Paul had already spoken of the Jewish sacred
literature as the ‘old covenant’ (wadaid diab%jxn),* and of Jesus as
instituting a ‘new covenant’ (a7) 61a67xn) in his blood.’ As the
Church gradually evolved a canon of its own sacred writings, as
distinct from the Hebrew scriptures which it had used from the
beginning, this corpus came to be known as the ‘New Testament’.
In other words, what Christians regarded as constituting the
title-deeds of their faith, they designated the “New Testament’ or
‘Covenant’, thus relating it to the ‘Old Testament’ which recorded
the sacred history that culminated in the coming of the Messiah
Jesus.6 So a view of Time, comprising two phases or ages, and
1Trenaeus, Adv. Haer. I, xxvii. 2; in Kidd, Documents, pp. 122-3.
2 See above, pp. I7I-2.
3 Barnabas, IV. 6, in Lightfoot, Apostolic Fathers, pp. 246, 271; see also J. R.
Harmer’s remarks, op. cit., p. 239. Cf. M. Simon, Verus Israel, pp. 91, 112-14.
41] Cor. iti. 14. Cf. Lietzmann, An die Korinther, III, pp. 112-13; Schoeps,
Paulus, p 230: ‘ITadad und xawr) dvabijxn wird ftir Paulus zum Gegensatz
von Judentum und Christentum.’
Ne @oraexia2 5:
8 Novum Testamentum became an accepted technical term from the time of
Tertullian: cf. Oxford Dictionary of Christian Church (ed. F. L. Cross), p. 9408;
Werner, Enstehung, pp. 144-60 (E.T., pp. 56-61); Simon, Verus Israel, pp.
94-5, 100-105.
divided, but also conjoined, by the career of Jesus Christ and the
establishment of his Church, found concrete and abiding expres-
sion. We may further note that, although the practice of dating
backwards into the past from the Birth of Christ did not become
general until the eighteenth century, the custom of reckoning the
period after as anni Domini began in 525, thus witnessing to the
Christian consciousness of living in the new‘and sacred era of the
divine purpose for mankind.
As the Church came to realize that it had an enduring mission in
the Roman Empire, the question ofits relations with pagan society
soon demanded the formulation of an apologetic concerning the
chief points upon which Christian belief and practice differed from
the accepted traditions of that society. To meet this need, certain
lines of argument were developed that are of great significance for
any assessment of the historical character of Christianity.
Most notable for our study here is the Apology of Tertullian,
which was composed during the years 197-8.2 In this work,
addressed to the magistrates of the Roman Empire who were
legally responsible for the suppression of Christianity, Tertullian
bases his case, inter alia, on two arguments drawn from what he
takes to be history. It would seem that the second of these argu-
ments is consequentially connected with the first, and that this first
argument was conditioned by the crucial event from which
Christianity derived. Addressing himself to such an audience,
Tertullian, a lawyer by profession, must have been very sensitive
to the fact that the crucifixion of Jesus had been carried out under
Roman law. He was doubtless aware that many viewed the
origins of Christianity as Tacitus had viewed them.® Since the
facts could not be denied, the best policy was to make them the
basis of a bold counter-claim. This Tertullian does, not only
asserting that Pilate was at heart himself a Christian (ipse iam sua
conscientia Christianus), but that he sent a report about Jesus to the
1Cf. L. Koep in R.A.C., Ill, 58-9; Cullmann, Christus und die Zeit, pp- 13-15.
* Cf. T. R. Glover in the Loeb edition of Tertullian’s Apology, p. xix; P. de
Labriolle, History and Literature (Latin) of Christianity, pp. 66-71.
3 Annales, XV, 44. Cf. P. de Labriolle, La réaction paienne, pp. 38-41. See
above p. 175.
Emperor Tiberius that convinced him of Jesus’ divinity.1 Despite

this extraordinary claim, which, if accepted, would surely have
proved his case, Tertullian was obviously much embarrassed by
having to admit the newness of Christianity, i.e. that it had begun
just over a century before, during the reign of Tiberius.? Now,
this modernity was a problem, because in contemporary society
a great premium was set on antiquity. Consequently, Tertullian
spends much time and ingenuity in trying to prove that Chris-
tianity really stemmed from an antiquity far beyond what could
be claimed for any pagan custom or institution. To this end he
argues that Christianity ‘rests on the very ancient books of the
Jews (antiquissimis Judaeorum instrumentis sectam istam esse sufful-
tam)’. And these writings, he maintains, are far older than any
book, city, cult or race of the pagan world.‘
This assumption of the (derivative) antiquity of Christianity is
reflected in the assurance with which Christian writers soon began
to present their religion in the context of the time-process. Thus
Julius Africanus produced a chronological scheme based on the
belief that the world would last for six thousand years from its
creation. Placing the birth of Christ in the year 5500, he could look
forward into a future of about three hundred years of the Church’s
mission before God brought the flow of Time to its appointed
end.® Eusebius, bishop of Caesarea, who was the first to compose
1 Apology, XXI, 24, iv. 2.

2 Apology, XXI. 1: ‘Sed quoniam edidimus antiquissimis Judaeorum instru-
mentis sectam istam esse suffultam quam aliquanto novellam, ut Tiberiani
temporis, plerique sciunt, profitentibus nobis quoque . . .’
3 E.g. see Josephus’s concern in his Contra Apionem to prove the antiquity of
the Jews. Tacitus is possibly jibing at the newness of Christianity in his state-
ment: ‘Auctor nominis euis Christus Tiberio imperitante per procuratorem
Pontium Pilatum supplicio adfectus erat’ (Annales XV. 44). See also Tertullian’s
statement (Apol. XIX. 1, Loeb ed., p. 92): “Apud vos quoque religionis est
instar, fidem de temporibus adserere. Auctoritatem litteris praestat antiquitas
summa.’ Eusebius undertakes to defend Christianity against those who object
to its novelty (yOé¢ xai 03 xpdtegov paveicay), Ecclesiastical History, 1, ii. 1.
4 Apology, XIX. 1-XXI. 1.
5 Cf Koep in R.A.C., Ill, 55; S. J. Case, The Christian Philosophy ofHistory,
p. 35. On the effect of the delay of the Parousia on Christian chronological
an ecclesiastical history, i.e. a consequential record of the past in

which the progress of the Church is the central theme, reveals in
his undertaking the confidence with which Christians now inter-
preted the historical réle of the Church.1 When he wrote in the
reign of the Emperor Constantine, the Church had just emerged
triumphantly from its long struggle with the pagan government
of Rome. Now, under imperial patronage, it could look forward
to an era of peace and its own increasing importance in the
Roman state. However, in thus setting out to record the victorious
progress of Christianity, Eusebius still felt the newness of the
faith, although now some three centuries old, to be a problem.
Accordingly, he undertakes to show that it had been necessary for
God to prepare for the incarnation of Christ, so ‘that no one
might think of our Saviour and Lord, Jesus Christ, as a novelty
(vedteoov) because of the date of his ministry in the flesh’.
This increasing consciousness of the historical significance of
Christianity in the scheme of divine providence achieves its classic
statement in the De Civitate Dei of Augustine, bishop of Hippo
Regius. The occasion that led to the production of this great and
seminal work was the sack of Rome by the Goths, under Alaric, in
410. This violation of the city, which men had come to regard as
eternal, caused a profound shock throughout the Empire. Those
who had remained attached to the old pagan cults were quick to
attribute the catastrophe to Christianity, which had seduced men
from their allegiance to the gods who had brought Rome to
world-empire. It was to combat such a charge that Augustine
undertook what was to be his magnum opus.? The title indicated
speculation and the idea of the Millennium see Werner, Entstehung, pp. 83-8
(E.T., pp. 37-9). Cf. W. Bauer in R.A.C., II, 1075-1078; H. Kraft in R.G.G.3,
I, 1651-3.
1Cf. A. Alféldi, The Conversion of Constantine and Pagan Rome, pp. 16-18;
R. L. P. Milburn, Early Christian Interpretations of History, pp. 54-73; Ehrhardt,
Politische Metaphysik, Il, pp. 283-9; A. Momigliano in The Conflict between
Paganism and Christianity (ed. A. Momigliano), pp. 83-5, 89-94.
2 Ecclesiastical History, I, iv. 1.
° Cf. de Labriolle, La réaction paienne, pp. 460-4; F. Lot, La fin du monde
antique, pp. 236-7; M. Mantius in C.M.H., I, pp.270-4; A. J. Toynbee, A Study
of History, V, pp. 223-5.
HISTORY AS A TWO-PHASED PLAN I9$
the theme. Augustine conceived of the entire history of mankind,

as he knew it, as a contest between two states: the ‘City of God’
(civitas Dei) and the ‘terrestrial city’ or state (civitas terrena).1 He
interprets what he knew of Egyptian, Assyrian, Greek and Roman
history as showing the inevitable decline and ruin of the civitas
terrena.* Although he never precisely defines or identifies his
civitas Dei, it is evident that it is the Church, integrated into a
Christian state, that he has in mind. For example, he sets forth the
ideal of Christian emperors (Christiani imperatores), who put their
power at the service of the Divine Majesty for the propagation of
the faith, fearing, loving, and worshipping God; ‘and who love
the Divine Kingdom (illud regnum), in which they do not fear
others as equals’.
Thus Augustine propounds a philosophy of history which
adumbrates the medieval conception of Christendom. Supple-
mented by the work of his disciple Orosius, the De Civitate Dei
provided Christians with an interpretation of the past, such as it
was then known, which seemed convincing and impressive.* The
kaleidoscope of human affairs was seen as forming an intelligible
and inspiring pattern. Instead of a cyclic process of ever recurring
phenomena, Time was presented as a linear sequence of events
through which the purpose of God moved steadily towards its
1 Augustine gives a concise description of the De Civitate Dei in his Retracta-
tiones, Il, 69: cf. de Labriolle, Saint Augustin: La Cité Dieu, I, pp. vi-vii. Cf. de
Labriolle, History and Literature of Christianity, pp. 408-13; H. I. Marrou, Saint
Augustin et lafin de la culture antique, pp. 701-2; K. Lowith, Meaning in History,
pp- 160-73.
2 De Civitate Dei. XIV. ii-xliii. Cf. B. Capelle in R.A.C., I, 988-91.
3 De Civitate Dei, V. xxiv: ‘si plus amant illud regnum, ubi non timent
habere consortes’.
4 On Orosius and his connection with Augustine see de Labriolle, History and
Literature of Christianity, pp. 434-8. The subsequent popularity of the De
Civitate Dei and the Adversum Paganos of Orosius is attested by the fact that
more than five hundred manuscripts of the former and more than two hun-
dred of the latter have survived (cf. de Labriolle, Saint Augustin: La Cité
de Dieu, 1, pp. xviii-xix; History and Literature of Christianity, p. 438). Cf
B. Croce, Teoria e Storia della Storiografia, pp. 186-92; Milburn, pp. 74-92;
F. J. Foakes Jackson, A History of Church History, pp. 87-96; Lowith, pp.
174-81.
goal. Time, accordingly, acquired in the Christian mind an

urgent significance, and its passage was regarded with awe and
solemnly recorded. The caléndar of the Church’s liturgical year
kept the Christian constantly mindful, not only of the passing of
the seasons, but of the great acts of God which secured his salva-
tion. Moreover, each year the calendar opened with the season of
Advent, when the faithful were solemnly reminded of the pros-
pect of that awful Second Coming of Christ which would mark
the end of all things and the last irrevocable decision on the
destinies of men.? And the daily passage of Time, also, was
brought home to the Christian in a manner unknown in the pagan
world: across the fields and through the streets of cities in medieval
Europe the sound of bells informed him of the passing of the
liturgical hours, whilethe doleful notes of the passing-bell told him
of the death of some Christian soul and reminded him of his own.?
The gradual unfolding of God’s purpose in history was also
presented graphically to the Christian each time he entered a
church. From such a writing as the Speculum historiale of Vincent
of Beauvais artists learned to depict in sculpture, in mural paintings
or coloured glass, a series of sacred events, illustrating or typifying
the divine scheme for man’s salvation, and ranging in time from
the Old Testament, through the New, on to the Acts of the
Saints.? But the time-scheme of this medieval art did not direct
the minds of the faithful only to contemplate the past; representa-
tions of the General Resurrection and the Last Judgment, crowded
with realistic and gruesome detail, urgently reminded them of the
future when God’s mighty purpose for them and all mankind
would be finally accomplished.® Nor were these the only means
* Cf. G. Quispel in Man and Time (Papers from the Eranos Yearbooks), pp.
97-107; Cullmann, Christus und die Zeit, pp. 43-52.
2 Cf. A. Baumstark in R.A.C., I, 118-125.
3Cf. O. Spengler, The Decline of the West, I, pp. 14-15; L. Mumford,
Technics and Civilization, pp. 12-18.
4 Cf. E. Male, The Gothic Image, pp. 131 f.
° Cf. Male, pp. 355 £; G. G. Coulton, Medieval Faith and Symbolism, chap.
XV; E. I. Watkins, Catholic Art and Culture, pp. 37-75; G. H. Cook, The
Mediaeval English Parish Church, pp. 195-7;J.Huizinga, Autumno del Medio Evo,
pp- 196-237.
whereby the Church sought to instruct its members in the sacred

history of God’s providence, or to rouse them to greater diligence
in their religious duties. The scheme of mankind’s salvation, as
revealed in the Bible story, was presented each year in dramatic
pageants, in the production of which clergy and laymen com-
bined.t No more eloquent testimony perhaps may be found of
popular awareness of what might justly be described as the
Christian philosophy of history than the following verses from
the York pageant-play concerning the Last Judgment:
God speaks: I have tholed mankind many a year
In lust and liking for to lend;
And uneaths find I far or near
A man that will his miss amend.
On earth I see but sins sere;
Therefore my angels will I send
To blow their bemes, that all may hear
The time is come I will make end.?
* * *
It has often been asserted that Christianity was successful against

the pagan mystery religions, in winning the allegiance of Graeco-
Roman society, because it was based on historical fact, whereas
they rested on myths. Such assertions seem to assume that the
early Christians, and indeed those pagans to whom they addressed
themselves, had an appreciation of historicity akin to that ex-
pressed in Ranke’s famous definition of the historian’s task as
being that of describing the past ‘as it really happened’ (wie es
eigentlich gewesen).® If such a claim in its more extreme form
appears anachronistic, there are certainly grounds for the impres-
sion that the Christian case during this vital period must have been
1Cf. Everyman and Medieval Miracle Plays (ed. A. C. Cawley), pp. viii-xii,
XV-XVIl.
2 The York Pageant of the Mercers. The Judgment [Scene I Heaven], 11.
57-64, in op. cit., pp. 192-3. oe
3 Geschichte der romanischen und germanischen Volker, preface to the first edition
(Werke, Leipzig, 1874, vol. xxxiii-xxxiv, p. vii). Cf. R. G. Collingwood, The
Idea of History, pp. 131-3; Croce, Teoria e Storia della Storiografia, pp. 44-5, 57,
265 f; G. P. Gooch, History and Historians in the Nineteenth Century, p. 78.
oO
greatly assisted by the fact that appeal could be made to the records
of its origins contained in the Gospels and Acts. Indeed, as we
have already seen, even in the Gospels of Luke and Matthew
attempts were made to prove the truth of the Resurrection of
Jesus by an appeal to what is alleged to be historical fact.! More-
over, it might also be thought that the elaborate chronological
references in Luke would have interested Christians and caused
them to appreciate the apparent historicity of such a record of the
life of Jesus.
That the early Christians were historically minded and did value
the Gospels as historical evidence would seem to be confirmed
also by their appeal to the Gospel record during the struggle with
Gnosticism. We have seen, for example, how Ignatius met the
Docetist heresy by asserting that Jesus had truly (aA70@c) been
born, suffered under Pontius Pilate, and rose from the dead. On
analysis, however, such appeal is found to be motivated not by an
appreciation of the historicity of the Gospel story, but by the con-
viction that its testimony demonstrated the physical reality of the
birth and death of the Saviour. A truer insight into the manner in
which the historical evidence of the Gospels was evaluated is
afforded by Irenaeus, one of the chief champions of orthodoxy
against Gnosticism. Seeking to refute the view of the Valentinian
Gnostics that the ministry of Jesus lasted for one year only,
Irenaeus so combined statements of John and Luke that he was able
to show, to his own satisfaction, that it had continued for twenty
years; in so doing he failed to realize that he was making the
serious historical error of dating the procuratorship of Pontius
Pilate for the reign of Claudius instead of that of Tiberius.’
An error of this magnitude reveals that Christians of the second
century could have had little appreciation of historical accuracy,
and that they wrote for people whose knowledge of history was
meagre and who were unlikely to check their statements by
reference to other sources. Such a conclusion is further confirmed
by the evidence of Justin Martyr and Tertullian. Thus Justin (d.
1 See pp. 180-1 2 See pp. 189-90.
8 Adv. Haer. I, 22, 5; Dem. 74. Cf. R. M. Grant, The Earliest Lives ofJesus,
p- 34.
163) declares that his readers can check on the birth of Jesus ‘from
the lists of the taxing which was made in the time of Cyrenius, the
first governor of yours inJudaea’. Such an assertion, made some
one and a half centuries after the alleged event, must surely indi-
cate either a woeful lack of historical accuracy or a kind of
rhetorical bluff—if reference had been made to the official ar-
chives, at least it would have been found that Coponius was then
procurator inJudaea and Cyrenius (Quirinius) the legate of Syria.
A similar assertion was made by Tertullian, as we have already
noticed. His claim that Pilate sent such a report of Christ to
Tiberius as to convince that emperor of Christ’s divinity, re-
inforced by the challenge consulite commentarios vestros, must surcly
be adjudged as due to a very poor appreciation of what con-
stitutes historical proof or as another example of an apologist’s
bluff.
Scholarship in the Graeco-Roman world was not without ideas
concerning what constitutes historical evidence. Early in the
second century A.D., the Alexandrian scholar Aelius Theon had
set out rules for distinguishing myth, narrative (i.e. descriptive
accounts of events that might have happened), and yea, which
denoted brief accounts of actions or sayings attributed to some
person. According to Theon, the yoeta resembled a yrbun (‘pro-
verbial saying’) and an dtowynpudvevya (‘reminiscence’). To what
degree Christians were familiar with literary and historical criti-
cism of this type is not known, but it is likely that the better
educated of the Church’s scholars had some acquaintance with it.
It is interesting, therefore, that Justin classifies the Gospels as the
éxtouynpovetuata of the apostles.® And it was on the ground
1 Apology, I. 34: tr. G. J. Davie, Oxford, 1861. Cf. Grant, p. 21.
2 Cf. Schiirer, G.J.V., I, pp. 454-7, 486.
3 Apol. V. 3. ‘Ea omnia super Christo Pilatus, et ipse iam pro sua conscientia
Christianus, Caesari tunc Tiberio nuntiavit’, Apol. XXI. 24. On the possibility
that an official report of Pilate on Jesus had been deposited in the imperial arch-
ives see R. Eisler, JHZOYX BAXIAEYX OY BALTIAEYZAS, I, pp. xxix-
xxx, 298-302; The Messiah Jesus and John the Baptist, 1-4, 13-15, 591-2.
4Cf, Grant, Earliest Lives ofJesus, p. 15. On droprnudvevma see also pp.
119-20.
5 Apol. Il. 11, 2-7; cf. Grant, pp. 16, 20, 119-120.
of their supposed apostolic origin, as described by Papias of

Hierapolis early in the second century,1 that their records were
accepted as.authentic.? Their authority being such, it never seems
to have occurred to Christian scholars to question the validity of
the Gospels as accurate accounts of what Jesus said and did. Their
critical faculties were exercised instead in two other directions,
namely, in reconciling certain conflicting statements in the four
Gospels? and in extracting the spiritual meaning of what they
recorded. From the point of view of our subject this latter con-
cern has a great significance, for it meant that the Gospels were
not evaluated primarily as records of the historical Jesus but as
revelations of the divine truths of Christ’s work for man’s salva-
tion. Hence these writings were approached as oracles, not as
historical documents, as the following statement of the great
Alexandrian exegete Origen shows: “Then, finally, (the Church’s
teaching) is that the Scriptures were written by the Spirit of God,
and have a meaning, not only such as is apparent at first sight, but
also another, which escapes the attention of most. For those
[words] which are written are the forms of certain mysteries, and
images of divine things.’
That Christians were then interested in the Gospel record of
Jesus not primarily for what it told of his life in first-century
Palestine, but for its revelation of divine truth, finds expression
also in the earliest forms of Christian art. In the Roman catacomb
paintings, dating from the beginning of the third century, the
subjects depicted typify or symbolize the saving intervention of
1 See Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History, II, xxxix. The Lukan Gospel derived its
apostolic authority from Paul, through Luke, his follower and assistant.
2 The formation of a canonical New Testament developed very largely in
response to the challenge of Gnosticism: cf. Streeter, Four Gospels, pp. 3-9;
Grant, pp. 3-14.
3 The Diatesseron of Tatian is the most notable example of the desire to
harmonize the various Gospel accounts; although it did not establish itself as a
popular work, it witnesses to the concern of Christians about the discrepancies
of the Gospel records. Cf. Grant, pp. 22-8; Streeter, pp. 9-10.
4 Cf. Grant, pp. 35-7.
° Origen, De Principiis, praefatio, 8, in Kidd, Documents, I, p. 180. Cf. Grant,
pp. 53 f., 114-18; J. Pepin, Les deux approches du Christianisme, p. 43.
“JUIAD yenqoe lee [[eoet STOTP[OS Surtdooys ou) jo soInsy =1ee! opty mM
pue UsT[vot JO JIN}XTUT L ST Aydeasouost OU
SSOIT) poy voIM—[oINey] OU 3 YIM “yoru o1}JUDD OU, “tusTpoquurAs
“UOTDIIINSIY oy saztpoqurks ‘our TY.) oy pue
sory oun Jo ydumniay, oI SuNezysnyt ‘(oob-o$ €9) sndveydoores uenstyD “TTX ILV1d
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dy} Op se sowmysoo uvuroy ArerodurayUoD IvoM (MET OY} SUTATOIOI) SasOYY PUL (IvS] Suroyiiors) weyeiqy Jy} JULIYVTUSIS st I]
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God in human affairs. From the Old Testament come such repre-
sentations of this theme as Noah in his ark, Moses producing water
from the rock, and the adventures of Jonah.’ The events depicted
from the New Testament are also selected to illustrate this soterio-
logical theme: baptism (perhaps of Christ), Jesus healing the
blind, the paralytic carrying his bed, the miracle of the loaves and
fishes, the raising of Lazarus.? The Crucifixion is not shown, nor
the Resurrection.’ The figure of the Good Shepherd appears to be
the favourite form in which Christ is represented,* while the
Orans, the praying female figure, perhaps symbolizing the wor-
shipping soul, is also frequently portrayed.® Similar scenes appear
on the sculptured sarcophagi which date mainly from the era of
Constantine. Old Testament episodes prefiguring the salvation
that Christ was to win often pair with scenes from the Gospel
story.® More incidents, however, from the life of Jesus are por-
trayed in these sculptures than in the catacomb paintings. What is
particularly notable in all these early representations of Jesus is that
he is invariably portrayed as a youth, beardless and in typical
1 Cf. F. Grossi Gondi, I Monumenti Cristiani, pp. 9-15.
2 Cf. Grossi Gondi, pp. 15-25.
8 The earliest representation (third century) of the Crucifixion is the scur-
rilous graffito found on the Palatine, and is, of course, of pagan origin: cf. H.
Leclercq, La vie chrétienne primitive, p. 85 and Pl. xlix. The oldest Christian
(realistic) representations date from the fifth century: cf. F. van der Meer and
C. Mohrmann, Atlas of the Early Christian World, ill. 475-8. Of particular
interest is the motif of the ‘Trophy of the Cross’ on a sarcophagus dating about
350, now in the Museo Lateranense. The sculpture concerned shows three
realistic depictions: Simon of Cyrene carrying the Cross; Christ being crowned
(with a wreath of victory?); Christ talking to Pilate. The central panel has the
Cross surmounted by the ChiRho sign, encircled by a wreath of victory: below
are two sleeping soldiers. This scene clearly symbolizes both the Crucifixion
and Resurrection. Cf. Atlas, ill. 466, 467; M. Gough, The Early Christians, ill.
39, 56, 58, pp. 258, 260; E. Dinkler in Jahrbuch fiir Antike und Christentum,
5 (1962), p. 107. See Plate xiii.
4Cf. T. Klauser in Jahrbuch fiir Antike und Christentum, 1 (1958), Pp. 24-44,
Tafeln 1-5.
5 Cf, Klauser in op. cit., 2 (1959), pp. 115-45, Tafeln 8-14; 3 (1960), pp.
112-33, Tafeln 4-10.
6 Cf. Grossi Gondi, pp. 101-18; Klauser in op. cit., 4 (1961), pp. 132-45. See
Plate xiv.
Roman attire.! In all scenes, both those of the Old Testament and
the New, no attempt is made to differentiate the periods concerned
by a change.of dress. All persons are depicted in the costume con-
temporary tothe time of the making of the paintings or sarcophagi.
The impression created by this early Christian art is the same as
that which comes from the writings of the Christian fathers,
namely, that the story ofJesus is essentially a hieros logos or ‘sacred
history’, which is truly as timeless in its enactment as is in its
spiritual significance. This does not mean that it was regarded as of
the nature of a myth, but that the date and place of its happening
were irrelevant so far as its soteriological efficacy was concerned.
In this sense the story of Jesus was not apprehended in a manner
generally different from that in which the devotees understood the
sacred histories which formed the rationales of the mystery reli-
gions. For, as we have seen from our earlier study of the Osirian
mortuary ritual, the principle of the ritual perpetuation of the past,
which was basic to such cults, stemmed essentially from.a belief
that it was by some definitive event of the past that salvation had
been made possible.? In their polemic against these cults, the
Christian fathers did not emphasize the historicity of the Gospel
narrative against the mythical nature of the sacred stories of the
mysteries; their attack was based on other grounds. It is, for
example, significant that an apologist of the calibre of Tertullian,
arguing for the truth of the Gospel story, makes the following
comparison with reference to the pagan mysteries: ‘For the
moment accept this story (hanc fabulam)—it is like your own
stories (similis est vestris)—while we show how Christ is proved,
and who they were who, in order to destroy the truth, set about
among you rival stories of the same kind (eiusmodi fabulas
aemulas).’* Tertullian subsequently shows that the authors of
1 The earliest bearded representation of Christ (Crucified) seems to be on
the carved panels of the wooden doors of the Church of S. Sabina, Rome (432).
Cf. Gough, ill. 66, p. 261. E. Male (The Early Churches of Rome, pp. 56-8),
discerns Eastern, i.e. Syrian or Palestinian, influences in the iconography of
these doors. 2 See above, pi23.
3 Apol. XXI. 14 (tr. T. R. Glover, Loeb ed., p- 109). See also Firmicus
Maternus (De Errore profan. relig., II. 3, 6) on the reality of Osiris and Set
(Typhon).
these deceiving stories are the daemons (gens daemonum), who have
their abode in the air, close to the stars.! What evidently counted
from the Christian point of view in the struggle with paganism
was not that Christianity was based on what was believed to be
historical fact and paganism on what was fiction, but that
Christianity was the work of God and the pagan cults the work
of demons.?
We may now bring this rather involved study of the historical

factor in Christianity to a close; for Christian belief achieved its
definitive pattern by the end of the sixth century, and the founda-
tions had by then been laid for the great synthesis of medieval
Christendom. As we have seen, the apparent historical character
of Christianity has two aspects, both of which were acquired by
the end of the first century. The formation of a historical narrative
of the life of Jesus arose out of the need of the original Jewish
disciples to prove the Messiahship of Jesus. The preservation of
that tradition, and its fusion with Paul’s ahistorical conception of
the divine Saviour of mankind, resulted from the situation in
which the Christian community at Rome found itself shortly
after A.D. 70. The presentation of the supernatural Christ in the
historical context of first-century Palestine, achieved in the Mar-
kan Gospel, provided the pattern for the other Gospels, and con-
sequently for all subsequent Christian thought. However, although
this narrative account of Jesus had its own natural appeal as the
1 Apol. XXII. 9-10. It should be noted that scholars in the Graeco-Roman
world were well aware of the difference between history and myth: cf. Grant,
pp- 120-2, and above, p. 199.
2 Cf. de Labriolle, La réaction paienne, pp. 446-51; M. Simon in The Saviour
God (ed. S. G. F. Brandon), pp. 145-6, Hercule et le Christianisme, pp. 20-3.
Although Christians were embarrassed by the recent origin of their faith, it is
evident that the graphic narrative of the Gospels was a very great asset. Early
Christian art reveals how rich was the Bible as a source of pictorial representa-
tion compared with the sacred legends of the Mysteries. The iconography of
both Osirianism and Mithraism shows a striking paucity of incident compared
with that of Christianity; and the mythoi of these cults provided more oppor-
tunities for pictorial representation than did those of the other Mysteries. Ch
M. J. Vermaseren, Mithras: the Secret God, pp. 75-106 and the accompanying
figs.
204 HISTORY, TIME AND) DEL LY
additions to it by way of apocryphal gospels show,! it was evalu-

ated primarily as a divinely inspired revelation of the signal acts
whereby God wrought mankind’s salvation. Its authenticity was
never questioned, since it was held to embody the ‘memoirs’ of
the apostles; whatever discrepancies existed between the four
Gospels it was the task of scholars to reconcile or to explain as
having some deep cryptic meaning. The historicity of the record
was never emphasized, because ‘historicity’, as conceived by
modern scholarship, was not then understood or appreciated; in-
deed to the contrary, the fact that the origins of Christianity could
be located in the not far distant past was a matter of embarrass-
ment, since a high value was placed then upon antiquity, especi-
ally where religion was concerned. The ‘quest for the historical
Jesus’ had to wait until a new appreciation of what constituted
historical evidence began to emerge in the world of secular
scholarship in the nineteenth century.”
The other aspect of Christianity, which may fairly be described
as historical, derived from the Hebrew philosophy of history on
which the original disciples, indeed Jesus himself, had been nur-
tured. After the disappointment of the primitive expectation that
the world would soon end, the Christian Weltanschauung was re-
orientated, so that an “Age of the Church’ was seen as constituting
the second phase of the divine purpose. The first phase, comprising
the history of God’s dealings with Israel, formed the Praeparatio
Evangelica, which ended with the birth of Jesus Christ. In their
endeavour to show that Christianity was no new thing, but deeply
rooted in the past, the Christian apologists, following Paul’s lead,
claimed that the Church was the expression in history of God’s
purpose which had gradually unfolded itself from the time of
1 The desire to have more information about those parts of the life of Jesus
not recorded in the Gospels found expression in the production of Infancy
Gospels and of detailed accounts of the Resurrection and the Descent into
Hades: see M. R. James, The Apocryphal New Testament, pp. 38-146.
2 See the survey (from Reimarus to Wrede) made by A. Schweitzer in The
Quest of the Historical Jesus. Cf. H. Zahrnt, The Historical Jesus; H. Conzelmann
in R.G.G.3, Ill, 619-53; J. M. Robinson, A New Quest for the Historical Jesus;
S. G. F. Brandon, ‘Further Quest for the Historical Jesus’, in The Modern
Churchman, V (new series), 1961-2, pp. 212-20.
HISTORY AS A TWO-PHASED PLAN 205.
Adam’s Fall. In the life and mission of the Church that purpose
was still being worked out, both in the life of the individual
Christian and in the Church, in its threefold parts, Militant, Ex-
pectant and Triumphant. Ultimately, it was believed, the divine
purpose would reach its culmination, and Christ would return,
the dead be raised, and the Final Judgment enacted, with eternal
beatitude for the saved and eternal punishment for the damned.
Hence, the Christian viewed the whole course of Time, from the
Creation to the End of the World, as the drama of God’s provi-
dence for the human race; hence, to him, history was in essence
teleology.
Epilogue
PNahe surveying so many and so diverse-expressions of man’s

reaction to his awareness of Time, it is natural to ask whether
they derive from several or from a single cause. In view of the fact
that experience of temporal change is common to human nature,
it is tempting to think that the cause must be single. However,
without seeking to press this argument, it may be recalled that we
saw that man’s time-sense causes him to anticipate the future and
to expect that it will bring change in his situation. Although such
anticipation in some instances may be pleasurable, generally con-
templation of the future is calculated to inspire a sense of insecurity.
This insecurity will appertain to various of the interests of each in-
dividual concerned, and what it touches will naturally vary from
person to person. For all mankind, however, there is one com-
mon source of insecurity, the significance of which is absolute: it
is the knowledge of one’s mortality. This knowledge stems ulti-
mately from our consciousness of Time—our ability to contem-
plate the future also causes us to anticipate our own deaths.
Confronted with so grim a prospect, with its inexorable logic
that ‘this pleasing anxious being’, in the words of the famous
Elegy, must leave ‘the warm precincts of cheerful day’, it is under-
standable that man’s instinctive reaction has been to seek salvation
from such a doom. Seen in this context, the many and diverse
beliefs and practices which we have surveyed are, accordingly,
found to have a common underlying motive—the defeat or avoid-
ance of Time’s inevitable process of decay and death.
Thus the ritual techniques, whether in ancient Osirianism or
Christianity, which were designed to perpetuate the saving effi-
cacy of a past event, promised those, on whose behalf they were
employed, eternal security by assimilation to a deity who had
conquered death, thereby transcending Time. In those faiths
where Time has been deified, a deity has been conceived of ambi-
valent character, combining in itself the attributes of both Creator
206
EPILOGUE 207
and Destroyer. However, although the destructive power of Time
has seemed thus to be realistically admitted, the logic of this ad-
mission was never accepted. As we have seen, in Zoroastrianism
and Mithraism a higher and beneficent personification of Time
was set over that Time which brought decay and death. In India
escape from “Time, that makes the worlds to perish’ has been
sought through bhakti, that intense personal devotion to the
supreme deity, instinctively envisaged in the benign aspect of his
being. Where Time has been regarded as a cyclic process of
existence in a lower material world, such existence has been inter-
preted as the penalty imposed upon spiritual beings who had for-
gotten or fallen from their original high estate. Yet, behind all this
apparent sophistication, there was always operative the instinct to
escape from the menace of Time. Hence in the faiths or philoso-
phies concerned, namely, Hinduism, Buddhism, and Orpheo-
Platonism, escape has taken the form of denying the absolute
reality of Time, of seeing it as a dimension of a lower phenomenal
world.
The acceptance of Time as the field in which the divine purpose
manifests itself, as inJudaism and Christianity, may at first sight
seem to contradict an instinct for security from Time’s menace.
However, although Hebrew religion was in origin an ethnic
faith, concerned essentially with the deity and his elect people, the
demand of the individual for ultimate personal significance led to
the sanction of belief in a post-mortem resurrection. Indeed, Hebrew
eschatology came to contemplate both the destiny of the holy
nation and of the faithful Israelite as a state of eternal beatitude,
beyond the vicissitudes of Time. Christianity, though stemming
from Judaism, transcended its narrow ethnicism and constructed
a soteriology that accounted for the history of mankind, from the
creation of its first parents to the final judgment delivered upon
its members individually at the end of the present world-order.
As inJudaism, but with a more elaborate schematology, Time has
been evaluated as the field of the gradual revelation and fulfilment
of the divine purpose. However, although thus implicated in the
temporal process by God’s will, the individual Christian has
hoped ultimately to escape from Time. The Vision of God, the
summum bonum of Christian endeavour, has been conceived as an

eternal experience; and, conversely, damnation has also been re-
garded as eternal.
Medieval Christianity achieved a synthesis of existence that was,

both macrocosmically and microcosmically, complete. The whole
world-order, the whole course of human history, and the life of
each individual being, were integrated into the transcendent pur-
pose of God. Time was regarded with awe, and its passage
solemnly recorded; it was meaningful, for it was the progressive
manifestation of the Divine Will. Hence the Christian believed
that he had his part in a mighty process that was moving slowly
and majestically to its ultimate conclusion, which would be the
complete achievement of God’s providence.
The gradual supersession of the Church’s authority from the
sixteenth century onwards, and the consequent secularization of
Western society, inevitably resulted in a gradual abandonment of
that Weltanschauung which reached its culminating form in the
Middle Ages. The abandonment was not generally consciously
willed, for rarely in Europe has there been an effective public
repudiation of Christianity. However, its influence has progres-
sively declined, and, with it, belief in the supernatural authority
that authenticated the Christian interpretation of Time. The con-
sequences of this situation were disguised for a while by a secular-
ized form of Christian teleology. The gradual improvement of
the social and economic conditions of Western society during the
nineteenth century, owing to advances in scientific knowledge
and general education, inspired an optimism about the future that
found expression in a doctrine of progress: that more science,
more education must inevitably raise the standard of human
living.
Progress in improving the material conditions of life has been
maintained, and its benefits have in varying measures affected a
Cf. J. Baillie, The Belief in Progress, pp. 88-154; C. Dawson, Progress and
Religion, pp. 190 f.; J. Burckhardt, Weltgeschichtliche Betrachtungen, pp. 243-45
L. Mumford, The Condition ofMan, chap. ix; S.J. Case, The Christian Philosophy
of History, pp. 77-86.
EPILOGUE 209
large part of the human race. However, not only has the searing
experience of two world-wars undermined the earlier optimism
about rising standards of social behaviour, but the continued ex-
pansion of scientific knowledge has also created a profound
scepticism as to whether any humanly inspiring purpose is to be
discerned in the cosmic process. This scepticism derives from the
findings of many scientific disciplines. The universe, as revealed
by the physical sciences, appears as the complex product of the un-
ceasing operation of impersonal forces, without any plan or pur-
pose that the human mind can comprehend. If we turn, baffled by
this cosmic enigma, to ask what our greater knowledge informs
us of ourselves, we receive a no more inspiring answer. Our
greater understanding of the physical and mental constitution of
human nature provides no evidence that we have any destiny
other than the obvious biological one of reproducing ourselves.
Archaeological and historical research have opened up an im-
mense vista of the past of the human race; but no plan or pur-
pose is to be discerned in the long history of mankind beyond
that of homo sapiens’s success as a species in the struggle for
existence.?
Now, since man is a purposeful being, and the more rational he
strives to be in his thinking, the more teleological will be his dis-
position, this failure to discern an inspiring purpose in life is
serious. The malaise that seems now to affect Western culture and
civilization surely stems from that failure. Never before has there
been so much conscious planning for the future; but rarely also
has there been a deeper conviction that significance for each in-
dividual is limited to the brief span of personal life. And the irony
of our situation is that the regimentation imposed by modern
society makes us increasingly conscious of Time; it also directs our
thoughts ever forward into the future, so that experience of the
present seems largely to be conditioned by anticipation of what is
to come. Yet this preoccupation with the future serves but to
remind us that our own personal future is limited, that Time
1 The interpretation of history in terms of man’s biological success has been
ably done by V. Gordon Childe, Man Makes Himself, chaps. i-ii; Progress and
Archaeology, chap. viii.
ultimately renders futile all our planning for the security of body
or estate.
Thus the problem of Time abides, confronting all our seeking
for significance with its chilling logic of the inevitability of decay
and death. From the existential philosophy of life which it thus
seems to thrust upon us our instinct still is to turn and seek other
and transcendental values. Hence the continuous effort, finding
expression in an unceasing series of books, to explain the nature of
history or to make sense of mankind’s past. Such essays in the
philosophy of history are usually received with impatience or in-
difference by the historian and philosopher, since they seem to
them, and often rightly so, to be generalizations based on inade-
quate assessments of highly complex data. But, whatever may be
their inadequacies, these works are symptomatic of a deep-rooted
need to find some significance in the life of man, both as an in-
dividual and as a species. It is probable that this need will never be
satisfied, since man’s awareness of the challenge of Time may well
be the penalty he has to pay for rationality. However that may be,
to understand something of the nature and proportions of the
problem surely has its value: if this study contributes in some
measure to that end, it will accordingly be justified.
1 ‘la philosophie de l’histoire est une partie essentielle de la philosophie, elle
en est 4 la fois l’introduction et la conclusion. Introduction, puisqu’il faut com-
prendre l’histoire pour penser la destinée humaine, d’un temps et de toujours,
conclusion, puisqu’il n’y a pas de compréhension du devenir sans une doctrine
de ’homme’, R. Aron, Introduction @ la philosophie de Vhistoire, pp. 12-13. On
other aspects of the issue involved here see W. H. Walsh, An Introduction to the
Philosophy of History, pp. 9-28; Brandon, Time and Mankind, pp. 177-99; A. J.
Toynbee, An Historian’s Approach to Religion, pp. 1-15; H. S. Hughes, Oswald
Spengler: a Critical Estimate, pp. 137-65; P. Teilhard de Chardin, The Pheno-
menon of Man, pp. 273-313; K. Lowith, ‘Christentum und Geschichte’, in
Numen, Il, pp. 147-55; E. H. Carr, What is History?, pp. 109-56; C. A. Patrides,
The Phoenix and the Ladder: the rise and decline of the Christian view of History
(University of California Press, 1964).
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Sources
(references to the not. es are shown in brackets)
CHRISTIAN Gal. 1, 6-8: 164(4)

Acts i, 6: 153 (1, 2) 1, II-I2: 163(4)
li, 22-36 , II-li, 21: 150(4)
ili, 12-26: 158(2) , 13-23: 163(3)
iv, 42 , 12: 164(Z)
vili, I-3: 163 (3) , 16-17: 164(2)
pede
pate
fade
ix, I-30: 163(3) i, 19: 178(2)
VES £178 (2) il, 9, 12: 178(2)
53257 (3) THE LB SS)
XX, 25, 29-30: 173(4) iv, 3-4: 54(3)
XXi, 18: 178(2) iv, 4: 186(3)
XXi, 20-1: 172(2) iv, 8-11: 186(3)
Apocryphon of John, 50 Heb. i, 1-4: 187(2)
Augustine, Confessions, I, i: 6(3) iii, I f.: 187(3)
XI, 17: 6(2) Vii, 23-5: 187(4)
' De Civit. Dei, V, xxiv: 195(3) ix, 11 f.: 187(3)
XIV, ii—xliii: 195 (2) xiii, 8: 30(z)
Retractationes, II, 69: 195(1) Hermas, Vision 2, iv, 1: 188(5)
Barnabas, Ep., IV, 6: 191(3) Ignatius, Ep. Trall., ix: 190(1)
Bede, Explanatio Apoc., 188(5) Irenaeus, Adv. Haer., I, xvii, 2: 51(1)
Col. ii, 8, 20: 54(3) I, xxiv, 4: 189(3)
I Cor. i, 22-3: 155(L) I, xxvi, I, 2: 189(3)
ii, 2: 165(4) I, xxvii, 2: 191(1)
ii, 6-8: 54(3), 165(3) II, xxii, 5: 198(3)
vi, II: 26(2) Dem. 74: 198(3)
xi, 23: 157(I) John i, I-11, 14: 182(2)
xi, 23-5: 159(3) iii, §: 28(1)
xi, 23-7: 29(I) xi, 47-51: 182(1)
xi, 25: 191(5) xvi, §-14: 183(4)
XV, 3: 164(3) XVill, 13-14, 28-38: 182(1)
XV, 3-7: 159(4) xix, 12-22: 182(1)
xv, 3-8: 157(6) Luke i, 1: 157(3)
xv, 3-8: 181(1) i, 2: 157(5)
XV, 12-20: 181(2) 13.0523)
II Cor. ii, 6-8: 167(1) ii, I-2: 150(2)
iii, 14: 191 (4) ii, 2: 181(4)
v, 14, 17: 160(2) i, I=—27 TO1($)
xi, 3-4: 165 (1) vii, 18-23: 158(1)
Eph. v, 25-7: 188(2) xiii, 18 f.: 186(2)
Eusebius, Eccl. Hist., I, ii, 1: 193 (3) xiii, 20: 186(2)
I, iv, I: 194(2) xv, 19-31: 184(3)
Ill, xxxix: 200(1) Xvii, 20-1: 183(4)
Firmicus Maternus, De errore, II, 3, 6: Xvii, 22-37: 153 (3)
202 (3) xxi, 20-4: 174(2)
227
228 SOURCES
Luke xxi, 25-8: 153 (3) XXVii, 62-6: 180(4)

xxii, 27: 154(3) XXViii, 4: 180(4)
Xxili, I-§: 175(2) XXVIll, I-15: 180(4)
xxiii, 3: 184(3) Origen, c. Celsum V1, 42: 86(3)
Xxill, 24-52°175(2) De princip., praef. 8: 200(5)
Xxili, 36-8: 175(2) Rev, x, 6: 188(5)
Kiva NO =20 5,52) XXi, 5-6: I
xxiv, 25-7: 155(3) xxii, 17 (xxi, 22): 188(3)
XXIV, 36-43: 180(3) Rom. i, 3: 159(2)
Mark i, 24: 158(3) i, 18-32: 169(1)
li, 12: 158(3) i, 20: 170(Z)
ti OseE 77713) i272)
iii, 21: 178(3) 23 703)
ili, 31-5: 178(4) ii, 17-24: 170(4)
iv, 30-2: 186(2) ili, 22-25: 170(5)
iv, 41: 158(3) Vi, 3-9: 26-7
v, 6-8: 158(3) vi, 4: 162(3)
vi, I-5: 178(4) vi, 8: 162(4)
Viii, 29-32: 178(1) rbd, Ti92,8 SityAu
Gs)
ix, 1: 153(4) ix, 22-6: 171 (2)
X, 23: 184(2) Xe aL WL(2)
x ieee 771(3)) ol HE 15/2(@)
xii, 13-17: 176(1, 3) xi, I-§: 171(2)
Xii, 26-7: 154(3) Tertullian, Apol. I, 34: 199(Z)
Xiii, 4-6: 183(1) IL, 11. 2-7: 199(5)
xiii, 4-23: 174(3) V, 3: 199(3)
xiii, 7-8: 182(6) XIX, 1: 193(3)
xiii, 8, 14, 22-31: 182(7) XIX, 1-XXI. 1: 193 (4)
Xiii, 10: 183(2) XXI, 1: 193 (2)
Xili, 21-3: 182(1) XXI, 14: 202(3)
xiii, 24-7: 153(I, 3) XXI, 24:193(1)
xiii, 29-30: 152(3), 153 (4) XXII, 9-10: 203 (1)
Xili, 29-31: 184(2) I Thess. iv, 13-18: 184(4)
Xiii, 33: 186(2) iv, 16-17: 154(3)
Xiv, 22-4: 29() I Tim. vi, 13: 149(1)
Xiv, IO-II: 177(3) York Pageant Play, 197
xiv, $0, 66-72: 178(5)
Xv, I-26: 175(2) EGYPTIAN
Xv, 6-15: 177(4) Book of the Dead, Ixiv, 2: 4(1), 30(t)
XV, II-I5: 177(5) Pyramid Texts, 135-135c: 20(2)
XV, 39: 178(6) 167a—d: 22(2)
Xvi, 8: 180(2) 167a-179a: 20(2)
XV1, 16: 28(1) 193a-c: 22(3)
Matt. 11, 1: 150(1), 180(1) 366c: 19(3)
li, 22: 150(2) 367b: 19(3)
X, 23: 153(4) 397a-412a: 20(2)
Xili, 31 f.: 186(2) 656c: 20(I)
Xvi, 18: 188(1) 703a—-705: 20(2)
XXIV, 29-31: 153(3) 721a—-b: 21(2)
xxiv, 30-1: 154(3) 1255C-1256b: 21 (3)
xxv, 31f.: 153(3) 1256c: 22(1)
XXVil, 15-37: 175(2) 1257d: 21(4)
XXVli, 24-5: 174(2) 198ia—c: 21(5)
SOURCES 229
Shabaka Stone, 68 (1) Hist., V, 4-5: 174(4)
Song of the Harper, 79-80, 81 Xenophanes, 89
Story of Sinuhe, 19(3)
HEBREW
GREEK AND LATIN
II Chron. vi, 24-5, 36-40: 135 (3)
Anaximander, see Simplicius XXV, 20-4: 134(2)
Anthology, 95(3) Dan. i, 31-45, vii—viii, xxi: 137(2)
Apuleius, Metam., XI, 4: 58(2) xii, 2, 3: 138(4)
Aristotle, Problemata, XVII, 3: 85-6 Deut. vu, 1: 115(2)
Athenagoras, pro Christianis, 18: XXi, 22-3: 155(1)
48(1) XXVi, 4-9: II3
Boethius, De consol., 5, 6: 103 (2) xxvi, 5 f.: 115(1)
Damascius, de principiis, c. 124 bis: 47(2) Ecclesiastes i, 9-10: 4(3), 84(3)
125 bis: 38 II Esdras vii, 32-44: 138(5)
Diog. Laert., VIII, 36: 89(z) Exodus i, 8-12: 109
Empedocles, frag., 115, 117: 90(3) iii, 8b.: 115 (2)
Eudemus of Rhodes (see Damascius) ili, 122(2)
Heraclitus, Fr. 51: 87(1) Vi, 2-3: 122
Fr. 80: 86(3) xii, 5: 115(2)
Hermetica, Ascelpius, 24: 60(2) xii, 40: I10(1)
XL 2: 61(t, 2) xix) i 1 30(2)
XVI, 2: 20(3) XXili, 23: 115(2)
Herodotus, II, 78: 60(1) XXXill, 2: I15(2)
123: 89(2) Reroc\y, Wie WwEs(@)
Hesiod, Theogony, 137-8: 47(Z) Ez. xvi, XxX. 2-33, Xxili: 136(3)
Hippolytus, Ref., IX, 9, 1: 87(1) Xxxvi, 22-4(4)
Josephus, Ant., II, 204: 110(1) Gen. ii, 4b—xi. 9: 108
Wars, 1, 2: 174(4) ii, 7: 126(2)
IL, 118: 140(1) ii, 8-14: 128 (1)
VI, 310-15: 136(2), 153(1) ili, 19: 126(3), 127(1)
VII, 116-62: 175(I) ili, 24: 128(1)
VII, 162: 176(2) v, 28-9: 128(5)
Contra Apionem, 193 (3) ix, 18-26: 108
Macrobius, Sat., i, 20, 13: 58(4) ix, 20-1: 128(4)
Marcus Aurelius, Medit., VII, 19: 93(2) ix, 24-7: 128(6)
IX, 28: 95(2) xi, I-9: 108, 129(Z)
XI, 1: 95(1) xii, I-3: 108 (3)
Nemesius, 93 xii, 6-7: 108(1)
Orphic Grave Tablet, 91-2 Xv, 18-21: I19(2)
Pap. Oxy., 1025: 58(3) real, JOR WRG)
Pherecydes, 47(2) xxvi, I-5: 109(2)
Pindar, Olymp., 2, 17: 47(3) XXVili, I3-15: I09(2)
2, 62: 90(I) xlvi, 1-27: 109(3)
Dirges, frag., 133: 90(2) KlixeaAei2 5 (2)
Plato, Phaedrus, 248-9: 91(1, 2) xlix, 28: 109(4)
Plutarch, de Is. et Os., 44: 59(3) Hosea xii, 2-4: 130(3)
46: 45(3) Isa. x, 5: 134(1)
370 B-C: 144(3) xiii, 20: 139(4)
Proclus, ad Tim., 5, 330: 92(2) xXxvi, 19: 138(4)
Seneca, Nat. Quest., II, 29, 1: 84(1) XXXiV, 10: 139(4)
Simplicius, Phys., 24, 17: 47(4) xlix, 23, lx. 14: 137(1)
Tacitus, Ann., XV, 44: 175(2), 192(3), Jer. vii, 25-6: 135(2)
193 (3) xi, I-11: 135(3)
Q
230 SOURCES
Jer. xxiii, 5-6: 136(1) Kausitaki-Brahmana Upan., I, 2: 30(1)

xxill, 7-8: 135 (4) Lankdvatara, 68: 104(1)
XXV, 4: 135(2) Maitri Upan., I, 3-4: 99(2)
xxix, 19: 135(2) We235 (0)
XXXV, 15: 135(2) VI, 15: 34(3)
xliv, 4: 135(2) Rig-Veda Il, 28, s: 33(5)
Jos. iii, 10: 115 (2) Svetasvatara Upan., Il, 2: 34(1)
xxi, 119(1) VI, 1: 34(2)
xxiv, 116(I) VI, 5: 34(2)
XXiv, II: 115(2) Udana, VIII, 1: 103 (4)
XXIV, 13: 119(1) VIIL, 1-3: 5(2)
xxiv, 13-18: 116(2)
XXiv, 14: 124(1) IRANIAN
XXiv, 20: 116(3) Bundahishn I, 2-3: 142(1)
XXiv, 25-8: 116(4) I, 20: 143(2)
Judges ii, 11-12, 14: 120(1) I, 24: 143 (2)
ii, 16, 18-19: 120(2) I, 25: 40(2)
ili, §: 115(2) XXIX, 2: 143 (4)
I Kings viii, 33-4, 46-53: 135(3) XXX, 1-3: 144(3)
ix, 20: 115(2) XXXIV, 1-2: 141(4)
xii, I-17: 123(1) XXXIV, 1-6: 144(2)
II Kings xxiii, 29-30: 134(2) Dinkard, VIL, vii-viii, 9: 146(2)
Tl Macc. xii, 43-4: 138(4) Menok i Khrat, VIII: 53(4)
Psalm ix, 6: 139(4) Rivayat, 41(2)
xlix, 20: 139(4) Sahnameh, 63 (2)
cv: 131-2 Sar Dar, Ixxxi, 4-5: 143 (5)
Il Sam. xxiv, 5-7: 119(2) Vidévdat, 19, 29: 39(1)
Zech, Vii, 22-3: 137(1) Yasna, XXX, 2-5
INDIAN XLV, 2-7: 145(2)
(including Buddhist)
ISLAM
Atharvaveda iv, 16. 6-9: 33(5)
Quran, Surah xlv, 23-4: 54(4)
xix, $3: 37(2), 98(1)
Bhagavadgita, Il, 27: 97(2)
MESOPOTAMIAN
IX-X], 4: 31(2)
IX, 7: 97(3) Assyrian (cynical) text, 82
IX, 19: 31(3) Berossos, 83-4
X, 34: 31(3) Enuma elish Wl, 116-22: 72(4)
XI, 25: 32(1) IV, 141-6: 73(1)
XI, 32: 3, 32(2) V, 1-4, II-12: 73(1)
Brhad. Upan., Il, 2, 13: 101 (z) Epic of Gilgamesh, V, 11, 1-4, 11-12:
IV, 3, 36: 99(1) 52(5)
IV, 4, 5: 101(5) X, iil, I-5: 127(4)
Chand. Upan., Ill, 11, 3: 103(3) X, i, I-14: 83 (2)
IV, 15, 3 X, iv: 82(2)
V, 10, I-7: 101(1) XI, 266-95: 11(1)
V, 10, 7: 101(5) Sumerian King List, 70(1)
Modern Authors
Adcock, F. E., 117(3)
Albright, W. F., 110(2), 117(2), 125(1)
69(1), 71(3), 72(t, 3, 4), 73(t, 2),
76(I), 77(1, 2), 81(2, 3), 83(2),
Alexander, S., V. 84(2, 3), 88(1), 94(1), 96(2), 99(3),
Alfoldi, A., 194(1) TO1(2), 115(2), 119(4), 121(1),
Allen, T. G., 30(1) 122(1, 2), 125(1), 126(2, 3), 127
AN SAs 117(@),125(2, 2; 3) (1,2,3,5,6), 128(L, 2, 3, 7), 129(2),
Anderson, G. W., 132(1) 130(I, 2), 133(3), 134(2), 135(1),
Anthes, R., 23 (2) 136(2), 138(2, 3), 139(3), 140(z),
Anthony, S., 10(1) 141(4), 145(2), 148(1), 150(3),
Arnim, von J., 93(2) 1$3(I), 154(2, 3), 155(4), 158(4),
Amold, E. V., 93 15 Q\(1)) saOO(Iam 2) SueLOL (1) SLO
Aron, R., 210(1) (2, 4), 165(2), 166(3), 167(1), 168
(2, 3), 172(2), 173(1, 2, 3, 4), 147
Babbitt, F. C., 144(3) (I, 2, 3, 4), 175(I, 3), 176(2, 3), 177
Baillie, J., 208 (1) (I, 2, 4), 178 (I, 2, 3, 6), 180(3), 182
Barlow, T. D., 62(4) (I, 6), 183(2, 3), 184(2), 186(t),
Barr, J., 139(4), 151(3), 186(3), 188(s) 189(2), 204(2), 210(1)
Barrett, C. K., 156(2) Breuil, H., 15(2), 17(1)
Basham, A. L., 32(3), 35(2), 36(Z) Breuil, H.-R. Lantier, 14(1), 15(Z),
Bauer, W., 160(2), 193 (5) 17(I), 76(Z)
Baumstark, A., 196(2) Brierre-Narbonne, J., 154(4)
Bell, H. Idris, 59(1) IBruices Bak sn013 (1) t271(6) S77 (D4)
Bendinelli, G., 60(6) Budge, E. A. W., 4(1), 50(6), 56(3)
Bethune-Baker, J. F., 28(1), 29(4), Bull, I., 67(z, 2), 69(2)
185(5) Bultmann, R., 54(1, 3), 94(1), 152
Bevan, E., 93 (2) (2, 3), 155(4), 156(Z, 2), 158(Z),
Beyerlin, W., 130(2) I60(I, 2), 162(1), 166(3), 167
Bianchi, U., 38(1), 39(1), 40(1, 3, 4), (3, 4), 176(1, 3), 177(1), 183(2),
42(2), 43(I), 141(3) 188(1)
Bidez, J.Cumont, Fr., 38(2, 3), 43(2), Burckhardt, J., 208(1)
45(3), 46(1), 50(4), 53(3), 54(2), Burkill, T. A., 178(5)
96(t), 144(3) Burrows, M., 106(1), 139(4)
Blackman, E. C., 190(2) Bury, J. B., 93 (2)
Bleeker, C. J., 24(3)
Boman, T., 139(4) Callahan, J. F., 86(1), 87(2)
Bonnet, H., 3 (2, 3), 19(), 21 (2), 23(z), Cameron, G. G., 146(1)
56(4), $8(1, 2), $9(1), 78(1, 3) Capelle, B., 195 (2)
Boylan, P., 58(2) Carcopino, J., 95(3), 174(4)
Brabant, F. H., 7(z) Garrp ie 2 100)
Brain, Lord, 6(1) Cary, M., 117(3)
Brandon, S. G. F., 3(4), 12(1), 13(1, 4), Case, S. J., 193 (5), 208 (1)
14(2), 17(1), 18(1), 19(2), 20(2), Cawley, A. C., 197(1)
21(1, 3), 22(2), 23(3), 24(1, 2), Cerny, J., 23 (1)
25(2, 3, 4), 27(1), 28(3), 29(1), Charles, R. H., 1(1), 138(5), 188(3)
38(1), 39(1), 45(1, 2), 46(1), 47 Chatterji, S. K., 100(2)
(1, 2), 48(2), 52(4, 5), 54(3), 55(3), Childe, V. G., 14(1), 15(1), 209(1)
59(4), 60(1), 61(2), 66(2), 68(3), Christensen, A., 44(3)
231
232 MODERN AUTHORS
ClarkaGeer3|(2a3) Eckenstein, L., 62(4)

Collingwood, R. G., 197(3) Eddington, A. S., 6(Z)
Colpe, C., 49(2) Edgar, G7 G58)
Conze, E., 33(6), 99(3), 102(2), 103 (5), Edgerton, F., 32(1, 2), 97(2, 3)
104() Edwards, I. E. S., 19(1)
Conzelmann, H., 183(2, 4), 204(2) Ebrhardt, A. A. T., 165(2), 188(5),
Cook, G. H., 196(5) I94(1)
Coomaraswamy, A. Ky, 103(2; 4); Eisler, R., 49(1), 199(3)
104(t) Eissfeldt, O., 107(2), 132(2), 133 (2)
Eliade, M., 12(1), 25(Z), 27(1), 30(z),
Corbin, H., 40(1)
Cornford, F. M., 90(1, 2) 33(4), 36(3), 56(2), 60-7, 71(4),
Couchoud, P.-L., 156(2) 72(2), 74(1), 93(), 95(4), 98(2),
Coulton, G. G., 62(1), 186(1), 196(5) 101 (5), 102(I), 103(1), 104(1, 2)
Creed, J. M., 157(4, 5), 158(1), 181 (3) Eliot, C., 32(3), 35(2, 4)
Croce, B., 195(4), 197(3) Emery, W. B., 67(1)
Cross, F. L., 177(2), 191 (6) Erman, A., 80(1, 2), 89(2), 107(1)
‘Cullmannye©set (sO G) en s(1); Erman, A.-Grapow, H., 22(2)
149(2), 150(3), 169(1), 178(2),
186(2), 188(1), 192(1), 196(z) Federn, W., 89(2)
Cumont, Fr., 25(4), 43(2, 3), 44(1, 3), Festugiere, A.-J., 52(1), 54(3), 61(1),
45(2), 52(2), 53 (3), 54(1, 2), 55(4), 167 (3)
56(1), 88(2), 95(3) Finegan, J., 15 (1)
Curtis, E. L., 134(2) Fischer, J. A., 185 (2)
Foakes-Jackson, F. J., 195 (4)
Dasgupta, S., 31(I), 32(2), 97(3), Foakes-Jackson, F. J._Lake, K. (Begin-
100(2), To1(4, 5), 102(2), 103 (I, 5) nings of Christianity), 150(3),
David, M., 52(5) 152(2), 153 (2)
Davies, W. D., 173(4), 184(4) Fowler, W. Warde, 96(1)
Dawson, C., 208(1) Frankfort, H., 20(1), 72(2), 78(2)
Deissmann, A., 166(2) Frankfort, H. & H. A., 71(4)
Derchain, Ph., 60(2), 74(1) Fung-Yu-Lan, 77(2)
Deussen, P., 34(3), 97(3), 100(2), Furlani, G., 52(5), 73(1)
101 (2)
Dhorme, Ed., 52(2, 3), 53(Z), 71(1, 2), Gadd, C. J., 82(3)
74(1 Galling, K., 108(3), 114(Z)
Dibelius, M., 167(3) Garbe, R., 2(1)
Dieterich, A., 54(2) Gardiner, A. H., 14(1), 19(3), 23(z),
Dinklery Es 2624) 27 (DL) Ls Gas), 56(3), 67(z, 2)
182(2), 183(4), 187(4), 189(t), Garnot, J. Ste. Fare, 69(z)
201 (3) Geden, A. S., 100(1)
Dodd, C. H., 148(z), 166(3), 183 (4) Geldner, K., 33(5), 98(Z)
Dodds, E. R., 88(2, 3) Gernet, L.-Boulanger, A., 117(3)
Doresse, J., 50(I, 5, 6) Gershevitch, I., 40(4), 46(Z)
Dowson, J., 35(4, 5), 36(4), 37(2) Giedon, S., 15(1, 2)
Drioton, E., 110(2) Glover, T. R., 192(2), 202(3)
Drioton, E.-Vandier, J., 67(2), 69(3), Goguel, M., 27(1), 151(3), 152(2),
II0(2) 155(4), 157(1), 1$8(2), 160(2),
IDrivermo ment iA (2) 162(1), 180(4), 183 (4)
Duchesne, L., 28 (1), 29(1, 2) Goldschmidt, V., 93(2), 94(1), 95(2)
Duchesne-Guillemin, J., 38(1), 39(2), Gonda, J., 2(I), 31(I), 33(1, 2, 3, 4)
40(1), 42(2), 43(3), 45(1, 4), 46(1), 35(2, 3, 4, 6), 36(2), 37(2), 100(2),
48(1), 49(Z), 53 (3), 141(3, 4), 146(3) ro1(s)
Dumézil, G., 33(z) Gooch, G, P., 197(3)
MODERN AUTHORS 233
Gorce, M.-M., 186(r) Kidd, B.J., 189(3), 191(1), 200(5)
Gough, M., 201(3), 202(r) Kilpatrick, G. D., 18 (4)
Granet, M., 77(1, 2) Kirk, G. S.-Raven, J. E., 47(2,.4),
Grant, R. M., 49(2), 61(3), 198(3), 48(I, 2), 86(2, 3), 87(z), 89(1),
199(21, 4, 5), 200(2, 3, 4, 5), 90(3), 92(2)
203 (I) Kirk, K. E., 186(1)
Gray, J., 115 (2) Klauser, T., 201(4, 5, 6)
Gressmann, H., 44 (3) Klausner, J., 152(2), 154(4), 160(2)
Groenewegen-Frankfort, H. A., 69(1) Klostermann, E., 150(r1), 178(3)
Grossi Gondi, F., 201 (1, 2, 6) Knox, W. L., 168(1)
Guignebert, Ch., 146(3), 150(3), Koep, L., 149(2), 192(1), 193 (5)
151(3), 152(2), 154(4), 160(t), Konow, S., 34(I), 35(2), 36(2), 101 (2)
163 (2), 183(4) Kraft, H., 193 (5)
Gundel, W., 56(3) Kraus, F. R., 82(2)
Gunkel, H., 129(2), 130(4) Kiimmel, W. G., 153 (4)
Gunn, J. A., 6(I), 87(2)
Giinther, H., 99(3) de Labriolle, P., 192(2, 3), 194(3),
Giiterbock, H.-G., 70(2) 195(I, 4), 203(2)
Guthrie, W. K. C., 48(1), 49(1), 89(2), Lake, K., 27(1), 184(4)
90(2), 92(t, 2), 93(t), 102(r) Lambert, W. G., 82(2, 3)
Laming, A., 18(z)
Haines, C. R., 95(Z) Lampe, G. W. H., 180(1)
Halliday, W. R., 117(3) Langdon, S. H., 82(3)
Harmer, J. R., 188(4), 191(3) Latte, K., 60(4, 5)
Harper, W. R., 130(3) Leipoldt, J., 25(4), 58(4)
Harrison, J., 17(2), 92(I, 2) Leisegang, H., 1(1)
Hartmann, S. S., 141(4) Lichtheim, M., 80(z)
Heidel, A., 82(2) Lietzmann, H., 29(1), 157(1), 160(2),
Hempel, J., 122(1), 130(z) 164(3), 166(1), 167(3), 190(2),
Hengel, M., 138(5), 140(1) 191 (4)
Hett, W. S., 86(z) Lightfoot, J. B., 188(4)
Higgins, A. J. B., 156(2), 157(6) Linforth, I. M., 90(2)
Hilgenfeld, Ad., 50(z) Pods Ave 1o7 (i) yent3\(l) ar tO(3) teu
Hooke, S. H., 66(2), 113(Z), 130(3) (1), 125(2), 134(2), 136(2, 3, 4)
Hubaux, J., 95(4), 96(1) Lohmeyer, E., 1(1), 156(2), 180(4)
Hughes, H. S., 210(z) Loisy, A., 160(r)
Huizinga, J., 62(Z), 196(5) Long, G., 95(2)
Hunt, A. S., 58(3) Lot, F., 194(3)
Huppenbauer, H. W. 146(3) Lowith, K., 195(1, 4), 210(1)
Luquet, G.-H., 18 (2)
Jacobi, H., 98(1), 99(3), 104(2)
Jacobsen, T., 82(3) Macchioro, V., 88(3)
Jaeger, W., 47(2, 4), 88(2), 90(, 3) Macdonell, A. A., 31(2)
James;cE. ©., 33(2);-14(). 15(1), 17 Mackail, J. W., 95(3)
(G2)y 2966 253574) 722); 70(h) Macnicol, N., 33(5)
James, M. R., 204(1) Mainage, T., 13(2, 3), 14(1), 76(1)
Jensen, Ad. E., 15(1) Male, E., 62(3), 186(1), 196(4, 5),
Jeremias, A., 106(1) 202(T)
Jolly, J., 37(2) Mancini, G., 94(2)
Manek, J., 181(5), 187(4)
Kautzsch, E., 138(5) Manson, T. W., 152(2, 4), 160(2),
Kees, H., 3(3), 19(2), 23(1), 69(1), 78 (1) 114(4), 166(r), 183 (4)
Kelly, J. N. D., 149(1) Mantius, M., 194(3)
234 MODERN AUTHORS
Maringer, J., 13(2, 3), 14(1); 15(2), Parrot, A., 110(2), 185(2)
L7(u,2) Patrides, C. A., 210(I)
Marrou, H. L., 195(1) Pearson, A. C., 88(3)
Maspero, H., 11(1) Pedersen, J., 113(1), 133(3), 139(4)
Massignon, L., 55(3) Peet, T. R., 106(1)
Meissner, B., 52(3), 53(Z), 71(2, 3), Pepin, J., 200(5)
84(z) Peretti, A., 96(1), 174(4)
Menzies, A., 165(1) Petrie, W. M. Flinders, 68 (2)
Mercer, S. A. B., 19(1), 21(2), 22(2, 3) Pettazzoni,R., 43(3), 44(1, 2), 49(1),
Meyer, Ed., 53(3), 67(1), 146(3), 55(5), 56(1), 58(2, 4), 59(2), 60(3),
165(2), 181(3), 184(4) 92(2)
Milburn, R. L. P., 194(1), 195(4) Pfeiffer, R. H., 4(2), 82(3), 107(2),
Molé, M., 42(2), 141(I, 3), 142(1, 4), 123 (T),133\(@52)) £372), 239.2)
144(I), 145(2) Piankoff, A., 56(3)
Momigliano, A., 194(Z) Piganiol, A., 174(4)
Mommeen, T., 174(4) Pittioni, R., 13(3), 15 (1)
Moore, G. F., 154(4) Plessner, H., 12(1)
Morenz, S., 23(2), 24(3), 59(s), 79(Z) Procksch, O., 129(2)
Moret, A., 23(1), 78(3) Puech, H.-C.; so(1, 4), 52(2), 61);
Mowinkel, D. S., 130(1), 136(1, 2), 86(1), 146(5), 189(4)
138(5), 152(4), 153(2), 154(4) Pusey, E. B., 6(2)
Mumford, L., 196(3), 208(z) Pythian-Adams, W. J., 130(4)
Munck, J., 157(6), 165 (2)
Murray, G., 92(1) Quispel, G., 7(Z), 49(2), 189(4), 196(1)
Murti, T. R. V., 103 (4)
Mylonas, G. E., 25 (2) von Rad, G., 108(3), 109(3, 4), 113(Z),
Lt4()) 105) 517 (a) et Tsie)s
Needham, J., 11(1) 119(2), 122(I), 128(3, 8), 129(2),
Neugebauer, O., 56(4), 74(1, 2) 130(I, 2), 132(2), 133(3), 136(Z)
Nicholson, R. A., 54(5) Radhakrishnan, S., 2(1), 31(1), 32(2),
Nikolainen, A. T., 138(5) 34(1, 2, 3), 97(2, 3), 99(Z, 2),
Nilsson, M. P., 30(z), 48(2), 49(z), 103 (3)
55(4), 58(4), 88(2, 3), 92(2) Rahner, H., 28 (2)
Nock, A. D., 44(3), 55(5), 56(I), 58 (2), Ranke, H., 89(2)
60(6), 96(1), 160(2) Ranke, L. von, 197(3)
Nock, A. D.—-Festugiére, A.-J., 20(3), Reitzenstein, R., 50(6)
60(2), 61(t) Renou, L., 33(1), ror (2)
Noldeke, Th., 54(5), 55(1) Rhys Davids, R. W., 99(3)
INorthisy Ca Reeio77 (2) 9122 (i) sma O(2))s Richmond, I. A., 95(3), 185 (2)
133(3) Robin, L., 47(4), 87(z), 91(2)
INothye Viet (iypee))ser Al(3)) seas (a) 5 Robinson, J. M., 204(2)
117(I, 2), 118(1, 2), 119(2), 123(Z), Robson, J., 26(Z)
130(2), 134(3), 136(2) Rohde, E., 88(3), 90(2, 3), 91(2)
Rowley, H2 HH.) 1108 (3), 110(z; =2);
Obermann, J. O., 147(1) I17(I, 2), 118(2), 130(2), 154(4)
Oesterley, W. O. E., 138(5) Rudolph, W., 115 (2)
Oesterley, W. O. E.—Robinson, T. H., Russell, B., 6(z)
113(1), 130(4), 134(3), 139(5), Riistow, A., 183 (4)
146(3) Ryckmans, G., 55(2)
Oppenheim, A. L., 70(2)
Sachs, C., 17(2)
Pallis.S3,As 72 (a) Saggs, a W2iP 953 (tee)a7 kee)
Panofsky, E., 63 (1) 74(2)
MODERN AUTHORS 235
Sanday, W.-Headlam, A. C., 26(4), Turchi, N., 90(1), 92(2)
170(I, 6), 171(2, 3) Tylor, E. B., 75(r)
Sander-Hansen, C. E., 19(2)
Sandman-Holmberg, M., 58(2) van der Leeuw, G., 66(2), 88(3)
Sasse,$6(I,
H., 2),
1(1),60(4,38(t),5), 40(1), $5(4, 5);
61(3), 168(1)
van der Meer, F.-Mohrmann, C., 201 (3)
Vandier, J., 23 (1)
Schlier, H., 164(1, 2, 4), 186(2) van Unnik, W. C., 5o(r)
Schmauch, W., 180(4) Vermaseren, M. J., 43 (3), 45 (1), 203 (2)
Schmidt, H., 132(2), 133(2) Vidal-Naquet, P., 96(2)
Schmidt-Clausing, F., 185 (2)
Schmidtke, F., 150(1) Waddell, W. G., 68(1)
Schmithals, W., 160(2) Wagner, G., 26(4), 27(1)
Schnabel, P., 84(z) Walsh, W. H., 210(1)
Schoeps, H. J., 27(1), 160(1, 2), 163(2), Watkins, E. I., 196(s5)
164(1), 165(2), 167(3), 169(Z), Watt, Montgomery W., 54(4), 55(3)
171 (I, 3), 191 (6) Webb, C. C. J., 148(2)
Schiirer, E., 137(2), 153(1, 2), 154(4), Weiser, P7A-, 106(1), 113(t), 122(r),
199 (2) 125(2), 132(2)
Schwabl, H., 48(z) Weiss, J., 150(3), 157(Z)
Schweitzer, A., 160(2), £62,(t5 5); Wendland, H.-J., 148(1),151(3), 152(Z)
181(2), 184(4), 204 (2) Wente, E. F., 80(z)
Scott, R. B. V., 154(3) Werner, M., 28(2), 167(4), 180(2),
Sethe, K., 21(2), 22(2), 23(1), 68(z) 183(4), 185(1), 188(5), 189(Z),
Seznec, J., 63(Z), 167(3) 191(6), 193(5)
‘Simon, M., 153(2), 191(3, 6), 203 (2) Wernet, P., 14(1), 15(1)
Smith, K. F., 93 (1) West, E. W., 141 (4)
Snaith, N. S., 113(1), 117(Z), 139(4) Whitehead, A. N., VI
Sdderblom, N., 144(2, 3) Widengren, G., 38(I), 41(1), 146(5)
Speiser, Bs A> 70(2), 71 (@), 82(E, 25 3) Wieger, L., 77(1)
Speleers, L., 2(2) Wildberger, H., 113 (1), 114(2), 117(1),
Spengler, O., 196(3) 133(3)
Spens, W., 29(3) Wildridge, T. Tindall, 62(3)
Spiegel, J., 22(2) Wilson, J. A., 69(3), 80(1), 81 (2)
Srawley, J. H., 29(3) Wilson, R. McL., 49(2), 189(4)
Stange, H. O. H., 77(2) Windisch, H., 160(2)
Stebbing, L. S., 7(1) Winter, P., 177(4)
Steinmetzer, F. X., 150(2), 180(1) Wright, J., 91(z)
Stone, L., 62(2)
Streeter, B. H., 183(4), 200(2, 3) Yeats, W. B., 12(1)
Struiber, A., 185 (2)
Zacliiaetam cs @esye (i) sei (a)sme 2 (3)5
Taylor, V., 152(2, 3), 153(1), 155(4), 33 (1; 2313, 4,.0)7 34 (5,3), 30(2,4),
156(1), 157(2, 4, 5), 158(1), 177(Z), 37(Z), 38(1, 2, 3), 39(1, 2), 40(L, 2,
178(3, 6), 186(2) 3, 4), 41(1), 42(1), 43 (1), 45(2, 2,
Teilhard de Chardin, P., 210(1) 3), 46(1), 53(3, 4), 63(2), 100(2),
Thackeray, H. St. J., 110(1) 102(I), 105(2), 141(2, 3, 4), 142
Thausing, G., 21(3) (54, 5, O)s 243 (lse3)5144 (tee),
Thomas, E. J., 5(1), 32(1, 2), 97(3), 145(2), 146(1, 2)
99(3), 104(1) Zahrnt, H., 204(2)
Thureau-Dangin, F., 72(1) Zandee, J., 19(3), 24(3), 50(4)
etl Wags 0h) Zimmer, H., 35(3, 5, 6), 36(I, 2, 3, 4),
Toynbee, A. J., 194(3), 210(1) 98(2), 99(1), 104(2)
. Names and Subjects
Acts of Apostles, historical aspect, 150 Book of the Dead, 3-4, 24
Adam, Fall, 126-7 Brahma, 34; day of, 104; “Brahma-
Advent, significance, 196 wheel’, 34
Aeternitas, 60; aeternitas populi Romani, Brahman, as Time, 34, 98
60 Buddhist ‘Chain of Causation’, 61
Agathos-Daimon, $5
Ahriman, 38, 41, 42, 45-6, 142, 143-4, Calendar, Christian, 196
145, 146 centurion’s confession, 178-9
Ahura Mazdah, 41 Cerinthus, 189
Aion, 44, 55, 56, 60, 61; comprehends Chandogya Upan. on Time, 103
all Time, 1(1) Christ: kata odexa, see Jesus, historical;
al@vec, 56, 61, 166, 168 transcends Time, 30(Z)
Alexandria, 55-6, 58, 60 Christian: art, significance, 200-2; and
Alpha and Omega, I pagan hieroi logoi, 202-3; liturgical
*AvayKn, 54 year, 196; philosophy of History,
Anaximander, 47, 86 see Time, in Christian thought;
Anemnesis, 29 teleology, 1-2, 182-8, 191-7, 203-
Angra Mainyu, 41 205, 207-8; view of Time, see
Anni Domini, 149, 192 Time
Antoninus Pius, column, 60 Christianity: and soteriology, 149, 167-
Anubis, 59-60 I7I, 189; ritual control of Time,
Apocryphon ofJohn, 50 27-30, 196; ‘historical religion’,
archontes, 166, 167, 168, 171, 189 148-9, 157, 174-9, 180-2, 189
Aristotle on cyclic Time, 85-6 Chronology: Christian, 149, 150(I, 2),
Arjuna, 3, 31-2, 97 179-82, 193-6; Indian, Buddhist,
Aron, R., philosophy of history Jaimist, 104-5; Zoroastrian, 141-4
essential, 210(Z) Chronos, 47, 59
astralism, see ‘stars and time’ and Cinvat Bridge, 39
‘planets and time’ Church: extension of mission, 183-5,
astrology, 52-4, 62 186-8, 192-7; historical con-
Atharvaveda on Time, 98 sciousness, 192-7; hypostatized,
atman, LOI 188; newness a problem, 192-4;
“Aud, 54-5 True Israel, 171-2, 191
Augustine, De Civitate Dei, 194-6; on Corpus Hermeticum on Egypt’s decay, 60
Time, 6-7 Covenant legend (Hebrew), 130
Creation and Fall legend, purpose, 126-
B.C. (era), 192 128
baptism, ritual perpetuation of past, Creation legends (Mesopot.), 72-3
26-8 Crucifixion: Jewish Christian explana-
Barabbas, 177 tion, 154-5, 156-7, 159; Paul’s
Barnabas, Epistle, 191 interpretation, 165-9; of Jesus,
bells, significance, 196 political aspect, 154, 175, 177, 178—
Berossos, 83-4 179, 192
Bhagavadgita, 2-3, 31-2, 97 Cumont, Fr. on Zurvan akarana, 44
bhakti, 37 Cyclic view of Time, 4, 36-7, 65-7, 68,
Black Death, 61 71(3), 73-5, 207 (see also Time,
Boethius on Time, 103 cyclic)
236
NAMES AND SUBJECTS 237
dahr, 54 fate: Arabian, 54-5; Egyptian, 24(2);
Dance of Death, 62 Gnostic, 50-4; Greek, 87-96;
“Dancing Sorcerer’, 15-18, 20 Indian, 33, 37(2), 101, 104-5;
Daniel and Heilsgeschichte, 137, 138 Iranian, 40-6; Mithraic, 46-3;
Death and Time, 10-12, 31-2, 36-7, Mesopotamian, 52-3; Orphic, 48-
40, 42-3, 44, 46, 50(I), 54, 59-60, 49
61-3, 98-105 Father Time, 62-3
death: discovery of, 10-11; Egyptian Firdausi, 63
view, 19; medieval conception, Flavian triumph, A.D. 71, 175
61-2 Frashkart (Final Rehabilitation), 144
decan-stars, 56
destiny, see fate Gay6mard, I41, 143
Deutero-Isaiah and Heilsgeschichte, 136- Gilgamesh: epic, 82, 84; quest for per-
137 petual youth, 11(z)
Deuteronomic theme, 133 Gnostic concept of Time, 49-54, 60-1
devaydna, 100 Gnosticism, Church’s reaction, 189-90,
dharma, 33, 36 198
Docetism, 189-90 Gospels: historical aspect, 149-50; nar-
Drama, medieval, 197 rative an advantage, 203 (2)
Dualism, 38-46, 49, 63-4, 141-6, 207 Granet, M., Chinese folk customs, 76
Diirer’s “Knight, Death and the Devil’, Great Year (Stoic), 84, 92-96
62 Greek view of man, 88
Hebrew: appeal to history, origin, 112—
Egyptian and Christian salvation rituals 121; historicization of cult, 113-17,
compared, 28, 30(I) 130; words for Time, 139(4)
Egyptian words for Time, 24(3), 56
Eleusinian mysteries, 25 :
heh, 56-7
Heilsgeschichte: (Christian) 1-2, 148-9,
Eliade, M., Le Mythe de IlEternel 159, 182 f., 190, 207-8; (Hebrew)
Retour, 65-7, 68, 69, 71-3, 75,
132-3, 137-8, 138-40, 143, 146-7,
84 152-3, 159, 169-170, 171
elixir of perpetual youth, 11 Heimarmené, 50
Elohist tradition, 139 Heraclitus, 86, 87(z)
embalmment ritual (Egyptian) signifi- Hermes Trismegistos, 61
cance, 21-2, 24 Herodotus on metempsychosis, 89
Empedocles, 90-1 Hesiod, 46-7
Empty Tomb, 180-1 Hexateuch, composition, 107
Enuma elish, 52, 72-3 historical evidence, Graeco-Roman
Eschatology: Christian, 151-3, 158-9, appreciation, 199-200
166, 174, 182-7, 193, 196-7, 205; historical interest: Christian, 148-50,
Egyptian, 18-25, 59-60; Hebrew, 157, 174-9, 180-2, 189-90, 192-
137-8, 146; Indian (incl. Bud- 205; Egyptian, 67-9; Hebrew,
dhist), 97-105; Iranian, 143-4; 106-7; Iranian, 143, 146; Meso-
Mesopotamian, 82-4 potamian, 70-1
eternity, 6, 87, 103-5, 207-8 (see also historicity, Christian appreciation, 197-
Aion and Aeternitas) 205
Eucharist, ritually renews past, 29 horoscope, $3
Eudemus of Rhodes on Time (Persian), hour-glass, symbol, 62
38, 42
Eusebius of Caesarea, 193-4 Ibn al-Kalbi, 55
Exodus, date, 110(2); tradition, 109- Ignatius of Antioch, 189-90, 198
(iG), Wie Te immortality, search for, 11-12, 18-25,
‘eyewitnesses’ (Christian), 157-8, 163 30, 37, 42-4, 45-6, 78, 90-2, 100-1,
Ezekiel and Heilsgeschichte, 136 102-5, 138, 172
238 NAMES AND SUBJECTS
Indian fear of Time, 102, 104-5 | Macrobius, 58

Insecurity resulting from Time, 9-12, Maha-Kala, 35
36-7, 97-105, 206-8 mahayugas, 104
Irenaeus: and history, 198; on Marcion, Maitri Upan. on Time, 34
190-1; on Marcosians, $1 malaise of Western culture, 209-10
Isis, 58 Manetho, 68
Islamic view of History, 147(1) Mani, 50(1)
Israel: modern state, 140; Yahweh’s Manichaeism, 146
providence, 106-7, I08-III, 123, Marcion, 190-1
128-9, 132-3, 137, 138, 139-40 Marcosians, 51
Marcus Aurelius, 94-5
Jaldabadth, so-1 Marduk, 52, 72-3
Janus, 60 Mark: anti-Jewish theme, 177-9; fixes
Jad, 50 historical pattern of Christianity,
Jeremiah and Heilsgeschichte, 135-6 179, 203
Jerusalem: Church, its ‘gospel’, 159, Markan Gospel, origin and purpose,
164-5, 166(3); Church, perished 175-9
A.D. 70, 158-9, 173-4; fall in medieval synthesis, 208
A.D. 70, 140, 158, 174-5, 182, memory, 7-8, 12(I), 15
203 Memphite priests, genealogies, 69
Jesus: as Messiah, 153-5, 158, 159, 160, Messianic hope, 136, 152-5, 182-3
I6I, 166, 169, 170, 172, 182-3; Metempsychosis, see Rebirth
formation of tradition, 156-8; Mithra (Mitra), 32-3, 43, 45, 46; and
historical, 160, 163, 165, 167, 168, the Bull, 25, 41(z)
169, I71, 172, 189-90; Palestinian Mithraic concept of Time, 43-6, 48-9,
tradition, 151-2; story of, a hieros 50, 53, 59-60,
146
logos, 202 moksa, 37, 102
Jewish Christian eschatology, 153-5, Muhammad, 54
159 Muharram ceremonies, 26
Job, significance, 138
John, fusion of historical and esoteric, Narmer, 67
182 Nataraja, 35
Josiah, death, 134 Neanderthal Man, 13
Judgment: Final, 138, 184, 185-6, 196— New Covenant (Testament), 176-7,
197, 205; Immediate, 184, 185 191, 196
Julius Africanus, 193 New Year festival, 55-6, 71-3
Justin Martyr and history, 198-9 Nilometers, 67
Nirvana-state, 4-5, 102, 103
kala, 98 Noah’s blessing and cursing, 108,
Kala-Rudra, 35 128-9
kalakaro, 34. Noth, M. on Israelite amphictyony,
Kali, 36-7 117-8
kalpas, 97-8, 104 nunc stans, 103, 105
kama, 101
karma, 101, 102, 104 Ohrmazd,
38, 39, 41, 42, 43, 45-6, 142,
Kronos,
47, 55, 58-9 143, 145, 146
kshana, 103 Old Covenant (Testament), 176-7,
kshanikavada, 104(1) 187, 190-2, 196
“Opening the Mouth’, 24
linear Time, 68-9, 70-3, 195-7 Origen, meaning of Scriptures, 200
lingam, 35 Orosius, 195
Luke, historical concern, 157, 179-80, Orphic grave tablets, 91-2
181-2 Orphism, 47-9, 89-92, 98
NAMES AND SUBJECTS 239
Osiris, 20-4, 59-60; and Time, 3-4, 24, Resurrection: attempts to prove, 180-1;
30(1) General, 138, 184, 185-6, 196;
(Hebrew), 138
Palaeolithic: art, Time-concept, 15-18; Ritual: assimilation, 22, 26-8; per-
burial practice, significance, 13-15 petuation of past, definition, 25
Palermo Stone, 67, 68 tla, 33
Parousia, effect of delay, 183-8 Rudra, 34-5
Papias of Hierapolis, 200
Passion-Narrative, formation, 156-7 St. Theophilus, legend, 62(3)
Passover, 25, 112-13, 130 Sakti, 36
Patriarchal Saga (Yahwist), 108-9, 110, Samael, 50(z)
III, 112, 121-6, 127, 128, 129 samsara, see Rebirth, Indian
Paul: baptism, 26-8, 162-3, 169, 184; Saoshyans, 143
conflict with Jerusalem Church, Sarapis, 56, 58, 59
163-4, 165, 166, 172-4; farewell Sarapis-Helios, 55
speech, significance, 173; ‘Gospel’, Satan, 50(Z)
159-72, 189; interpretation of Saturn, 62
History, 169-72; no_ historical scythe, symbol, 62-3
interest, I5O-I, 159-169, 172; Shabaka Stone, 68(1), 69
scorns historical tradition, 165, 167 Siva, 34-7
pessimism, inspired by Time: Bud- Song of the Harper, 79-81
dhism, 99-100, 101-5; Egyptian, Sophia, 50
79-81; Greek, 91-6; Indian, 98— Space, Persian concept, 38
105; Mesopotamian, 81-4 Spenta Mainyu, 41
Phanes, 48-9 stars and Time, 50, 51-4, 78, 85, 86, 87
Pherecydes of Syros, 47 Stoicism, 54, 84, 87, 92-6
Philosophy of history, attitude to, 210 Story of Sinuhe, 19(3)
Pindar: on metempsychosis, 89-90; on Sumerian King List, 70
_ Time, 47(3)
pitryana, 100 Taoist, medicine of immortality, 11
planets and Time, 50, 51-4, 62, 87, 166, teleology: Christian, 1-2, 82-8, 191-7,
167, 168, 189 203-5, 207-8; basic on Western
Plato on Time, 87 thought, 208-10; Hebrew, 139-
Plutarch: on Anubis, 59; on Mithra, 45 140; Zoroastrian, 141-3, 145
Pontius Pilate, ‘suffered under’, 148-9, Temple veil, 176
167 ‘terreur de l’histoire’, 67, 68, 69
Praeparatio evangelica, 172, 194, 204 Tertullian: Christian and pagan fabulae,
pranayama (regulated breathing), 102 203; historical sense, 199; newness
priestly tradition, 122, 139 of Christianity, 193
primeval history (Yahwist), 108, 112, Theon, rules of evidence, 199
126-9 Theopompus on Iranian chronology,
progress, belief in, 208-10 144
Psalms, embody Heilsgeschichte, 130-2 Thoth, 58
Ptah as nb rnp. wt, 58(2) Time: ambivalence, 3, 31-2, 35-7, 39-
Purgatory, 185-6 46, 47, 49-50, 58-9, 63-4, 10S,
Pyramid Texts, 18-19 206-7; and consciousness, 7-8;
Pythagoras, 89 consciousness, social aspect, 65;
and purpose, 208-10; as Destroyer,
gadar, 54 2-3, 31-2, 35-7, 39-40, 42-3, 44-6,
49, 54-5, 63-4, 80, 97; as illusion,
von Ranke’s definition of history, 197 5, 102-5; as nunc fluens, 103, 105;
Rebirth: Chinese, 76-7; Greek, 87-92; as primal source, 31-2, 34, 36-7,
Indian, 97-104; Palaeolithic, 75-6 38, 41, 47, 51, 63
240 NAMES AND SUBJECTS
Time, cyclic: Buddhist, 99-100, 101-5; Tri-miurti, 34-5

Chinese, 7-6; Egyptian, 77-82; Twelve Tribes, origin, 118-9
Graeco-Roman, 93-6; Greek, 85-
96; Hebrew, 84-5; Indian, 99-105; Valentinus, 51
Mesopotamian, 82-4; Palaeolithic, Varuna, 32-4, 37
75-6; Stoic, 92-6 Vasudeva (Vishnu), 3, 31, 34-5, 37, 97
Time, factor in mankind’s success, 8-10 Videvdat, 39
Time, individual identified with, 3-4, Vincent of Beauvais, 196
24, 30(1); in the Bhagavadgita, 2-3, Vision of God, 207-8
31-2; in Buddhism, 4-5, 103-4;
Whitehead, A. N., religious signi-
in Christian thought, 1-2, 30(1),
ficance of Time, vi
61-3, 149, 159, 182-3, 184-8, 190-
197, 207-8; in Corpus Hermeticum, Xenophanes, 89
61; in Egyptian thought, 3-4, 19-
25, 55-60, 67-9, 77-81; in Gno- Yahwist: Heilsgeschichte challenged,
sticism, 49-54; in Greek thought, 134-8; interpretation, influence,
46-9, 85-96; in Hebrew thought, 129-33, 138—40; narrative, purpose,
139-40, 207; in Indian thought, 110-12, 121-6, 129; philosophy of
2-3, 31-7, 97-105; 1 Iranian History, 123-4, 126-9, 130, 134-8,
thought, 38-46, 54, 141-7; in 138-140, 146-7; tradition, I07—2I
Islam, 54-5; in Mesopotamian Yama, 35(1)
thought, 52-3; in Mithraism, 43— Yeats, W. B., on death, 12(r)
46; in Orphism, 47-9, 89-92; Ying-Yang, 77(2), 145
in pre-Islamic Arabia, §4-5; in Yoga, abolition of Time, 102-3
Roman thought, 60
Time, linear conception, 139-40, 145, Zaehner, R. C., on Zurvan, 40(1)
195-7; linked with suffering, 99- zaman, $4
105 Zarathustra, 41, 143, 145
Time, modern challenge, 209-10 Zealots, 140(1), 176(3)
Time, nature of, 6-8 Zeus comprehends Time, 30(1), 158(4)
Time, personified, 2-3, 31-2, 35-7, 39- Zimmer, H., on Kali, 36
40, 42-6, 48-9, S0-I, 54-5, 58, 59, zodiac, $3
60, 62-3 Zoroastrian philosophy of History,
Time, ritual control, 17-18, 20-5, 25- T41-7
30 Zurvan, 39, 40, 41, 42, 45, 55; akarana,
Time, source of religion, 10-12, 206-8 39-40, 43, 44, 46, 48, 55; 63-4, 142,
Tower of Babel, legend, 108, 129 146, 168(1); dareghd-chvadhata, 39-
Transmigration of Souls, see Rebirth 40, 43, 44-6, 48, 49, SO-I, $3, 55,
Tribute Money, 176 58, 59-60, 61, 63-4, 142-3, 146,
triceps animans, 58-9 168 (1)
Brandonee.e
History...
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School of Toestegat Claremon

The Last Judgement

MANCHESTER UNIVERSITY PRESS

BARNES & NOBLE, INC., NEW YORK

All rights reserved

as invitation to give the Forwood Lectures in the Philosophy

Some three decades ago, a great seminal thinker, A. N. White-

Once more I have to thank my friend and colleague, the Rev.

ings. I am grateful also to the Manchester University Press for

Iam indebted to the following publishers for permission to quote

‘The Last Judgment’ (H. Van Eyck)

Pyr. Pyramid Texts.

The Problem: Five Views of Time

N that majestic vision which concludes the Book of the Revela-

to year.’ It is an estimate that finds its raison d’étre in a philosophy

The Bhagavadgita, or the ‘Song of the Lord’, is, beyond com-

theme is set forth in the form of a dialogue between the prince

1 XI, 32. See below, chap. 3.

concerned, the deceased, who has been thus ritually assimilated,

does so by drawing a characteristic distinction between that state

In these examples we see the significance of Time interpreted in

affected mankind that it has thus found expression in its religions

due to that peculiar evaluation of Time which, as we have briefly

should not be the particular persons we are without it—complete

Now, this familiar process will be found, on closer examina-

we may justly sce the original cause of civilization in man’s quest

the very disintegration of himself—a menace, too, that he knows

To delay death, mankind has resorted to various means of two

Salvation by Ritual Perpetuation

Wee E observed above that there is reason for thinking that, in

him, we may next ask whether the funerary customs of Palaeo-

pallid corpse the hue of life; in other words, an element of

has been variously explained as the representation of a masked

ritual practice, concerning post-mortem security, of a truly remark-

Time’s decay.t Another means of salvation, inspired by a similar

documents. The reason for this omission is obvious, namely, that

The ritual of embalmment, which thus repeats what was once

In the religion of ancient Egypt, accordingly, we see an expression

Muharram ceremonies of the Shi‘ite Muslims, which dramatically

baptism as a ritual of mystical assimilation whereby the neophyte

located in a specific place and time in the past. Although with

characterized by the practice of another notable instance of the

In Christianity this reaction to the challenge of Time, exemplified

in the rituals of Baptism and the Eucharist, is invested with an

WEG have already noted, in our brief introductory survey of

or double. Thus, while Mitra is benevolent, Varuna is regarded as

the Rig-Veda, in the pantheon of the subsequent Hinduism; how-

and preservation.! The attempt, however, appears to have been

the energy of the universe, perpetually creating, sustaining and

The all-devouring nature of Time is symbolised by the lion’s head.

We have noted that the Aryan invaders of northern India, in the

1 Cf, Zaehner, Hinduism, chap. vi.

itself, both illuminates and is illuminated by information that we

kinds of Time: that which had no bounds, and that of a limited,

Zarathustra, who founded the religion that goes under his

may be, what is recorded. is of considerable significance. It is

ingly, perhaps owing to that proclivity towards a dualistic

of the long Dominion’ that found a place, in some way, in

1Cf Zaehner, Zurvan, pp. viti-ix, in B.S.O.A.S., XVII/2 (1955), pp-

The dissemination of the Iranian conception of Time, in its two-

Earth, the universal genetrix, brought forth Kronos.1 The simi-

an unsolved problem of the history of Greek religion. According to

appear; the emblem of a thunder-bolt is held in the right hand