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Manichaeism and Augustine's Idea of ‘Massa Perditionis’

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 October 2011

E. Buonaiuti
Affiliation:
University of Rome

Extract

In my essay, “The Genesis of St. Augustine's Idea of Original Sin,” published in this Review (1917, pp. 159–175), I advanced the theory that Augustine's doctrine of original sin and its transmission was not derived from the teaching of Ambrose, as Harnack holds, but rather from the commentary on the Epistle to the Romans by the unknown writer commonly referred to as Ambrosiaster. From this fourth-century writer Augustine borrowed his final formulation of the doctrine of the universal participation of mankind in the sin of Adam and his interpretation of the most discussed passages of the Epistle to the Romans, as well as the notions of man “servus culpae” and “servus gratiae.”

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © President and Fellows of Harvard College 1927

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References

1 Souter, (Pelagius's Expositions of Thirteen Epistles of St. Paul: Introduction, 1922, p. 178Google Scholar) fully agrees with my conclusions, and thinks that the concurrent use of the term ‘massa’ in both Ambrosiaster and Augustine is very significant.

2 C. W. Mitchell, S. Ephraim's Prose Refutations of Mani, Marcion and Bardaisan, transcribed from the palimpsest B. M. Add. 14623. I. The Discourses addressed to Hypatius, 1912, p. lxxii. Mitchell's suggestion that βῶλος was a faulty transcription for διάβολος has been rightly rejected by Burkitt in the second volume of the same series, The Discourse of Domnus, 1921, pp. cxxxviii ff. and p. 236. Cf. also Burkitt, The Beligion of the Manichees, 1925, pp. 65 ff.

3 Titi Bostreni quae ex opere contra Manichaeos edito in cod. Hamburgensi servata sunt graece ed. P. A. de Lagarde, 1859, p. 41. In this passage Titus of Bostra speaks of Mani as saying (λέγων) that the wicked souls must έν τῇ βὠλῳ ἐμπαγήσασθαι ἄμα τῇκακίᾳ Burkitt comments on this statement: “The wicked soul is thus turned into a literal villain, ascriptus glebae” (p. 65, n. 1). The Syriac version, made before 411, merely transliterates βῶλος in bōlārā.

4 Edited by C. H. Beeson in the Berlin corpus, 1906. See his Einleitung, pp. xiii-xvi, also Alfaric, Les Écritures Manichéennes, I, p. 112.

5 ἐπὶ τέλει λέγει … τότε ὁ ’Ωμοϕόρος ἀϕίησιν ἕξω τὴν γῆν, καὶ οῠτως ἀπολύεται τὸμέγα πῦρ καὶ ðλον ἀναλίσκει τὸν κόσμον εἷτα πάλιν ἀϕίησι τὸν βῶλον μετὰ τοῦ νέου αἰῶνος, ðπως πᾶσαι αἱ ψυχαὶ τῶν άμαρτωλῶν δεθῶσιν εἰς τὸν αἰῶνα (Beeson, p. 21). The Latin version substitutes ‘animam’ for βῶλον. On the Omophoros and its historical and religious parallels see Cumont, Recherches sur le Manichéisme, Bruxelles, 1908, Fasc. I, Appendix II.

6 εἴ τις ἀκολουθεῖ τοῖς λόγοις αύτῶν (the prophets of the Old Testament), ἀποθνήσκει εἰς τούς αἰῶνας, δεδεμένος εἰς τὸν βῶλον, ὅτι οὐκ ἕμαθε τὴν γνῶσιν τοῦ παρακλήτου (Beeson, p. 19).

7 This particular could perhaps give a clue to the date and place of origin of the Latin version. There would have been no doubt that the Acta were originally written in Greek and not in Syriac, as appears by the simple comparison of the Syriac text with the Greek fragments found in Epiphanius (Panarion, Haeresis 66), if Jerome had not created an embarrassing problem by stating (De viris illustribus 72): “Archelaus epis-copus Mesopotamiae librum disputationis suae quam habuit adversum Manichaeum exeuntem de Perside Syro sermone composuit, qui translatus in Graecum babetur a multis.” But in spite of this statement scholars in general hold the Greek text to be the original, since the internal evidence is in its favor. It is noticeable, however, that Jerome does not mention the Latin version, which means either that at the time he was writing “De viris illustribus” the version was not yet in existence or that it had not come to his knowledge.

8 Evodius, as we know from Augustine's Epistle 162, 2, was one of the interlocutors in the two dialogues “De Quantitate Animae” and “De Libero Arbitrio,” written by Augustine in 888, in both of which his anti-Manichaean reaction is vividly manifest. Also the questions which Evodius submits to Augustine in Epistles 158, 160, 161, 164 (see also Ep. 169), deal with anthropological problems. Dom Morin has published another letter of Evodius addressed to Valentine of Hadrumetum, written in 426 and concerning the doctrine of grace (Revue Bénédictine, 1896 and 1901). See Bardenhewer, Geschichte d. altkirchlichen Literatur, IV, p. 467).

9 De fide contra Manichaeos; published by Zycha in the Vienna Corpus, volume XXV, which contains the anti-Manichaean writings of Augustine.

10 A comparative analysis of the divergencies and similarities of the various families of the extant Manichaean texts is an undertaking still in its beginnings. Many additions of new texts have been made during recent years; the Arabic and Syriac texts have been printed, and new texts have been found in the Far East. A tentative classification of the sources has been attempted by P. Alfaric, Les Ecritures Manicheennes, Paris, 1918. But perhaps the author was too optimistic in his hope of finding a way to harmonize these discordant witnesses to the Manichaean tradition. On the other hand he was too easily influenced by the example of the ancient ecclesiastical polemic writers who associated and almost identified Gnosticism, Mandaeanism, and Manichaeism. So far as concerns the Manichaean literature to be found in the West at the time of Augustine, I think that on comparing the fragments which have survived with the Eastern sources it becomes evident that these latter were subjected to a process of adaptation and often of deformation by the Western writers or translators. An attempt to compare some of the Western and Eastern sources with the aim of reconstructing the original form of a specific tradition is to be found in my study, ‘La prima coppia umana nel sistema del Manicheismo’ (Rivista degli studi Orientali, VII), in which I tried to trace the origin and meaning of the Manichaean cosmogony and its account of the origin of man, together with the story of the seduction of the Archons and the eating by them of their own abortive offspring.

11 This treatise is posterior to Augustine's “De natura boni contra Manichaeos.”

12 Ep. 186, 19: “ista vero vel consparsio, vel sicut in plerisque codicibus legitur, massa, quoniam tota mortis est.” Priscillian also had said: “Scriptura dei res solida, res vera et nee ab homine electa sed homini de deo tradita, cuius si delibatio sancta est et massa sancta est” (Liber de fide et de apocryphis, ed. Schepps, 20). Jerome's Vulgate has also ‘massa,’ and for παρχ has ‘delibatio.’ But evidently in this case Jerome keeps the reading of the Old Latin, for in other cases he prefers to translate ἀπαρχή by ‘primitiae,’ and ϕύραμα by ‘conspersio’ (see his Comm. in Ep. ad Galat., 5,9).

13 For instance in Quaestio 68, 8, he writes: “Ex quo in paradiso natura nostra peccavit, non secundum spiritum, sed secundumcarnem, mortali generatione formamur, et omnes una massa luti facti sumus, quod est massa peccati. Cum ergo meritum peccando amiserimus, nihil aliud, peccantibus, nisi aeterna damnatio debetur.” And in “De diversis quaest.” i. 16: “Tune facta est una massa omnium, veniens de traduce peccati et de forma mortalitatis.... Sunt igitur omnes homines una quaedam massa peccati, supplicium debens divinae summaeque iustitiae, quod sive exigatur, sive donetur, nulla est iniquitas.” The notion of ‘massa’ is here very similar to the notion of the βῶλος in which the sinners are absorbed to suffer an eternal punishment. And it is important to notice that here Augustine speaks of a ‘peccatum naturae,’ exactly the opposite of Evodius's point in speaking of evil as having a voluntary and not a natural origin.

14 Commenting upon Rom. 5, 12, Ambrosiaster wrote: “in quo, id est in Adam, omnes peccaverunt. Ideo dixit, in quo, cum de muliere loquebatur, quia non ad speciem retulit sed ad genus. Manifestum itaque est in Adam omnes peccasse, quasi in massa: ipse enim per peccatum conceptus, quod genuit omnes nati sunt sub peccato. Ex eo, igitur, cuncti peccatores qui ex ipso sumus omnes.”

15 For instance, in the “Enarratio in Ps. LXII”: “Fecisti hominem, dedisti ei liberum arbitrium, in paradiso collocasti, praeceptum imposuisti, mortem si praecep-tum violaret iustissimam denuntiasti; nibil non fecisti, nemo est qui a te amplius exigat: peccavit, factum est genus humanum tanquam massa peccatorum, profiuens de peccatoribus: quid ergo, tu si massam istam iniquitatis damnes, quisque tibi dicet: iniuste fecisti?”

16 ii. 38: “Sic autem argumentantur dicentes: Ergo malum sunt nuptiae et non est opus dei homo quem generant nuptiae? Quasi nuptiarum bonum sit motus eon-cupiscentiae in quo uxores diligunt qui ignorant deum, quod apostolus prohibet; ac non potius pudicitia coniugalis, qua in bonos usus ordinate filios procreandi redigitur libido carnalis: aut vero possit esse homo nisi opus dei non solum qui de coniugio, verum etiam qui de fornicatione vel de adulterio procreatur. Sed in hac quaestione ubi quaeritur non cui rei creator, sed cui salvator sit necessarius, non intuendum est quid boni sit in procreatione naturae, sed quid in peccato mali quo certum est vitiatam esse naturam. Simul autem utrumque propagatur, et natura et naturae vitium; quorum est unum bonum alterum malum. Illud de conditoris largitate sumitur, hoc de originis damnatione attrahitur: illi est causa bona voluntas dei summi, huic mala voluntas hominis primi; illud indicat deum creaturae institutorem, hoc indicat deum inoboedientiae punitorem. Denique idem ipse Christus propter illud creandum factor est hominis, propter hoc sanandum factus est homo.” It may seem at first sight that this passage implies a clear condemnation of the Manichaean doctrine that generation is the work of the evil power; but in reality such is not the case: on the contrary we find in Augustine's ideas a close correspondence with Manichaean anthropology. As a matter of fact the latter assumed that the sexes were created by the lord of darkness to prevent the imprisoned Light from being rescued, but at the same time it taught also in the myth of the redemption of the Archons that even through the sexual instincts elements of Light could become free and be redeemed.

17 Ep. 186, 18: “Haec massa si esset ita media, ut quemadmodum nihil boni ita nee mali aliquid mereretur, non frustra videretur iniquitas, ut ex ea fierent vasa in contumeliam; cum vero per liberum arbitrium primi hominis in condemnationem ex uno universa defluxerint, procul dubio, quod ex ea fiunt vasa in honorem, non ipsius iustitiae, quae gratiam nulla praecessit, sed dei misericordiae, quod vero in contumeliam, non iniquitati dei, quae absit ut sit apud deum, sed iudicio deputandum est. Hoc quisquis cum ecclesia catholica sapit, non contra gratiam pro meritis disputat, sed misericordiam et iudicium domino cantat, ut nee misericordiam recuset ingratus nee indicium accipiet iniustus.” Here undoubtedly ‘massa’ is completely identical with βῶλος that is to say, a conglomeration of perversity.

18 Contra Julianum, iv. 8, 46; v. 4, 14; vi. 24, 25. The second of these passages is especially important: “Quamvis ergo onines ex eadem massa perditionis et damnationis secundum duritiam cordis sui et cor impoenitens, quantum ad ipsos pertinet, thesauriz-ant sibi iram in die irae, quo redditur unicuique secundum opera sua: deus tamen alios inde per misericordem bonitatem adducit ad poenitentiam, alios secundum iustum iudicium non adducit.” And in the “Opus imperfectum,” i. 127: “Gratia liberat a totius massae damnatione quos liberat, quam vos negando estis haeretici.” See also i. 136; iv. 181.

19 E. de Stoops, Gssai sur la diffusion du Manichéisme dans l'Empire romain, Ghent, 1909.

20 Migne, Patrologia Graeca, I. Appendix.

21 Panarion, Haer. 67.

22 Jerome himself did not escape the charge of Manichaean tendencies, and Priscillian was altogether a victim of the anti-Manichaean opposition.