The Apostles
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Source: Bahá'í Library Online (bahai-library.com), curated by Jonah Winters. Used by permission of the curator. Original citation: Ernest Renan, The Apostles, bahai-library.com.
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THE APOSTLES

llY

ERNEST             RENAN

TRANSLATED BY WILLIAM G. HUTCHISON

[ISSUED FOR THE RATIONALIST     PRESS ASSOCIATION, LIMIT!mJ

ATTS & CO.,
17, JOHNSON'S COURT, FLEET STREET, LONDON, E.C.
1905
CONTENTS

CHAP,                                                                                             PAGB.

TRA!lfSJ.ATOR'S      PREFACE                                                                5
INTRODUCTION:           CRITICISM OF THE ORIGISAL                 DOCV!.IENTS          13
I. FORMATION           OF THE        BELIEFS        RELATIXG        TO THE RESUR-
RECTION OF JESUS-THE                  APPEARANCES            AT JERUSALEM             33
II.   DEPARTURE          OF THE DISCIPLES              FROM JERUSALEll-THE
SECO!lfD GALILEA!'l           LIFE OF JESUS

III.       RETURN       OF THE APOSTLES            TO JERUSALEM-END                  OF THE
PERIOD     OF VISIO!'lS -                                                             44
IV.        DESCENT OF THE HOLY SPIRIT-ECSTATIC                            AND PROPHETIC
PHE!'lOMENA        -

V. THE          FIRST    CHURCH          OF     JERUSALE!'.1 : ITS          E:-ITIRF.I.Y
MONKISH         CHARACTER                                                             53
VI.        CONVERSION        OF THE HELLENIST               AND PROSELYTE            JEWS -        6o
VII.        THE     CHURCH       CONSIDERED           AS AN AssOCL\TIO!lf             OF THE
POOR -      INSTITUTIO!lf          OF         THE        DIACO!'<An:    -   Tm•:
DEACONESSES            AND WIDOWS                                                     63
VIII.         THE      FIRST     PERSECUTION-DEATH                       OF STEPHEN-DES-
TRUCTION        OF THE FIRST CHURCH                     OF jERUSALEll                 6<)
IX.        FIRST     MISSIONS-THE            DEACON        PHILIP                                  73
X. CONVERSION               OF ST. PAUL                                                           77
XI.        PEACE     AND INTERNAL            DEVELOP!.IENTS             OF THE      CHURCH
OF }UDlEA                                                                              84
XI I. FOUNDATION               OF THE CHURCH                OF ANTIOCH                               91

XIII.         THE     IDEA OF A GENTILE           APOSTOLATE-ST.               BARNABAS         -    95
XIV.          HEROD      AGRIPPA       l.'s   PERSECUTION           -                                 98
XV.         MOVEMENTS         PARALLEL WITH               OR IMITATED        FROM CHRIS-
TIANITY-SIMON              OF GITTON                                                 103
XVI.          GENERAL      PROGRESS           OF THE CHRISTIAN              MISSIONS                107
XVII.         THE     STATE     OF THE WORLD                ABOUT THE MIDDLE o~á THE
FIRST     CENTURY                                                                   114
XVIII.         THE     RELIGIOUS        LEGISLATION           OF THE PERIOD                          125

XIX. THE             FUTURE     OF MISSIONS            -                                           130
THE FUTURE          OF MISSIONS                               [45].
century, thousands of men of our own I and was forced to get up by blows from
race, living in the miraculous, believing the whip or a stab from a bayonet, howwith a blind faith in marvels which they ever little strength the loss of blood,
declare they have seen and touched .. streaming down all his limbs, still left
There is already a whole literature to him, he started dancing and crying with
demonstrate the harmony of Mormonism renewed enthusiasm : ' In truth we are
and science; what is better is that this God's, and unto him we return ! ' Some
religion, based on silly impostures, has of the children expired in the course of ,
been capable of achieving prodigies of the journey. The executioners cast their ,
patience and abnegation ; in another dead bodies under the feet of their
five hundred years doctors will be prov- fathers and sisters, who trod proudly
ing its divinity by the wonders of its over them, and did not give them a
foundation. Babism in Persia has been second glance. When the place of execua phenomenon important in another tion was reached, the victims were again
way. A man of mild disposition and of offered their lives for their recantation.
no pretensions, a sort of pious and One executioner took it into his head to
modest Spinoza, found himself, almost say to a father that, if he did not give
in spite of himself, raised to the rank of a way, he would cut the throats of his two
thaumaturgist of divine incarnation, and sons on his breast. These were two
became the leader of a numerous sect, little boys, the elder of whom was fourfervent and fanatical, which almost teen, and who, red with their own blood,
brought about a revolution comparable their flesh charred, coldly listened to this
with that of Islam. For his sake, colloquy; the father replied, lying down
thousands of martyrs flocked to their on the ground, that he was ready, and
death. A day unparalleled perhaps in the elder of the children, eagerly claimthe world's history was that of the great ing his right of birth, asked to be slain
massacre of the Babis at Teheran. first. At last all was finished; the night
"On that day was to be seen in the fell upon a formless heap of flesh; the
streets and bazaars of Teheran," says a heads were hung in bundles on the stake
narrator, who has first-hand knowledge,1 of justice, and the dogs of the suburbs
"a spectacle which it does not seem that slunk in troops to the spot."
the population can ever forget. When                This happened in 1852. The sect of
conversation, even to-day, turns on the Mazdak, under Chosroes Nushirvan, was
matter, one can judge of the admiration stifled i_na similar bath of blood. Absomingled with horror, which the multi- lute devotion is for simple natures the
tude experienced, and which the lapse of most exquisite of delights and a sort of
years has not diminished. Women and necessity. In the affair of the Babis,
children were to be seen advancing people who scarce belonged to the sect
between the ranks of executioners, their were seen coming forward to make self•
flesh slashed all over the body, with accusation, that they might be added to
flaming matches thrust in the wounds. the victims. It is so sweet to man to suffer
The victims were dragged along by ropes, for something, that in many cases the
and forced to walk with blows of the bait of martyrdom suffices to cause belief.
whip. Women and children advanced, A disciple, who was the comrade in
singing a verse, which says : 'In truth suffering of the Bab, hanging by his side
we come from God, and unto him we on the ramparts of Tabriz and awaiting
return !' Their voices swelled loud death, had but one word in his mouth :
above the profound stillness of the "Are you satisfied with me, master?"
crowd. When one of the victims fell                  Persons who regard as miraculous or
chimerical what in history transcends
'J. A. de Gobineau: Les Religions et /esPhilo- the calculations of ordinary common
n.,M.1~,dan.r l'.d,ie Cmtrale, p. 304 et seq.       sense must n.u.li S'll<:.\\fa.<:.ts
inexplicable,
(45]                      THE FUTURE         OF ,JflSSIONS                          135

, The fundamental condition of criticism respects our betters. It is not thus at
' is ability to understand the diverse con- epochs and in countries where each is
ditions of the human spirit. Absolute whole-heartedly of his own communion,
faith is for us an utterly alien pheno- his own race, his own political school ;
menon. Outside the positive sciences, and that is why all the great religious
which are of a certitude in some measure creations have taken place in societies,
material, every opinion is in our eyes the prevailing spirit of which was more
only an approximation, implying both or less analogous to that of the East.
an element of truth and an element of Up till now, in fact, absolute faith has
error. The element of error may be alone succeeded in imposing itself upon
small as you will ; it is never reduced to others. A good servant-maid of Lyons,
zero when we are dealing with moral Blandina, who went to her death for her
things, implicating a question of art, faith seventeen hundred years ago, a
language, literary form, and personalities. brutal tribal chief, Clovis, who saw good,
Such is not the manner of seeing of nearly fourteen centuries ago, to embrace
narrow and stubborn minds-of Orientals, Catholicism, still make the law for us.
for instance. The eye of such people is        Who has not paused, in passing through
not like ours ; it is the enamel eye of the our modernised ancient towns, at the foot
figures in mosaics, dull and fixed. They of the gigantic monuments of the faith
• can see but one thing at once, and that of old ? All about them has been
thing obsesses them, takes hold of them; rebuilt ; there is no longer a vestige of
they are no longer free, then, to believe the habitations of a former day ; the
oi; not to believe ; there is no longer cathedral has remained, a little defaced,
room in them for a reflective after-thought. maybe, so high as man's hand can reach,
For an opinion thus embraced men go but deeply rooted in the soil. Mole sua
to their death. The martyr is in religion stat I Its huge bulk is its justification.
what the party man is in politics. There It has withstood the deluge which has
have not been many very intelligent swept away all about it ; not one of the
martyrs. The confessors of the time of men of olden time, returning to visit the
Diocletian must have been, after the places where he lived, would find his
peace of the Church, worrying and abode; alone the raven which has built
dictatorial persons. Nobody is very its nest in the heights of the sacred fane
tolerant who believes that he is quite has never seen the hammer raised upon
right, and that the others are quite its dwelling. Strange enactment! Those
wrong.                                       worthy martyrs, those rude converts,
The great religious conflagrations, those extortionate builders of churches,
being the consequence of a very rigid wield over us an eternal sway. We are
manner of seeing things, have thus Christians, because it pleased them to be
become enigmas for a century like ours, so. As in politics it is only the barbaric
in which the rigour of convictions has foundations that endure, in religion it is
been weakened. Among us the sincere • only the spontaneous, and, if I may dare
man is constantly modifying his opinions to say so, the fanatical affirmations, that
-in the first place, because the world are contagious. The fact is that religions
changes; in the second place, because are entirely popular creations. Their
the observer changes also. We believe success does not depend on the more or
in several things at once. We love less sound proofs that they furnish of
justice and truth; for them we would their divinity; their success is in ratio
venture our lives; but we do not admit with what they speak to the heart of the
that justice and truth are the monopoly people.
of any one sect or party. We are good          Are we from this to conclude that
Frenchmen ; but we confess that the religion is destined to dwindle little by
Germans, the English, are in many little, and finally to disaQQe.atli.k.e.   ~Q,~~\-n
THE FUTURE           OF MISSIONS                            1
[45]
errors about magic and sorcery and man would be transcendently religjous,
spirits? Assuredly not. Religion is not plunged in an eternal adoration, passing ;
a popular error; it is a great instinctive from ecstasy to ecstasy, being born,
truth, perceived by the people, expressed living, and dying in a torrent of rapturous
by the people. All the creeds which delight. Egoism, in fact, which denotes
serve to give a form to religious feeling the measure of the inferiority of beings,
are defective, and it is their fate to be decreases in proportion as the animal is
cast aside one after the other. But noth- left behind. A perfect being would be
ing can be falser than the dream of no longer egoistic ; he would be abso•
certain persons, who, seeking to conceive lutely religious. Progress, then, will
a perfect humanity, conceive it lacking have as its effect the augmentation of
religion. It is the reverse which must religion, not its destruction or diminution.
be said. China, which presents an             But it is time to return to the three
inferior humanity, has scarce any reli- missionaries, Paul, Barnabas, and John

gion. On the contrary, let us suppose a ; Mark, whom we have left at the moment
planet inhabited by a humanity whose ' of their leaving Antioch by the gate
intellectual, moral, and physical power I which leads to Seleucia. In my third
is double that of earthly humanity ; that i Book I shall attempt to follow the track
humanity would be at least twice as of those messengers of good tidings over
religious as ours. I say "at least," for it sea and land, in calm and tempest, •
is probable that the augmentation of the through good and evil days. I am
religious faculties would proceed in more impatient to tell again that unparalleled
rapid progression than the augmentation epic, to depict those roads stretching
of the intellectual capacity, and would infinitely through Asia and Europe,
not be in simple, direct proportion. Let along which they sowed the seed of the
us suppose a humanity ten times stronger Gospel, those waves over which they
than ours ; that humanity would be in- fared so often under conditions so
finitely more religious. It is even prob- diverse. The great Christian Odyssey is
able that, at that pitch of sublimity, about to begin. Already the apostolic
untrammelled by all material cares and bark has shaken forth her sails; the wind
all egoism, invested with perfect discri- is blowing, and aspires for nought save
mination and divinely subtle taste, seeing to bear upon its wings the words of
the baseness and vacuity of all that is Jesus.
not truth and goodness and beauty,
-- The Apostles (Used by permission of the curator)