ÀҾ˹éÒ˹ѧÊ×Í
PDF
ePub

unmarried during thirty years, which time they employed in offering sacrifices and performing other rites ordained by the law; and if they suffered themselves to be debauched they were delivered up to the most miserable death, being placed in a subterraneous cell, in their funeral attire, without any sepulchral column, funeral rites, or other customary solemnities. After the expiration of the term of thirty years they might marry on quitting the ensigns of their priesthood; but we are told that very few did this, as those who did suffered calamities which were regarded as ominous by the rest, and induced them to remain virgins in the temple of the goddess till their death. In Greece priestesses were not infrequently required to be virgins, if not for their whole life, at any rate for the duration of their priesthood.3 Tertullian writes :"To the Achaean Juno, at the town Aegium, a virgin is allotted; and the priestesses who rave at Delphi know not marriage. We know that widows minister to the African Ceres; they not only withdraw from their still living husbands, but they even introduce other wives to them in their own room, all contact with males, even as far as the kiss of their sons, being forbidden them. . . . . We have heard, too, of continent men, and among others the priests of the famous Egyptian bull." There were eunuch priests connected with the cults of the Ephesian Artemis," the Phrygian Cybele," and the Syrian Astarte."

4

Among the Todas of the Neilgherry Hills the "dairyman or priest is bound to a celibate existence; and

[ocr errors]

1 Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Antiquitates Romanæ, ii. 64 sqq. Plutarch, Numa, x. 7 sqq.

2 Dionysius of Halicarnassus, ii. 67. 3 Strabo, xiv. I. 23. Müller, Das sexuelle Leben der alten Kulturvölker, P. 44 sqq. Blümner, Home Life of the Ancient Greeks, p. 325. Götte, Das Delphische Orakel, p. 78 sq.

Tertullian, Ad uxorem, i. 6 (Migne, Patrologia cursus, i. 1284). Idem, De exhortatione castitatis, 13 (Migne, ii. 928 sq.). Cf. Idem, De monogamia, 17 (Migne, ii. 953).

[blocks in formation]

8

Arnobius, Adversus gentes, v. 7 (Migne, op. cit. v. 1095 sqq.). Farnell, "Sociological Hypotheses concerning the Position of Women in Ancient Religion,' in Archiv f. Religionswiss. vii. 78.

7 Lucian, De dea Syria, 15, 27, 50 sqq.

8 Thurston, Anthropology of the Todas and Kotas,' in the Madras Government Museum's Bulletin, i. 169, 170, 193. Rivers, Todas, pp. 80, 99, 236.

among the Hindus, in spite of the great honour in which marriage is held, celibacy has always commanded respect in instances of extraordinary sanctity. Those of the Sannyasis who are known to lead their lives in perfect celibacy receive on that account marks of distinguished honour and respect.2 Already the time-honoured Indian institution of the four Asramas contained the germ of monastic celibacy, the Brahmacarin, or student, being obliged to observe absolute chastity during the whole course of his study. The idea was further developed in Jainism and Buddhism. The Jain monk was to renounce all sexual pleasures, "either with gods, or men, or animals"; not to give way to sensuality; not to discuss topics relating to women; not to contemplate the forms of women.* Buddhism regards sensuality as altogether incompatible with wisdom and holiness; it is said that "a wise man should avoid married life as if it were a burning pit of live coals."5 According to the legend, Buddha's mother, who was the best and purest of the daughters of men, had no other sons, and her conception was due to supernatural causes." One of the fundamental duties of monastic life, by an infringement of which the guilty person brings about his inevitable. expulsion from Buddha's order, is that "an ordained monk may not have sexual intercourse, not even with an animal.”7 In Tibet some sects of the Lamas are allowed to marry, but those who do not are considered more holy; and in every sect the nuns must take a vow of absolute continence. The Buddhist priests of Ceylon are totally debarred from women." Chinese law enjoins celibacy on all priests, Buddhist or Taouist.10 And among the immortals of

[merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small]

Taouism there are some women also, who have led an extaordinarily ascetic life.1

them marry,

3

A small class of Hebrews held the idea that marriage is impure. The Essenes, says Josephus, "reject pleasure as an evil, but esteem continence and the conquest over our passions to be virtue. They neglect wedlock." This doctrine exercised no influence on Judaism, but probably much upon Christianity. St. Paul considered celibacy to be preferable to marriage. "He that giveth her (his virgin) in marriage doeth well; but he that giveth her not in marriage doeth better." "It is good for a man not to touch a woman. Nevertheless, to avoid fornication, let each man have his own wife, and let each woman have her own husband." + If the unmarried and widows cannot contain let "for it is better to marry than to burn." 5 These and other passages 6 in the New Testament inspired a general enthusiasm for virginity. Commenting on the words of the Apostle, Tertullian points out that what is better is not necessarily good. It is better to lose one eye than two, but neither is good; so also, though it is better to marry than to burn, it is far better neither to marry nor to burn. Marriage "consists of that which is the essence of fornication "; whereas continence "is a means whereby a man will traffic in a mighty substance of sanctity.' The body which our Lord wore and in which He carried on the conflict of life in this world He put on from a holy virgin; and John the Baptist, Paul, and all the others "whose names are in the book of life" 10 cherished and loved virginity." Virginity works miracles: Mary, the sister of Moses, leading the female band, passed on

9

8

[blocks in formation]

"10

op. cit. i. 1278 sq.). Idem, De monogamia, 3 (Migne, ii. 932 sq.).

Idem, De exhortatione castitatis,

9 (Migne, op. cit. ii. 925).

9 Idem, De exhortatione castitatis, IO (Migne, op. cit. ii. 925).

10 Philippians, iv. 3.

11 St. Clement of Rome, Epistola I. ad virgines, 6 (Migne, op. cit. Ser. Græca, i. 392).

foot over the straits of the sea, and by the same grace Thecla was reverenced even by lions, so that the unfed beasts, lying at the feet of their prey, underwent a holy fast, neither with wanton look nor sharp claw venturing to harm the virgin.1 Virginity is like a spring flower, always softly exhaling immortality from its white petals. The Lord himself opens the kingdoms of the heavens to eunuchs. If Adam had preserved his obedience to the Creator he would have lived for ever in a state of virgin purity, and some harmless mode of vegetation would have peopled paradise with a race of innocent and immortal beings. It is true that, though virginity is the shortest way to the camp of the faithful, the way of matrimony also arrives there, by a longer circuit. Tertullian himself opposed the Marcionites, who prohibited marriage among themselves and compelled those who were married to separate before they were received by baptism into the community. And in the earlier part of the fourth century the Council of Gangra expressly condemned anyone who maintained that marriage prevented a Christian from entering the kingdom of God. But, at the end of the same century, a council also excommunicated the monk Jovinian because he denied that virginity was meritorious than marriage. permitted to man only as a necessary expedient for the continuance of the human species, and as a restraint,

[blocks in formation]

was more

The use of marriage was

the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, ii. 186).

5 St. Ambrose, Epistola LXIII. 40 (Migne, op. cit. xvi. 1200).

6 Tertullian, Adversus Marcionem, i. 1, 29; iv. II; &c. (Migne, op. cit. ii. 247, 280 sqq., 382). Idem, De monogamia, 1, 15 (Migne, ii. 931, 950). Cf. Irenaeus, Contra Haæreses, i. 28. 1 (Migne, op. cit. Ser. Græca, vii. 690 sq.); Clement of Alexandria, Stromata, iii. 3 (Migne, op. cit. Ser. Græca, viii. 1113 sqq). 7 Concilium Gangrense, can. I (Labbe-Mansi, Sacrorum Conciliorum collectio, ii. 1106).

8 Concilium Mediolanense, A. D. 390 (Labbe-Mansi, op. cit. iii. 689 sq.).

however imperfect, on the natural licentiousness of desire.1 The procreation of children is the measure of a Christian's indulgence in appetite, just as the husbandman throwing the seed into the ground awaits the harvest, not sowing more upon it.2

3

These opinions led by degrees to the obligatory celibacy of the secular and regular clergy. The conviction that a second marriage of a priest, or the marriage of a priest with a widow, is unlawful, seems to have existed from the earliest period of the Church; and as early as the beginning of the fourth century a synod held in Elvira in Spain insisted on the absolute continence of the higher ecclesiastics. The celibacy of the clergy in general was prescribed by Gregory VII., who "looked with abhorrence on the contamination of the holy sacerdotal character, even in its lowest degree, by any sexual connection." But in many countries this prescription was so strenuously resisted, that it could not be carried through till late in the thirteenth century.5

The practice of religious celibacy may be traced to several sources. In many cases the priestess is obviously regarded as married to the god whom she is serving, and is therefore forbidden to marry anybody else. In ancient Peru the Sun was the husband of the virgins dedicated to him. They were obliged to be of the same blood as their consort, that is to say, daughters of the Incas. "For though they imagined that the Sun had children, they considered that they ought not to be bastards, with mixed divine and human blood. So the

1 St. Justin, Apologia I. pro Christianis, 29 (Migne, op. cit. Ser. Græca, vi. 373). Clement of Alexandria, Stromata, ii. 23 (Migne, op. cit. Ser. Græca, viii. 1089). Gibbon, op. cit. ii. 186.

2 Athenagoras, Legatio pro Christianis, 33 (Migne, op. cit. Ser. Græca, vi. 966).

Lea, Sacerdotal Celibacy in the Christian Church, p. 37. Lecky, History of European Morals, ii. 328 sq.

+ Concilium Eliberitanum, A.D. 305,

ch. 33 (Labbe-Mansi, op. cit. ii. 11):"Placuit in totum prohiberi episcopis, presbyteris, et diaconibus, vel omnibus clericis positis in ministerio, abstinere se a conjugibus suis, et non generare filios: quicumque vero fecerit, ab

honore clericatus exterminetur."

5 Gieseler, Text-Book of Ecclesiastical History, ii. 275. Milman, History of Latin Christianity, ii. 150.

6 Garcilasso de la Vega, op. cit. i

297.

« ¡è͹˹éÒ´Óà¹Ô¹¡ÒõèÍ
 »