Christian (Hastings' Dictionary)

The name borne by the ' followers of Christ ' in all ages and countries from NT times. I. Place and date of origin. — According to th« account in Ac 11-' the first to have the name applied to them were the members of the church at Antioch. This fact is especially mentioned by the author of the Acts in a manner which shows that he attached great significance to it. The evangelising work in the city of Antioch wa? being carried out by men of Cyprus and Cyrene (i.e.

by Hellenists), and thougli perhaps not directed to Gentiles who had no previous con- nexion with the synagogue (for we can scarcely substitute "EXXtjkos for 'S,\\tivl(tt6.s in face of the MS evidence; see Westcott and Hort, N.T. in Greek, Introd. ad loc), yet on more liberal lines than hitherto. In Antioch, too, was established the first considerable church outside Palestine. The mother-church of Jerus. was not slow to recognise the importance of these events.

Barnabas was sent to guide and control the new community, and the result of a year's work in co-operation with his chosen partner, Saul, was that they ' taught a great multitude, and the disciples were called Christians first in Antioch.' We cannot fix exactly the date of this 'whole year' (v.^*), but it is certainly before the Herodian persecution of 44, and, to judge from the expressions of v."

12' (i* TaOrats rats ij^pais, Kar' iKuvov rbv Katpbv), not very long before it ; perhaps between 40-44, which leaves room for the possibility that the words fjrit iyivero iirl KXavdiov, 'which came to pass in the days of Claudius,' in v.^ maij imply that Agabus' prophecy was uttered in the reign of Caligula. The objections made to the statement of Ac 1136 are based ultimately upon the theory which discredits the authority of that book as a comparatively late document.

If we re^'ard the Acts as the work of St. Luke, the account it gives of the origin of the name 'Christian' is invested with the authority of con- temporary evidence, which cannot lightly be set aside on account of apparent difficulties. The objections which have been raisea on the score of these difficulties may be gathered under three heads, (a) Baur {Paid, His Life and Work, i. 04, footnote, Eng. tr. 1873) says that the termination is Latin, and eeems to think that the name arose in Rome.

The temiiriirtion tanxu was used in Latin during the time of the civil wars to denot« ' followers of ' (e.rf. ' Csesariani,' Hint. Bell. Afr. 13 ; * Ponipeiani,' Caesar, Hell. Cieil, iii. 44 et pass.), and acquired this meaning from the adjectival sense ' belonging to,' which the form already possessed, although it w.ia very seldom used, e.g. Tamphiliana donms (from 'Tamphilus'), Nep. Att. xiii. 2; Cajsarianura helium, ib. vii. 1 ; Catoniana familia, Cic. ad Q. Frat. IV. vi.

5; Miloniana tempera, Balbus ap. Cic. E. a. Att. IX. 7, B2. The adoptive names in -lanM-sare not parallel because the 'i' in these cases belongs to the stem of the gentile name, f .i7. ^milianus, .Euiilius. So far, then, Baur was justified. The termination -iamut was common in Latin of this period. But a& names like Cajsariani, Pompeiani, etc., were known and used throughout the whole Rom.

Empire, it seems to have become the fashion in Greek-speaking countries also to form other words on the same analogy. Thus (omitting ' Herodiani,' which may have originated in Roman official circles) we find names such aa those mentioned in Hcgesipjius (ap Eus. Ecel. Hist. iv. 22), ^tUAiti»»i, Ko:^T0x^<ETiAOJ. 0^acAl,Ti, lavoi, BacffAffStacw, ^Satnpwf Xiavoi.

The theory that this -<«►« is a native ' Asiatic type ' of termination is not borne out by the instances quoted, in which either the 'i' belongs to the stem, e.g. 'Ain&.»6< ('Aria) ^apii- akcf (^eiphtit), Or the words are late enoujjh to have been copied from the Latin termination. But the instances quoted above show that, whether derived from the Latin or not, the tennina- tion became common enough in Greek, and therefore there is no necessity to ascribe to tiie name Xfiimafof a Roman origin.

(It) Hausrath (A'.T. Timet: Apostles, ii. pp 211, 212, tng. tr. ISlt.^i) objects to Ac ll^s that we find no trace of the word 'Christian' in contemporary literature until the time of Trajai* But until the Neronian persecution the sect cai scarcely have attracted much attention in the Roman literary cJose, and from the year 64 to the time of Trajan the extant literature Is ex- tremely scanty, and so in both cases we are not justified in arguing ex silentio.

On the other hand, however, passages in Tacitus and Suetonius furnish us with an indirect argiiraent that the name was known and used in Rome in the year 64. Tacitus (-Inn. xv. 44) says, 'nuos . . vulgus Christianos appellahat. Auctor nominis ejus Christus,' etc. The imperfect 'appvllahat* is significant when we remember that Tacitus was prol»abIy living in Rome in 64, and an eye-witness of the Neronian persecution.

It is quite probable that he is recording a circumstance which he remembered in connexion with these events, viz. that the word 'Christiani' was in everj-body's mouth, and he somewhat naturally believed Christ Himself to have been the author (auctor) of tiie name.

Suetonius, writing only a year or two later than Tacitus, also introduces the nam< 'Christiani' into his reference to this persecution (A^ew, 18, CHRISTIAN CHRISTIAN 385 'afflirtl iuppli''iia Christiani, genua liominnm Buperetitionis novB ac mftletl..-:!*'). Some have found additional evidence (or an early UMe of the name in the supposed occurrence of the worU in an inscription at Foiupeii, i.e. dating before a.d. 79. But thi» inKription (OIL iv.

679), which w merely a few line* Bcribhled upon a wall, cannot be deciphered uith any certainty. The letters -KISTIANl are fairly plain, and before the U are two faint perpendicular strokes, probably 11 ( b KX U they are meant for li the horizontal stroke has quite dis- appeare^l. The drift of the whole ins'-ription is a.^ uncertain .13 the rea/ling of this word. See V. Schuize in ZKfr iv. 12.'^ fT. ; JMedlander, DarttfUuiigen att» rf«- Sittcnffe4cfi. iiotntfi iii. 045, n. 3 : C. F.

Arnold, SeTon. Chriftenver/ota. p. 64. Efiually indecisive is the mention of the name in Josephus (AnL mil. iii. 3), li'riTi n »?► rjt Xfiir^ixrvi ire rtuii ittu^r- uiw> tim iviAjvi T# 9vy»w. This flection is deservedly suspected by the great bulk of modem acholanj to be entirely or partly a lat*r forgery. The latest editor, Niese (Flavii Jotephi Op^ra, B«rtin, lby2, Intnyl. to vol. iii.), rejects the whole section as an interpolation. Others (e.g. Q. A. Miiller, Chrutxu t>ri F.

Joufphut) incline to accept a suljetrmtum of authentic matter. The i»aa- •af^e is not found at all until it occurs in a quotation bv Kuse- biua {tlUt. Eeel. L 11 ; Dein. Ecang. iii. 5), sinc« whose time the whole ifl repeated (exceptinif quite unimportant divergences) in all MSS and other evidence for the text of this part of josephus' works. (Besidefl the liooks referred to aliove, see also on Ihia subject C. AnioUl, .V.VA' KpititoUM df F. jMfphi tettimonio qwHt Jtru Chritto trihtiit, \Wl ; C.

Daubut, Pro tegtimonio F. Jotrphi dt Jtnt Chrittn, 17(16 ; F. H. Schnidel, F. Jot. rf« Jfxa Chrulotatatwi, 184(l ; Oieseler, Lthrb. d. Kirchftu/ttch. 1B24, i. K> ; Langen, TA. <juartaitchri/t, 1865,1 ; Schurer, If J J' 1. ii. 14311.) (e)R. A. LipsiuB urges the silence of St. Paul's Epistles, and Indeed of the whole body of the earliest Christian literuture. He retfards the Asiatic ori^rin of the name as probable, but is Dot inclined to dat« It earlier than tbs last decade of the Ist cent.

But e\en if we set t^side, as he does, the evidence of Acts and 1 Peter, this silence explains itself from the fact that the name arose in non-Cbristian circles, and was for soms time conflnsd to them. II. By tchom tixu the name invented? — Here we are left without direct eviilence. The xS"ll">-^^<"'^^ (EV 'were OAlIed ') of Ac ll*" mii^ht be used in- differently of a name adopted by oneself, or given by other» (see Thayer, j.VT Lex. $.v.) But there are certain hints which furnish some clues.

(a) The Christians do not seem to have used it of themselves, at any rate vt-ithin the apostolic period. They cnllcd themselves 'the bretlnim ' (0' i^f^0o'^i Ac 14' l5", Ko 16'* etc.), 'the disciple-s ' (ol naetrral, Ac 11" 13" 2(fi°), 'the saints' (oi 57^01, Ro 16", 1 Co 16', Eph 1" etc.), 'the faithful' (ol ir«rTo(, Ac lO", I Ti 4»-"), 'the elect' (ol iKXeicrol, Mt 24", Mk 13", 2 Ti '2'», 1 P 1'), 'the way ' (i 6S6s, Ac »• 199." 24'-°), but never 'Christians.'

In the only passage in whicli this is apparently not true (I P 4"), ' as a Christian ' is parallel with ' as a thief,' 'as a murderer,' which shows that the writer is speaking for the moment from the point of view of the heathen persecutor. St. Paul (Ac 26*) seems even to avoid using the n.anie 'Chri.stian,' which Agrippa had employed, and to substitute for it tlie periphrasis toioOtoj ^Troros koI iyii el^i.

It is not probable, then, that we must look to Chris- tians themselves for the invention of tliis title. (6) Nor is it much more probiible that the Jews invented it. The onlj- direct nanu' by which they call the Christians in NT is that of Xaj-wparoi, ' Nazarenes' (Ac 24). Elsewhere they speak of them as^ atptait th-ri, 'this sect' {ih. 28'-"''; cf. 24"). On one occa- sion, indeed, we find the word in the mouth of the Jewish king Agrippa (Ac 26**).

But Agriripa ha<l spent a great part of his life in Rom. circles, and wna speaking on this occa-sion at Ca'sarea liefore a Rom. audience. It is too much then to infer from this passage that the word ' Christian ' wa» in use among the Jews. On the other hand, there is a strong <t priori improbability that the Jews, even in irony, would call the new sect ' followers of the Messiah, the Anointed One ' (i XpiffTil).

(r) More probably it is to the heathen populace of Antioch that we must look for the origin of the Dame. It wa.s amongst the ^lopulace ('vulgus.'in iof. cit.) that Tacitus' attention was drawn to the word in Rome. It was (next to the Jews) the heathen populace whose notice was iirst attracted VOL. I. — ••c by the Christians. And their notice was attracted to them as the preachers of one Christos. This name was always on their lips. It was the name in which they were baptized (.

-Vc 2" 8" 10", Ja 2' *). It i« not surprising, then, that tlie Antiocbenes, hearing that this Christos had been alive not more than fifteen years before, should call his followers the Xpimafoi. vVe must, however, leave room for the possibility that the word may have originated in the Latin-speaking suite of the leqatus, i.e. in the official class, though not necessarily as an official name.

Though we hear of nothing which would bring the Christians prominently before this class in Antioch, as happened in other towns, yet, in our complete ignorance of the relations between the Christians and tliis official class in Antioch at the time, this might easily be the case without our knowing anything of it. III. Early .fpread of the name. — We must be on our guard against overestimating the attention which the Christian body attracted in Antioch at the time when the name was invented.

The i-xXot iKavit, 'much people,' of Ac 11* might be almost unnoticeable in so large a metropolis as Antioch, and the arrival of another new teaching would easily escape observation in a great centre of thought, where all the religions of the world jostled with one another. St. Luke, writing at a time when the name had become famous, assigns to its origin an imjxirtance reflected from its later history.

He is writing also from within the Christian circle, to which the name woulil be familiar long before its application became general. But though confined, it may be, in its beginnings to that quarter of the city where the Cliristians had settled, it must have spread very quickly be3-ond Antioch to all parte of the empire whither Christianity had made its way. Less than twenty years after its birth we hear it mentioned in the Rom.

official circle at Caesarea as a familiar word, whoso signification was too well known for it to need introduction or explanation (Ac 20*). A year or two later it is in common use among the popu- lace of Rome (Tac. loc. cit.), and not far from the same date St. Luke indirectly implies that the name has become famous (U^). St Peter, writing probably between 64-67 from Rome to the Christian communities in Asia Minor (I P 5'^ 1'), a.ssumes that it is quite well known over all that district (ih.

4"). From the correspondence between the younger Pliny and the emperor Trajan in 112-113 we find that it is by that time equally familiar to members of the olficial bodies in llorae and Bithynia. Finally, in the Ignatian Epn., written in the first or at the lieg. of the second decade of the 2nd cent., we find for the first time that the Chris- tians have accepted the name and use it atiiongsl themselves {e.q. Eph. 11", Rum. 3, I'ulmyirp 7). IV. Significance of the nmne. — St.

Luke evidently wishes to connect the origin of the name with the final departure of Christianity from merely Jewish ideals and the dawning consciousness of this fact in the (Jentile mind. It is then fair to ask, ' What were the distinctive marks of the new sect to those who first used the word Christian ? ' If it did not originate as a sarcastic jeu d'esprit, it very soon came to be used with a contemptuous signification.

It occurs with an implication of scorn in the mouth of Agrippa, 'With but little persuasion thou wouldest fain make me a Christian (Ac 26'). Many editors take this pas«af;e as a direct allusion to the name 'Christian.' The expresiion « ita^i rni it. t,»» ««/i'iV is a Hebraism which occurs many times in the LXX. The Ileb. equivalent dennles that the person whose name is *calle<l over' a tliiiiff po-vsesses the rights of ownership in It. See csp.

2 S 12* Lent I take the city, and my name be called ujM)n it' (HVm), and the note of Driver, ad too (llrh. Tejct of Sam.\ Tlie allusion in Ja 2' is, then, mors correctly referred to baptism In the name of Christ (SM M«yor, Bp. of Si. James, ad toe.) See also art. Call. 986 CHRISTOLOGY CHRISTOLOGr From 1 P we learn that in heathen mouths ' Chris- tian ' was practically equivalent to ' malefactor ' (415. 16^ (.f. 2'- 3'").

What were the reasons for this malice and contempt t They were perhaps mainly four. (a) The object of the Christians' worship was a crucilied mar., ' unto Jews a stumbling-block, and unto Gentiles foolishness' (1 Co l'^). Compare the contempt expressed in the Palatine grattito, prol)ably of the 2nd cent., representing a Christian worshipping a crucified man with an ass's head. (6) 1 lie Christians themselves were ' not many wise after the flesh, not many miglity, not many noble' {ib.")

, but 'base' and 'despised' (ib.^). Many of them were slaves (Eph 6», Col S^, 1 P 2", 1 Co 7^')- (c) There was much in heathen social life which, even if innocent in itself, suggested associa- tions offensive to Christian scruples (1 P 4'- *, 1 Co 8'"'', Ro 14'-''). Again, it must have caused many heart-burnings and domestic strifes when the new religion made its way into families. Hence arose the hatred of Christians as morose and unsociable Puritans.

(rf) Besides merely holding aloof from heathen society. Christians were fearlessly outspoken in condemnation of its vices and idolatry (Eph 2'"' 4", Ro l'*'^). The secret consciousness that such condemnation was not at bottom unfounded, em- bittered the heathen world still more against its self-constituted censors.

From this hatred it was but a short step to the fabrication of slanders (1 P 2" 3"), and such charges found a shadow of support in the mystery with which the Christians invested their acts of worship. At the same time the proofs of their world-wide organization gave them the aspect of a secret society banded together against the religion and manners of the day.

Somewhat later in the corrupted form ' Chres- tianus ' the Apologists applied the word to themselves as tne ' good ' (x/n^fToO- The word Xpiirrdi, though known to the Greeks as an ad- jective, was not used as a proper name except to translate the Hebrew ' Messiah.' X/rrjirrSi, on the other hand, was a tolerably familiar name. Hence arose the corruption (probably towards the middle of 2nd cent.) into Xpri<mai>oi. Suetonius (Claud.

25) nses ' Chrestus ' for ' Christus ' ; but there is no evidence that he connected the name with ' Chris- tiani,' which appears (Nero, 16) without any variant reading ' Chrestiani.' It appears as ' Christiani ' also in Tacitus and Pliny [loc. cit.) Justin Martyr plays on the double name (Ap, i. 55 A), Scov ye iK ToO 6v6fiaTQS roin KarTjyopovyrai uaXXoi' KoXd^eiv 6tp^l\cTe. XptffTtafol yhp cXvat KaTijyopovfifda' rd 5^ Xpv<rrbv fufffurdai ov ^/Katof. Cf. Tert.

Ap, 3, ' cum et perperam Chrestianus pronuntiatur a vobis (nam nee nominis certa est notitia penes vos) de ■uavitate et benignitate compositum est.' LtTKRATlTRB. — R. A. LipsiuB, tjber den Urspruna und ditfsUn tie^rauch de^ Chrixiennaintmg, lb73 ; Zeller, Bwl. W&rterbxich f.r. 'Christ'; Lit;htfoot, Ai>ost. Fathers, 1889, It^natius. i. pp. 41S-419; Keira, Atig dfm Crchritt. Essjiy vi., t ragmente ant dtr mm. Verfolguiuj, § I, ' Das neroni.sche Verbrechen und der Chribttruiame' ; C. V.

Arnold, Neron. ChrutfiiverJUij. ; Ivanisay, Church in homan Empire (jiastim). S. C. (jAYFORD.