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70 - Ebionites or Judaizing Christians

From the book of Acts and the Pauline Epistles, it is seen that there existed in the early church an extreme Judaizing party. Paul could come to an understanding with James and Peter, but an uncompromising set of Judaizers made it their business to follow in his footsteps to stigmatize him as a spurious apostle, to condemn his gospel as insufficient, and to insist on a rigid adherence to the Jewish law as necessary to salvation through Christ. Gradually the great body of Christians, being recruited from paganism, became emancipated from Jewish scruples and those who were inclined to make much of Judaism were cast off as heretics.

The destruction of Jerusalem (A. D. 70) greatly promoted the separation of Judaizers from Christians of the New Testament type. From about 110 until the suppression of the Jewish revolt under Barcochab (132-135) Judaism enjoyed a great revival over the Roman Empire and Judaistic Christians naturally were confirmed in their Judaism. After the suppression of the revolt the hopes of Judaism were crushed. The Judaistic elements soon separated themselves from Christianity, but the extreme Judaizing Christians persisted in small numbers in Palestine and the surrounding countries for about two hundred years longer. The separation was promoted by the increasing stress that was laid by the non-Judaizing Christians on Is the essential and absolute Deity of Christ.

It is important to distinguish between the earlier Ebionism and the later Ebionism as it was developed under the influence of the Alexandrian philosophy. Earlier and later Ebionism agreed in maintaining that the true God is the maker of the world and the author of the Mosaic law; in holding that Jesus was the Messiah, but not divine ; in rejecting and abominating Paul, and in venerating James and Peter. The earlier Ebionites were ascetics, and exalted virginity. At that time, James, bishop of Jerusalem, brother of Jesus, was their hero. At a later time, when the ascetic spirit had been developed in the Gentile churches, they returned to the Judaic spirit and exalted marriage above virginity. Peter became their hero.

Many shades of opinion regarding the person of Christ can be distinguished among the Judaizing Christians of the early centuries. Some held to the purely human generation of Jesus, while others acknowledged his supernatural birth. Some modern writers distinguish between Pharisaic Ebionites and Essenic Ebionites, the former term denoting those who held fast to the then-current Jewish legalism and who were free from the influence of theosophy, the latter denoting the theosophical forms of Jewish Christian thought.

Cerinthus, educated in Alexandria but active chiefly in Asia Minor, to refute whose teachings the Fourth Gospel is said to have been written, was the first noted Ebionite of the speculative type. According to Irenaeus and Hippolytus, he held that the world was not made by God but by an ignorant being. "He represented Jesus as not having been born of a virgin . . . but as having been the son of Joseph and Mary, born after the manner of other men, though distinguished above all others by justice and prudence and wisdom. He taught, moreover, that after the baptism of Jesus the Christ descended upon him in the form of a dove from that Sovereign Power which is over all things, and that he then announced the unknown Father and wrought miracles, but that toward the end the Christ departed again from Jesus, and Jesus suffered and rose from the dead, while the Christ remained impassible as a spiritual being."

Eusebius quotes Caius (latter part of the second century) to the effect that Cerinthus was a propagator of chiliastic views, which, as he claimed, were "shown him by angels." "And he says that after the resurrection the kingdom of Christ will be set up on the earth, and that the flesh dwelling in Jerusalem will again be subject to desires and pleasures. And being an enemy of the Scriptures of God, he asserts, with the purpose of deceiving men, that there is to be a period of a thousand years for marriage festivals." Eusebius quotes also Dionysius of Alexandria to the effect that Cerinthus "dreamed that the kingdom would consist in those things which he desired, . . . that is to say, in eating and drinking and marrying . . . and in festivals and sacrifices and the slaying of victims." It is probable that Cerinthus' views of a temporal reign of Christ are somewhat caricatured by these writers.

The term "Ebionite" (of Hebrew derivation) means " poor," and was applied to the early Christians in general, who were poor in earthly goods and poor in spirit. The use of it was continued by the Judaizing party or was applied to them by their enemies. Some of the Jewish Christians of the second and third centuries were called "Nazarenes." This term also was sometimes applied to the early Christians as followers of Jesus of Nazareth (Acts 24 : 5). It may have adhered to certain communities of Jewish Christians from the earliest time. Ebionites and Nazarenes were probably separate parties in the third and fourth centuries. Epiphanius represents the latter as the more orthodox and as acknowledging the supernatural birth of Christ.

The Clementine " Homilies " and " Recognitions" are among the most curious products of the religious movements of the second century. Judaism had been outlawed by the empire, and was despised by Gentile Christians and Gnostics. It occurred to some Jewish Christian, or Christians, to compose books purporting to have been written by Clement of Rome (the third pastor of the Roman Church, one of whose genuine Epistles we have), and of which the materials should be the supposititious discourses and acts of Peter. This would afford an excellent opportunity for combating the now dominant Paulinism, as represented by the Gentile Christians in general, and in a grossly perverted form by the Gnostics. Simon Magus is made to take a prominent place, and to have frequent encounters with Peter, who confounds him in argument and drives him away. Here was, drawn out in supposed debates between Peter and Simon, a speculative Ebionitic system, somewhat analogous to those of the Gnostics.