第26章

"The whole point of my article lies in the fact that during the first three centuries Christianity only existed on earth in the Church and was nothing but the Church.When the pagan Roman Empire desired to become Christian, it inevitably happened that, by becoming Christian, it included the Church but remained a pagan State in very many of its departments.In reality this was bound to happen.But Rome as a State retained too much of the pagan civilisation and culture, as, for example, in the very objects and fundamental principles of the State.The Christian Church entering into the State could, of course, surrender no part of its fundamental principles- the rock on which it stands- and could pursue no other aims than those which have been ordained and revealed by God Himself, and among them that of drawing the whole world, and therefore the ancient pagan State itself, into the Church.In that way (that is, with a view to the future) it is not the Church that should seek a definite position in the State, like 'every social organisation,' or as 'an organisation of men for religious purposes' (as my opponent calls the Church), but, on the contrary, every earthly State should be, in the end, completely transformed into the Church and should become nothing else but a Church, rejecting every purpose incongruous with the aims of the Church.All this will not degrade it in any way or take from its honour and glory as a great State, nor from the glory of its rulers, but only turns it from a false, still pagan, and mistaken path to the true and rightful path, which alone leads to the eternal goal.

This is why the author of the book On the Foundations of Church Jurisdiction would have judged correctly if, in seeking and laying down those foundations, he bad looked upon them as a temporary compromise inevitable in our sinful and imperfect days.But as soon as the author ventures to declare that the foundations which he predicates now, part of which Father Iosif just enumerated, are the permanent, essential, and eternal foundations, he is going directly against the Church and its sacred and eternal vocation.That is the gist of my article.""That is, in brief," Father Paissy began again, laying stress on each word, "according to certain theories only too clearly formulated in the nineteenth century, the Church ought to be transformed into the State, as though this would be an advance from a lower to a higher form, so as to disappear into it, making way for science, for the spirit of the age, and civilisation.And if the Church resists and is unwilling, some corner will be set apart for her in the State, and even that under control and this will be so everywhere in all modern European countries.But Russian hopes and conceptions demand not that the Church should pass as from a lower into a higher type into the State, but, on the contrary, that the State should end by being worthy to become only the Church and nothing else.So be it! So be it!""Well, I confess you've reassured me somewhat," Miusov said smiling, again crossing his legs."So far as I understand, then, the realisation of such an ideal is infinitely remote, at the second coming of Christ.That's as you please.It's a beautiful Utopian dream of the abolition of war, diplomacy, banks, and so on- something after the fashion of socialism, indeed.But I imagined that it was all meant seriously, and that the Church might be now going to try criminals, and sentence them to beating, prison, and even death.""But if there were none but the ecclesiastical court, the Church would not even now sentence a criminal to prison or to death.Crime and the way of regarding it would inevitably change, not all at once of course, but fairly soon," Ivan replied calmly, without flinching.

"Are you serious?" Miusov glanced keenly at him.

"If everything became the Church, the Church would exclude all the criminal and disobedient, and would not cut off their heads," Ivan went on."I ask you, what would become of the excluded? He would be cut off then not only from men, as now, but from Christ.By his crime he would have transgressed not only against men but against the Church of Christ.This is so even now, of course, strictly speaking, but it is not clearly enunciated, and very, very often the criminal of to-day compromises with his conscience: 'I steal,' he says, 'but I don't go against the Church.I'm not an enemy of Christ.'

That's what the criminal of to-day is continually saying to himself, but when the Church takes the place of the State it will be difficult for him, in opposition to the Church all over the world, to say: 'All men are mistaken, all in error, all mankind are the false Church.I, a thief and murderer, am the only true Christian Church.'