[Porphyry, a fragment from his Against the Christians, trans. T. W. Crafer, in “The Work of Porphyry against the Christians, and Its Reconstruction,” by T. W. Crafer, Journal of Theological Studies 15 (1913–1914): 502. Crafer’s translation of these fragments from Porphyry’s Against the Christians is, as far as I know, the only English translation available. In P. de Labriolle, Camus’ source, the text is referred to as fragment no. 63. This system of enumeration is likely borrowed from Harnack, who first translated these texts. Crafer himself uses no standard form of enumeration. Though Crafer’s translation of the text differs slightly, in terms of its detail, from Camus’ French version, the meaning is clearly the same. The page reference from Labriolle should read p. 271.—Trans.]
the sense of death and its flesh-and-blood contents in the thought that concerns us.
b) “We are laughable,” says Pascal, “to remain in the company of ourfellow men: miserable like us, powerless like us, they will not help us: one dies alone.”11The experience of death carries with it a certain position that is tricky to define. There are actually numerous Gospel texts in which Jesus recommends indifference or even hatred toward one’s loved ones as a way of reaching the Kingdom of God.12 Is this the basis of an immoralism? No, but of a superior moral: “If any one comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.”13 Through these texts we understand the extent to which the “Render unto Caesar” marks a contemptuous concession rather than a declaration of conformism. That which belongs to Caesar is the denarius on which is imprinted his effigy. That which belongs to God alone is man’s heart, having severed all ties with the world. This is the mark of pessimism and not of acceptance. But as it is natural, these rather vague themes and these spiritual attitudes are made concrete and summed up in the specifically religious notion of sin.
c) In sin, man becomes aware of his misery and his pride. “No one isgood;”14 “All have sinned.”15 Sin is universal. But among all the significant16texts of the New Testament, few are as rich in meaning and insight
- [Camus does not offer a reference for this quotation from Pascal.—Trans.]
- Matthew 8:22, 10:21–22 and 35–37, 12:46–50; Luke 3:34, 14:26–33.
- Luke 14:26–28.
[The text should read: Luke 14:26.—Trans.] - [“Nemo bonus.” Mark 10:18.—Trans.]
- [“Omnes peccaverunt.” Rom. 3:23.—Trans.]
- John 1:8; 1 Corinthians 10:13; Matthew 12:21–23, 19:25–26.
as this passage from the Epistle to the Romans: “I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. Now if I do what I do not want, I agree that the law is good . . . So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. For I delight in the law of God, in my inmost self, but I see in my members another law at war with the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin which dwells in my members.”17
Here Saint Augustine’s “incapacity not to sin”18 becomes apparent. At the same time, the pessimistic soul of the Christians toward the world is explained. It is to this view and to these aspirations that the constructive element of Evangelical Christianity provides an answer. But it was useful to note beforehand this state of mind. “Let us imagine a number of men in chains and all condemned to death, of which some each day have their throats cut in the sight of the others, and those who remain see their true condition in that of their fellows, and, looking at each other with sorrow and hopelessness, await their turn. This is an image of man’s condition.”19
But in the same way that this Pascalian thought, situated at the beginning of the Apology, serves to emphasize the ultimate support for God, these men under the sentence of death are left with the hope that should have transported them.
B. The Hope in God
a) “Augustine: I desire to know God and the soul. Ratio: Nothing more? Augustine: Nothing whatever.”20 It is much the same in the Gospel, in which only the Kingdom of God counts, for the conquest of which one must renounce so much here below. The idea of the Kingdom of God is
- Romans 7:15–24.
[The reference should read: Rom. 7:15–16, 22–23.—Trans.] - [“Non posse non peccare.” Camus offers no reference for this passage. The text is from Saint Augustine’s De natura et gratia, 57. The full sentence in which the remark occurs reads as follows: “Quia vero posse non peccare nostrum non est, et, si voluerimus non posse non peccare, non possumus non posse non peccare.” “Inasmuch as, however, it is not of us to be able to avoid sin; even if we were to wish not to be able to avoid sin, it is not in our power to be unable to avoid sin.” This translation is from www.ccel.org/fathers2/NPNF1–05/npnf1–05-16.htm#P2197_915376.—Trans.]
- Pascal, Pensées, No. 199.
- Saint Augustine, Soliloquia, I, 2, 7.
[“Deum et animam scire Cupio,” says Saint Augustine—“Nihil plus”—“Nihil omnino” [sic]. The text should read: “Augustinus: Deum et animam scire cupio. Ratio: Nihilne plus? Augustinus: Nihil omino.” Augustine, Soliloquiorum libri duo,Opera Omnia, editio Latina, P.L. 32. www.augustinus.it/latino/soliloqui/index2.htm. The manner in which Camus cites the passage obscures its dramatic character as a dialogue between Augustine and his reason.—Trans.]
not absolutely new in the New Testament. The Jews already knew the word and the thing.21 But in the Gospels, the Kingdom has nothing terrestrial about it.22 It is spiritual. It is the contemplation of God himself. Apart from this conquest, no speculation is desirable. “I say this in order that no one may delude you with beguiling speech . . . See to it that no one makes a prey of you by philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the universe, and not according to Christ.”23One must endeavor to attain the humility and simplicity of little children.24 It is therefore to the children that the Kingdom of God is promised, but also to the learned who have known to divest themselves of their knowledge in order to understand the truth of the heart and who have added in this manner to this very virtue of simplicity the invaluable merit of their own effort. In Octavius,25 Minucius Felix has Caecilius, defender of paganism, speak in these terms: “And thus all men must be indignant, all men must feel pain, that certain persons—and these unskilled in learning, strangers to literature, without knowledge even of sordid arts—should dare to determine on any certainty concerning the nature at large, and the (divine) majesty, of which so many of the multitude of sects in all ages (still doubt), and philosophy itself deliberates still.” The explanation for this disdain for
- Sagesse,X, 10: “C’est celle qui conduisit par les voies droites le juste fuyant les colères de son frère; qui lui montra le royaume de Dieu et lui donna la science des choses saintes.”
[The Wisdom of Solomon 10:10: “An upright man, who was a fugitive from a brother’s wrath, she guided in straight paths; she showed him knowledge of holy things.” In The Apocrypha: An American Translation, E. J. Goodspeed (New York: Random House, 1959), 196. The English translation lacks the reference to the Kingdom of God found in Camus’
French translation.—Trans.] - Luke 12:14; Matthew 18:11, 20:28.
- Colossians 2:18.
[The reference should read: Col. 2:4, 8.—Trans.] 24. Matthew 18:3, 4, and 19:16; Mark 10:14–15. - Minucius Felix, Octavius,VI, 4 [sic]: “Ne doit-on pas s’indigner que des gens qui n’ont pas étudié, étrangers aux lettres, inhabiles même dans les arts vils, émettent des opinions qu’ils tiennent pour certaines, sur tout ce qu’il y a de plus élevé et plus majestueux dans la nature, tandis que la philosophie en discute depuis des siècles?”
[Minucius Felix, Octavius, chap. 5, trans. R. E. Wallis, in The Ante-Nicene Fathers, ed. A. Roberts and J. Donaldson (1870; repr., Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1989), 4:175.— Trans.]
all pure speculation lies in the people who held emotional belief in God to be the goal of all human effort. But again a number of consequences follow from this view.
b) By placing man’s striving toward God on the highest level, theseChristians subordinate everything to this movement. The world itself is ordered according to the direction of this movement. The meaning of history is what God was willing to give it. The philosophy of history, a notion foreign to the Greek spirit, is a Jewish invention.26 Metaphysical problems are incarnated in time, and the world becomes only a fleshly symbol of man’s striving toward God. And here again, fundamental importance is given to faith.27 It suffices that a paralytic or a blind man believes—this is what cures him. This is because the essence of faith is to consent and to relinquish. Moreover, faith is always more important than works.28
The reward in the next world retains a gratuitous character. It is of so high a price that it surpasses the requirement of merit. And here again, it is only a matter of an apology for humility. It is necessary to prefer the repentant sinner to the virtuous man, who is completely fulfilled in himself and in his good works. The laborer of the eleventh hour will be paid the same wage as those of the first hour. And a feast
