Lactantius

LACTANTIUS. - Christian writer (3rd-4th century).

I. Life

The sources for L.'s life are certain passages of his works, especially Inst., 1, 1, 8-10; 3, 13, 12; 5, 2, 2; 5, 11, 15, and the testimonies of St. Jerome (De vir. ill., 80; Chron., a. 2333=317).

Caecilius Firmianus L. (some codices give the name Caelius, but Caecilius is confirmed by an inscription from Numidia, in CIL, VIII, 7241), born of a pagan family around 250 in Africa, was a disciple of Arnobius (v.). Trained in literary studies, he became a teacher of rhetoric, first in Africa and then in Nicomedia, called there by the emperor Diocletian, perhaps around 290. But his school was poorly attended: Latin letters aroused little interest in a center of Greek culture; on the other hand, L. was more learned than eloquent; he therefore suffered a painful poverty. Having converted to Christianity, it is not known whether at Nicomedia or already earlier, he had to leave Bithynia in 305-306, because of the persecution of Diocletian; he probably returned there in 311, after the Edict of toleration promulgated by Galerius. In 317 he was called to Gaul by Constantine, who entrusted him with the education of his son Crispus. This is the last piece of information about L.

II. WORKS

Those certainly belonging to L. and preserved: 1) De opificio Dei; composed when the persecution of Diocletian had already broken out (1, 1, 7; 20, 1), probably at the end of 303 or the beginning of 304, and addressed to an old disciple of the author, Demetrianus; keeping to scientific and philosophical ground, without introducing specifically Christian elements (except the dualistic passage 19, 8), it sets out to demonstrate the providence of God in the constitution of the human body, which it examines in a careful anatomical and physiological description, and of the soul. 2) The Divinae institutiones, in 7 books, composed between 304 and 313, have a fundamentally apologetic intent, aiming to defend Christianity from the accusations of the pagans, in particular of two writers, a philosopher, who cannot be identified, and a judge, probably the inheritance. But the author's culture and his purpose of responding exhaustively to the objections of cultured pagans gave the work the character of a systematic treatise (as the title indicates), in which the polemical element is integrated by the constant effort of rational deepening of Christianity. In book I, De falsa religione, he demonstrates by reason and tradition the unity of God and the absurdity of polytheism, whose cause, in book II, De origine erroris, he identifies in the work of the demons, expanding into an exposition of demonology. He then proceeds to demonstrate, in book III, De falsis philosophis, the insufficiency of the supposed human wisdom, especially in the doctrine of the supreme good; and he contrasts with it, in book IV, De vera sapientia et religione, Christianity and its central dogma of the Incarnation and the Redemption. In book V, De iustitia, the interest is concentrated on the ethical field, reproaching the pagans for the injustice with which they persecute the Christians and demonstrating that justice is founded on the true knowledge of God. Book VI, De vero cultu, is likewise devoted to the moral problem, since God is honored not with material sacrifices, but with rectitude of conscience, which induces love toward one's neighbor. Book VII, De vita beata, concludes with the demonstration of the immortality of the soul and with a fantastic description of the future life in a millenarian sense. 3) In the Epitome, composed after 314 at the request of Pentadius, L. summarizes the major work in a free reworking. 4) Probably in 314 or 315 he wrote the De ira Dei, in which he affirms, against Epicureans and Stoics, that in God there is wrath as there is goodness.

The Lactantian authorship of two important writings is debated, the first as a historical source, the second as a literary document. 1) In the De mortibus persecutorum, composed when the persecution of Licinius (v.) was imminent, the origin of Christianity is briefly narrated and then its fierce persecutors are reviewed, showing the miserable end of each: Nero, Domitian, Decius, Valerian, Aurelian, and above all of the contemporaries Diocletian, Maximian, Galerius and Maximinus. Its substantial historical reliability is generally admitted; criticism today is almost unanimous in recognizing the author as L., despite some difficulties of an external character (the author's name, the title reported by St. Jerome) and above all of an internal character, that is, the strong difference of tone and style between this writing of violent polemic and the other works. 2) The poem De ave phoenice narrates in 85 elegiac distichs the marvelous story of the fabulous bird that rises again from its own ashes. The mythical content does not prevent its attribution to a Christian author, to whom this fable offered a clear symbol of the Resurrection; the Lactantian authorship then appears confirmed by notable consonances with the ideas of L.

St. Jerome informs us of other works of L., now lost: Symposium; Hodoeporicon; Grammaticus; two books Ad Asclepiadem; four books of letters to Probus; two to Demetrianus; two to Severus. From a book De motibus animi a brief fragment has survived bearing the name of L.

Two poems were wrongly attributed to him: the De Resurrectione, or De Pascha, due to Venantius Fortunatus, and the De passione Domini.

III. THOUGHT

L.'s work is of little interest in the history of dogma, moving as it does predominantly in the field of natural theology and ethics; where specifically Christian concepts surface, there is neither originality of position nor speculative depth. Trinitarian theology is particularly poor and uncertain. The order of things manifests to all, in some way, the existence of God and his providence (Inst., 1, 2, 5; 2, 7, 1-3; 7, 9, 5), yet man, whose soul is created immediately by God (Epit., 19, 1-6), cannot attain to the perfect knowledge of the truth unless he is taught by God (2, 3, 23), "the light of the human mind" (Ira Dei. 1). God is one (Inst., 1, 3 ff. and passim); Father and Son are not separated, but form a single mind, a single spirit, a single substance, being distinct from one another as the stream from the source, the ray from the sun (4, 29, 1-5); elsewhere he attempts to explain the origin of the Son from the Father as "word" and "breath" (4, 8, 6 ff.). Christ therefore was born twice, first in the spirit, then in the flesh, son of God according to the spirit, son of man according to the flesh (4, 8, 1-2; 13, 2-5). The Holy Spirit of God descended into the Virgin and made her fruitful (4, 12, 1; cf. however Epit., 38, 9). The divinity of Christ is demonstrated by the fulfillment in him of the prophecies of the prophets, who also foretold the cross (Inst., 5, 3, 18-21); he knew that he had to suffer and be killed for the salvation of many (4, 18, 2); he is "the food and the life of all who believe in the flesh which he bore and in the cross on which he hung" (4, 18, 28). Moreover, L. insists above all on Christ's mission as teacher, a mission which precisely required that he be passible and mortal (4, 22 ff.). In the Catholic Church alone, which preserves the true worship of God, adulterated by heretics, are life and salvation to be found; and it is the Church in which confession and penance are found (4, 30), a harbor of salvation opened by God to man (6, 24). This penance and confession of sins, symbolized by circumcision, is necessary to obtain forgiveness (4, 17, 17), just as Baptism is necessary to purify man and give him immortality and perfection (3, 20, 8-9; 7, 5, 22). Peter and Paul preached at Rome under Nero and there suffered martyrdom (4, 21, 12; De mort. pers., 2, 5-6). Mention has already been made of the millenarianism professed by L. Singular too is his dualism, which sets against God the devil, who, although created by God, the author of every good, is the cause of every evil.

IV. THE WRITER

The historical significance of L. lies above all in the presentation he was able to make of Christianity in the form demanded by the culture of his time, that is, in an elaboration — however weak philosophically and theologically — that was organic, in which appeal was made to reason, even while philosophy was repudiated, and in an artistic prose inspired by classical models, in the first place by Cicero. It was in large part this stylistic perfection (which nevertheless did not prevent him from enriching his language with Christian elements), suggested to him not only by his education but also by the firm conviction of thereby serving the Christian cause (Inst., 1, 1, 10), that was the reason for the fortune L. enjoyed, the "Christian Cicero" of Pico della Mirandola, in Christian antiquity, in the Middle Ages and in the Renaissance.

Studies: R. Pichon, Lactance. Étude sur le mouvement philos. et religieux sous le règne de Constantin, Paris 1901; P. Monceaux, Histoire littéraire de l'Afrique chrétienne. II, ibid. 1905, pp. 287-359; Burdenhower, II (1914), pp. 525-49; G. Krüger, in Schanz-Hosius, III, 3rd ed. (1922), pp. 413-37; Moricea, I, pp. 618-64; P. de Labriolle-G. Bardy, Histoire de la littérature latine chrétienne, I, 3rd ed., Paris 1947, pp. 201-318; E. Amann, Lactance, in D'ThC. VIII, coll. 2425-44. The most recent specialized bibliography in U. Mannucci-A. Casamassa, Istituzioni di patrologie, I, 6th ed., Rome 1948, pp. 143-48; B. Altaner, Patrologie, 2nd ed., Freiburg im Br. 1950, pp. 153-57. One may add: L. Alfonsi, L. e Giustino, in Rendic. istit. tomb., 82 (1949), pp. 19-27; A. Hudson-Williams, Orientius and L., in Vigiliae christianae, 3 (1949), pp. 237-43. On the Christian elements of L.'s language, v. C. Mohrmann, in Vigiliae christianae, 2 (1948), pp. 165-76.

Michele Pellegrino