Million Book Collection - The Fishers of Men Ministries

264 THE FORMATION OF CHRISTENDOMand he is supposed to return after death for the purposeof convincing a doubting youth that it has beenaccomplished in the soul as soon as set free from thebondage of its imprisonment in matter, that is to say,from the body borne about by it on earth. Thus inApollonius the union of philosophy with religion isassociated with another union, in which the multitudinousdeities of Hellenic, Indian, and Egyptianworship are taken up and absorbed. They becomein a manner which is nowhere defined, manifestationsof one power. In it, as the producer of all things,the source of that generation whose evolutions arecountless, the whole universe is lying.This is one side of the biography by Philostratus.It is its aspect viewed absolutely. If we look at itrelatively, the latest historian of Greek philosophy isonly summing up what is the concurrent judgment ofalmost all who have studied the work, where he says :" The delineation of Apollonius as a whole and inmany particular traits is so remarkable a counterpartto the representation of Christ in the Gospels, that wehave every ground for assuming the purpose of itsauthor to have really been to set an equally distinguishedrepresentative of the old religion overagainst the wonder-working Prophet of the newone." Thus both the knowledge of the Gospels andthe imitation of Christ by Philostratus are indisputable,although both Christ and Christians are completelyignored by him, and although his system hasits own positive and entirely heathen standing-ground.For the thorough contrast of his doctrine with theChristian is as remarkable as the covert imitation ofChrist.Nor is this, as has been already observed, a1 Zeller, v. 135.