(2 of 2)
The Spiritual Heir. "If this self-criticism is just, then we must revise the whole of our present conception of modern history.. . . Our present view of modern history focuses attention on the rise of our modern Western secular civilization as the latest great new event in the world. ... If we can bring ourselves to think of it, instead, as one of the vain repetitions of the Gentiles—an almost meaningless repetition of something that the Greeks and Romans did before us and did supremely well—then the greatest new event in the history of mankind will be seen to be a very different one. The greatest new event will then not be the monotonous rise of yet another secular civilization out of the bosom of the Christian church . . . it will still be the Crucifixion and its spiritual consequences. . . .
"At its first appearance Christianity was provided by the Graeco-Roman civilization with a universal state, in the shape of the Roman Empire with its policed roads and shipping routes, as an aid to the spread of Christianity round the shores of the Mediterranean. Our modern . . . civilization in its turn may serve its historical purpose by providing Christianity with a completely worldwide repetition of the Roman Empire to spread over. . . .
"It is even possible that as, under the Roman Empire, Christianity drew out of and inherited from the other Oriental religions the heart of what was best in them, so the present religions of India and the form of Buddhism that is practiced today in the Far East may contribute new elements to be grafted on to Christianity in days to come. And then one may look forward to what may happen when Caesar's Empire decays—for Caesar's Empire always does decay after a run of a few hundred years. What may happen is that Christianity may be left as the spiritual heir of all the other higher religions . . . while the Christian church as an institution may be left as the social heir of all the other churches and all the civilizations."
* In his classic Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Gibbon referred to Rome's downfall as "the triumph of barbarism and religion" [Christianity].
† "Christianity and Civilization"; published by the Quaker center, Pendle Hill (25¢).