Ilaria Ramelli on Macarius of Magnesia

Ilaria Ramelli on Macarius of Magnesia

"Another supporter of apokatastasis along Origen’s lines seems to have been Macarius of Magnesia, the author of the Apocriticus or Monogenes, very probably stemming from the fourth century. He seems to have been a semi-contemporary of Didymus and Gregory Nyssen (on whom see below) and to have followed Origen in his doctrine of rational creatures, originally homogeneous, but then divided into angels, humans, and demons, according to the gravity of their sins and degrees of elongation from God. His very refutation of a Porphyrian polemicist seems to be inspired by Origen’s refutation of Celsus.

Hints of the apokatastasis theory are to be found in the sections of his Apocriticus or Monogenes that are preserved, such as 3.43.2: when Paul says that “God grants mercy to whom he will and hardens the heart of whom he wills” (Rom 9:18), he does not mean “that some are granted mercy by God while others are not granted mercy, but have their hearts hardened, but rather he holds that all are granted mercy by God and saved, saying: ‘God, who wants all human beings to be saved’ [1 Tim 2:4].” But the section in which Macarius was most explicit about apokatastasis is—not accidentally—lost. This is attested by Nicephorus of Constantinople (early ninth century) in his Epikrisis against iconoclasm, : at the end of the fourth book, now lost (possibly just for this reason), Macarius taught “the crippled doctrines of the impious and apoplectic Origen, and undertook to teach the same things as that wretched man: that the chastisement threatened and prepared by God for impious people in the time to come will come to an end.”

Macarius envisages an eschatological renovation, at the end of all aeons, at the second coming of Christ, which is configured as universal restoration. Macarius remarks that every human being at the end of all will receive back the logos of a second existence in incorruptibility—which can refer both to the physical resurrection and to the restoration of each one to virtue. He adds that in the same way the whole world, after perishing (at the “end of the world”), will be renewed in a greater beauty and in impassivity (apatheia). As a silver vase that has become tarnished over time is molted and shaped again, more beautiful and without rust, keeping its logos, likewise this world will be purified from the rust of sin coming from disobedience, but it will retain and improve “the logos of its essence” (ousia), an expression that was already used by Origen. Just as Origen said about the resurrection of the body of each human, as well as about the end of the world, so does Macarius claim that the visible shape of the world will pass away, but the Logos of the Creator, which remains in the creation, will never pass away, but will rather renovate the universe (epanakainisei to pan). The Logos Creator (ὁ δημιουργὸς λόγος/ho dēmiourgos logos) will create again the whole nature of creatures (πᾶσαν τῶν γενητῶν φύσιν/pasan tōn genētōn physin) in a second and better creation (δευτέραν ἀναλαβεῖν καὶ βελτίω γένεσιν/deuteran analabein kai beltiō genesin). Macarius employs the same metaphor used by Gregory of Nyssa at the end of his dialogue On the Soul and the Resurrection for God’s action of restoration of all rational creatures. It is also significant that the notion of the deception of the devil by the incarnate Christ is shared by Origen, his faithful followers Gregory Nyssen and Rufinus, and Macarius himself." (Ilaria Ramelli, A Larger Hope, vol.1, pp. 92-93)

Quotes of the Apocriticus (source: https://www.tertullian.org/fathers/macarius_apocriticus.htm ):

"Often in Paul's writings a phrase by itself may suggest what he did not mean, as when he says, "On whom he will he hath mercy, and whom he will he hardeneth," a statement which must be taken in conjunction with his words about Him "that willeth that all men should be saved."" (Apocriticus, 3.43)

"Thus the world's splendour will be of no more use when man is gone. And yet as man will pass through death into a better and incorruptible state, so will it be with all the world. It will be like a damaged silver vessel, which the artificer melts down, and then makes a new and better one of it. It passes away, but the "Logos" of it remains with the artificer. Just so Christ says His "Logos" will remain when heaven and earth have passed away. Therefore all created things will in this way have a second and a better beginning." (Apocriticus, 4.16)

"First of all we may fitly consider the following point: has that which is created come into being from what existed already or not? If it was from what had an existence, there was no sense in attaching a beginning to it. But if such a beginning has to be attached, the reason is quite plain (i.e. that it was made from nothing). But if, from being nothing, God has given it an existence, what kind of essence did He grant to that which had none just before? For He who brought into being that which was not, will be all the more likely to preserve that which came into existence, even when it is dissolved, and to think it deserving of a better conclusion to be added. For it is the property of a nature that is unbegotten to change for the better the existence of the things that are begotten, and to lead to a renewal the things which He has created in time, and to wipe off with grace the things which were stained with the poison of wickedness, and to consider the things which were exhausted as worthy of a second beginning and a kind of remaking. For the world, after again receiving a better form and covering, does not dissolve its being, but on the contrary, it rejoices in being clothed with a fairer beauty than that which it received before. It befits the Divine alone to remain in a state of sameness, but for creation it is suitable that it should suffer change and alteration. Therefore the present life and order is our guide, leading us like children to the future assembly of immortality, and preparing us to face the glory that will lead us upward. For our present life is like a womb  containing a babe, for it holds down the whole being of things in obscurity, in the forgetfulness of ignorance, where the light does not penetrate. The whole of what is growing must rise from the present age as from the membrane which holds it in the womb, and must receive a second mode of life in the light of the abiding place which is inviolable.

You would like to think that corruption goes on without end, that it is born in foulness and dies in filth, that it begets and is begotten and is covered in forgetfulness, that evil flourishes and calamity increases, that it melts through want and grows thin through poverty, suffering ill by day and sleeping by night, eating in luxury and then again in bitterness weighed down with satiety, and suffering in scarcity ; a state alike of slavery and mastership, the rich man standing up and the poor man lying down, the old man falling and the young man rising, the breasts of women growing and the babe receiving suck, sorrow being brought by care and disease by toil, the life of the country hated and the life of the city welcomed, equality being shunned and that which is unequal being sought after, the nature of things troubled by much anomaly, cast down in winter and burning in summer, brightened by the flowers of spring in their season, and nourished by the fruits of autumn, digging the earth and working its clods . . . making a tragedy of existence and a comedy of life. . . . And that the hateful covering of these things should never pass away, even late in time, nor their dark robe disappear ; that the soul should never be free from the inhuman earth; that lamentation should never be silent; . . . that the violence of tyrants should never die; . . . that the toil of those that groan should never be lightened, nor the tears of the mourners comforted ; that the virtues of those who have mastered themselves should never shine forth, nor the boasting of the proud be quenched ; that the deeds of the unrighteous should never be punished, nor the success of the righteous be seen ; that there should be no judgment of the cunning of quackery and no honour for the guilelessness of the sincere; . . . that the earth should  never be freed from pollutions, nor the sea have rest from navigation ; that the world should not be turned round like a wheel and preserve its essence while changing its form ; that everything in the whole world should not receive a renewal apart from the things which transcend it, nor receive a genuine newness of life; that the order of things should never put off its disorder, nor cast aside the unseemliness which it has now, but retain its grievous garb beyond the limits of time, and be yet more exhausted by its calamities !

For that which appears to be brought down upon the world as wholly a ruin and a destruction is really the beginning of immortality and the starting-point of salvation. For a second beautifying of life will make it a success, when rational nature shall a second time receive in the resurrection the word of a beginning which will be indissoluble. It is for the sake of man that the whole suffers change, seeing that it was also for his sake that at the outset it was deemed worthy of a beginning. Man was made on his own account, not on account of any other being, but heaven and earth and the things that appertain to them are created on man's account, and when he receives a change and alteration, the whole must be changed and wiped out along with him. Think of an architect who builds a house to begin with, and then when it has grown weak in course of time and come to an end by a fall, he raises it up again and considers it worthy of better workmanship and comeliness, not troubling himself which stone was laid first in the beginning or which was second or third in the building ; but he erects it by setting in the last stones among the first and the first among the last, and the middle ones haphazard, not in the least disturbing the plan of the erection thereby, nor causing the arrangement of his workmanship to be found fault with; but, by applying suitable adornment to the house and decorating the form of its appearance, he receives abundant praise for his skill. Just in the same way God became the maker of reasoning beings like an architect making a house, and created man in the beginning, and built him as the sacred abode of divine power, composed of many kindred races like stones. And after he has been made for many ages and seasons, and has fallen by many experiences of sins, and in the end is altogether undone and destroyed, He will raise him up again, and will bring nature together with skilful understanding and wise authority, and will gather together the things that have been scattered, allowing none of the things that have fallen to perish; and, even though He place the first among the last in His arrangement, and bring those at the end into the first rank of merit, He will not at all disturb what He has done, but will grant that setting forth of the resurrection which is suitable to each." (Apocriticus, 4.30)

From the Introduction of T.W. Crafer: "AN introduction to the Apocriticus of Macarius Magnes cannot be written on the ordinary lines. This is the first time that it has been introduced to English readers, and those who wish to study it in the original Greek will find it very difficult to obtain a copy of the only edition. My own study of this obscure and neglected author has probably been more lengthy than that of any one outside Germany, and it is therefore a great pleasure to share with others the result of it. He is still surrounded with so much uncertainty that it is impossible to offer final conclusions with regard to him, but he is full of an interest which is in many ways unique, and his work not only affords a critical problem which should prove fascinating to many besides myself, but also contains much that is both interesting and novel. The Apocriticus really presents us with two separate works, for the questions of a heathen objector are in each case quoted verbatim before the "answer" is given. As the objections represent an attack on the Scriptures in detail, and undoubtedly reflect the philosophy of Porphyry, the famous Neoplatonist of the third century, the reproduction of them preserves for us a form of anti-Christian literature in a fulness which has no parallel. I have therefore translated them without any abbreviation. The answers have proved too lengthy to give in full, but, rather than offer a mere selection, I have translated the most important parts, and given the rest in the form of a summary.

Such is the chequered history of the work, that the author's name, date, and country have always been a matter of doubt, while the dialogue which he claims to  be reproducing in his book has generally been considered a mere literary device. It was rescued from oblivion by its use in a bitter controversy in the ninth century, after which there is no mention of it until the sixteenth, when its use was again controversial. When its genuineness was then called in question, the only Manuscript was found to have disappeared from Venice. Nothing more is heard of the book until 1867, when a Manuscript was found in Epirus, and taken to Athens. It was collated by a young French scholar, who died before it could be published. The destructive criticism of a series of German scholars reduced its importance and checked the study of it. While I was myself talking of another collation, a German scholar sought it at Athens and found that the Manuscript was not in the Library, but in private possession, with the risk of being lost. The only edition is increasingly difficult to obtain, and there is a danger of the Apocriticus again sinking into oblivion. I therefore greatly welcome this opportunity of making it more widely known.

...

In spite of the ambiguity of his double name, we may safely speak of the author as Macarius, and regard Magnes as a place-name, meaning "the Magnesian."  The question still remains whether the latter implies that he was Bishop of Magnesia. The fact that there was such a bishop, whose name was Macarius, has naturally suggested an identification of the two. Photius records that this Macarius came forward at the Synod of the Oak in A.D. 403 as one of those who accused Heraclides of Ephesus of heresy, his offence consisting of an undue following of Origen. But it is difficult to see how such a charge can have been brought by the author of the Apocriticus, who is himself steeped in Origenism. Not only was this the conclusion arrived at by Nicephorus [40], when he studied the book in the, ninth century, but it is obvious to any one who looks at it."

Note 40: " He is condemned, particularly with regard to the non-eternity of punishment, of being a follower tou~ dussebou~j kai\ a0poplh&ktou 'Wrige/nouj, Nic., op. cit. ; cf. Apocr. iv. 16, p. 187, 1. 32." (source: https://www.tertullian.org/fathers/macarius_apocriticus_fn.htm#40 )