Page:The Journal of Classical and Sacred Philology, Volume 1, 1854.djvu/135

 125 Notices of New Books. J. Dollinger. Hippolytus u. Kallistus u. s. w. 8vo. pp. vi and 358. Regensburg, Manz. 1 Thlr. 20 Ngr. [This work introduces a new element into the controversy on the treatise Against all Heresies, published by M. Miller, as representing a Roman Catholic view of the question. It was partly printed before the author was in possession of the Essays of Baur, Gieseler, and Wordsworth; and consequently he devotes one of his later chapters to a re-examination of the conclusions which he had originally obtained, and a fuller refuta- tion of the objections to which they lie open. This circumstance detracts in some degree from the unity of his work, but it gives, we believe, an additional value to his results, as showing that they were derived from an independent criticism of the facts of the case, and are not merely a con- troversial answer to other scholars. Dollinger agrees in the general belief that this treatise is the work of Hippolytus, though not the Syntagma read by Photius. Like Dr Words- worth, he makes out this latter point convincingly against M. Bunsen. After this, however, Dollinger diverges from the common track, and tries to prove that there is no satisfactory evidence for believing that Hip- polytus was Bp of Portus that, indeed, there is no proof that Portus was an episcopal see before a.d. 313 that before the middle ages there is no mention in the West of any such bishop that in the East he was called Bishop of Rome and not Bishop of Portus that the two titles aro by no means convertible that the poem of the Spaniard Prudentius is of no historical moment that the single ground for the popular notion is drawn from the spurious Acta S. Aurece, dating from the 7th century, and first current at Constantinople. This being made out, he proceeds to explain the position of Hippolytus at Rome, which he supposes to have been this : after the death of Zephyrinus, Callistus was chosen as his suc- cessor; through fear of Hippolytus Callistus abjured the teaching of Sabellius ; but new differences arose both in doctrine and discipline, and in the end Hippolytus was chosen Bishop of Rome by a section of the Church in place of the heretical Callistus, and continued to be so re- garded even after his rival's death (pp. 100 104). The historical criticism is followed by an inquiry into the points at issue between Hippolytus and Callistus. Dollinger endeavours to make out that the principles of Callistus in reference to general absolution, the reception of. penitents, the discipline of the clergy, and the laws of mar- riage, were in a great measure necessitated by the condition of the church (c. iii.) In like manner he seeks to establish a position for Callistus be- tween the tenets of Hippolytus and those of Noetus (p. 224) ; and tries to show that the opinions of Origen condemned at Rome in 231 were connected with those of Hippolytus (p. 257). The whole is concluded by an investigation into some points in Hippolytus' doctrine his teaching