Salvian on the Jews

The German-born Christian who we know as Salvian is not a well-known fifth century author of the classical world, but he is an interesting one given that he is one of the earliest examples of militant Christian ideas of the equality and justice. Essentially Salvian was what we would now call a socialist - if not a communist - and he refused to back down from his beliefs. In the last sense regardless of your personal views on socialist and communist ideas we can admire Salvian's steadfast sense of purpose precisely because he never compromised on what he believed was fundamentally right.

In many senses Salvian is the anti-thesis of many modern political thinkers as well as Christians in that he showed a great deal of spine in his reasoned intractability. While in comparison many of those who profess to have strong political and religious beliefs today have almost no spine whatsoever and are less intractable and more undefinable in the sense that an opponent of theirs has a great deal of difficulty in pinning them down to any specific position per se.

Salvian in his lifetime was not close to major political figures, but he was a significant figure in Christian intellectual circles and worked closely with several French bishops such as Hilary of Arles and Eucherius of Lyons. That said Salvian's influence and ideas are often seen - although usually by proxy - in the interpretation of the works and ideas of Saint Augustine by Christian authors up to the present time which tends - as he did - to stress Augustine's focus on asceticism and belief that no government was above the law of God.

We know Salvian was a fairly prolific author, but only two of his works and several letters have come down to us. It is in his treatise 'De gubernatione Dei' (lit. 'The Government of God') that we find Salvian commenting on the jews thus:

'Surely then, since our most indulgent Lord shows himself always more prone to mercy than to punishment, even though in punishing a part of the Jewish host by his divine censure he gave some scope to judgement and severity, yet his love claimed the greater portion of the people - a special and peculiar act of mercy to countless men that the punishment might not destroy all who were implicated in the guilt.' (1)

This is then needs to be understood in the context of his later comment in relation to Saint Paul and the jews:

'Since he so followed Christ, let us consider which of us seems to be a true follower of the apostle. He writes of himself first of all that he never gave offence to any, but in all things showed himself the minister of God, in much patience, in affliction, in necessities, in blows, in imprisonments, in stripes. Elsewhere, comparing himself with others, he says: "How is it, wherein so ever any is bold (I speak foolishly) I am bold also: I speak as a fool, I am more; in labours more abundant, in prisons more frequent, in stripes above measure, in deaths oft. Of the Jews five times received I forty stripes save one. Thrice was I beaten with rods, once was I stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck."' (2)

This is then clarified further by Salvian's comments on the nature of the jewish people and their relationship with God:

'The twelve tribes of the Hebrews, when they were of old chosen by God, received two holy names, for they were called the people of God, and Israel. We read: "Hear, O my people, and I will speak; O Israel, and I will testify against thee." Once the Jews bore both these titles, now they have neither. They who long since left off the worship of God cannot be called God's people, nor can they who denied his Son be given a name that means "Seeing God." So it is written: "But Israel does not know, my people doth not consider." For this reason on another occasion our God spoke of the people of the Hebrews to the prophet, saying: "Call his name, Not Beloved." And speaking to the Jews themselves: "You are not my people and I am not your God." Moreover, he himself showed clearly why he spoke thus about them, for he said: "They have forsaken the Lord, the fountain of living waters." And again: "They have rejected the word of the Lord and there is no wisdom in them."' (3)

In addition to:

'For the whole human race is rushing headlong into eternal punishment by the very course that the Scriptures describe. First we kindle the fire, then add fuel to the flames, and lastly enter the flames that we have prepared. When does man first kindle eternal fire for himself? Surely when he first begins to sin. But when does he add fuel to the flames? When he heaps up sins upon sins. When shall he enter the everlasting fire? When he has already completed the irrevocable account of wickedness by the increase of his sins, as our Saviour said to the leaders of the Jews: "Fill ye up then the measure of your fathers, ye serpents, ye generation of vipers," The men whom the Lord himself told to fill up the measure were not far from completing the full number of their sins. Because they were no longer worthy of salvation, they filled up the number of iniquities by which they were to perish.' (4)

Now in the above I have quoted four extracts from Salvian's writing which deal with the jews one after the other. The reason for this is very simple: in that each individual bit of text qualifies Salvian's attitude to the jews appreciably.

Salvian starts out in the first piece of quoted text pointing out that the jews were divinely censured by God who decided to kill a goodly number of them for transgressing his instructions/commandments to them, but proceeded to forgive most of them for doing so (i.e., the mass of the jews as opposed to the leaders/ringleaders) and thus spares most of the jews his chastisement. However in doing so he - to Salvian's mind - is clearly reminding the jews that they need not always be the chosen people and should they suitably anger God then they will suffer terribly and possibly even be wiped out altogether.

In the second piece of quoted text Salvian is introducing the conduct of the jews in relation to Saint Paul into the equation. Here we can see Salvian recounting the persecution, suffering and torment of Saint Paul at the hands of the jews and thus begins - in effect - to illustrate the fall of jews from divine favour as they have once again rejected God's instructions/commandments in favour of their own instructions/commandments.

This then leads to Salvian's qualification in the third piece of quoted text where the jews are said to have been finally deprived of their status as the 'chosen nation' of God and that God has abandoned them to their fate as being unrighteous and undeserving of his forbearance and grace. Salvian clearly tells us that in his view: a people who name themselves as the ones who can 'see God' cannot retain that name when they reject that God's ultimate messenger because they were wilfully blind to that status.

Essentially Salvian is telling us that the jews are outcast and cannot be admitted into God's good books until such time as they accept Jesus as their Messiah and then beg forgiveness for their past errors.

Salvian then - in the fourth piece of quoted text - makes it abundantly clear that jews are destined for hellfire and brimstone unless they do just this. Indeed he even suggests that many jews - although necessarily not all - are now incapable of receiving God's forgiveness, because they are the oft-quoted 'generations of vipers'. This means in effect that Salvian is arguing that the jews are the active servants of the devil and are thus the principle opponents of all Christians in spiritual warfare and are to be hunted down and treated as active enemy combatants where-ever they are found by the Christian faithful.

To confirm this we should note that Salvian argues that the Vandals - then ravaging the Western Roman Empire - were acting the part of the chastiser of the Christians, because they had - like jews of old - turned their face from God and thus he had also turned his face from them. (5) However unlike the jews this could be rectified, but like the jews Christians should beware because of the potential that God's wrath could be awakened as it had been by the jewish rejection and crucifixion of Jesus. (6)

Indeed Salvian also refers to the perpetual jewish hatred of Jesus as well as their responsibility for the crime of deicide (the murder of a God). (7) Salvian also vehemently makes the point that the pagans have not murdered the Saints, but rather the jews have done so. (8)

This indicates Salvian's deep-seated hostility towards the jews as being a group defined by national origin as well as faith, who - in his view - actively do the work of the devil and are accordingly to be expunged at every opportunity unless they truly convert to Christianity and ask forgiveness for their many sins. It also fundamentally shows that Salvian was - like Martin Luther after him - unable to show much compassion for the jews as a people and regarded them very much as his active enemies who wouldn't by enlarge see the light of Christian reason and so thus needed to be put to the sword.

References

(1) Salv. De gub. 1:11

(2) Ibid. 3:4

(3) Ibid. 4:1

(4) Ibid. 4:8

(5) Ibid. 7:7

(6) Ibid. 7:8-11

(7) Ibid. 7:4

(8) Ibid.