Required reading
Ante-Nicene Fathers (Vol 6) (Available from Amazon or free here) - Conclude 'The seven books of Arnobius against the heathen' by reading Book VI.
My summary
Now Arnobius answers the charge against Christians for not making sacrifices.
The focus is particularly on the sacrifice of animals, and why the pagan gods would need such sacrifices.
But Arnobius also speaks about the sacrifice of incense and the music and ceremonies that accompany such sacrifices.
What grabbed me
I was a bit disturbed by Arnobius' arguments, as Christianity is not free from the subject of sacrifice. Yet he did not mention this. He seemed to minimise sacrifices altogether.
Thus I found myself agreeing with these words in the elucidations:
'It must be felt that Arnobius here lays himself open to a severe retort. The God of Christians is the author of sacrifice, and accepts the unspeakable sufferings of the innocent Lamb for the sins of the whole world.
The answer, indeed, suggests itself, that the sacrifices of the heathen had no apparent relation whatever to faith in this Atoning Lamb; none in the mysterious will of God that this faith should be nurtured before the Advent by an institution in which He had no pleasure, but which was profoundly harmonious with human thought and the self-consciousness of human guilt.
Arnobius would have written better had he been a better-instructed Christian. He demolishes pagan rites, but he should have called up the Gentile mind to the truths covered under its corruptions and superstitions.'
We do have a sacrifice in Christianity, the perfect sacrifice of the Lamb of God!
Next week's reading
Commence 'The works of Jonathan Edwards Volume 1' by beginning the 'Memoirs of Jonathan Edwards' and reading 'Chapter 1'.
Now it's your turn
Please post your own notes and thoughts in the comments section below.
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