In Christo, or The Monogram of St. Paul

“ps occur to you,” says a gifted writer,

I K j” count the number of times in St. Paul’s

i Epistles, in which the phrases ’ m Christ,’

and its equivalents * in Him,’ and * in the Lord ’ are to

be found?” ’

With singular, and very notable iteration, no less indeed than on thirty-three occasions, do the words “IN CHEIST” alone, independent of these equivalents, occur.^

This Volume is an attempt to gather the characteristic expression (or occasionally where the Apostle’s thought and meaning are more suggestive, the latter), as themes of meditation.^

I have used the word “Monogram” on the title-page and throughout, from the difficulty of finding any

Dean Howson’s Hulsean Lectures.

Besides these, as we shall aftenvards find, our translators in their rendering have occasionally adopted the preposition “through,” when it is “in” (iv) in the original.

3 In case any may care to employ them as daily readings, they are numbered so as to extend over a month.

other that would better describe the favourite phrase. This IN Christo is the cor cordium of his writings: the key-note, — the one master-chord which vibrates and pulsates through the whole divine symphony; recalling, as an Old Testament parallel, the watchword of the Great Elijah — “Jehovah liveth.”

Are his Epistles a temple of living stones? IN Chkisto is the superscription on the portico. Does he speak of running the Christian race? in Christo is the sacred torch he holds aloft in pressing towards the goal, and which he hands down to his successors in all ages. Is the badge assigned to him by the early Church — the sword of conquest entwined with a garland of victory? IN Christo, if we can venture to employ a modern term to the acknowledged chief of the spiritual aristocracy, is the heraldic motto encircling it. “Thou hast given a banner,” says the Psalmist, “to them that fear thee:” — in Christo was the banner-device of this illustrious champion of the faith. Like a clarion-note, it rises clear and loud above * the shout and shell of battle.’ It was solely in the mystic, but very real significance of the grand spiritual verity therein expressed, that

Favourite epithets and phrases occur in the %mtings of more than one of the sacred penmen, suggested by some special incidents in their lives. Note (for example), St. Peter’s frequent reference to hi-y Divine Master, as “the Shepherd,” “the Chief Shepherd,” “the Shepherd and Bishop of Souls:” — emblems which the memories of the Lake-shore — “Feed my sheep,” “Feed my Lambs,” are surely sufficient very naturally to account for. The In Christo of the other Apostle does not require to be explained by any similar suggestion or association.

PREFACE AND INTRODUCTION. ix

he would have accepted the otherwise -unauthorised ’ nimbus ’ and ’ halo ’ with which the devout painters of early and mediaeval ages cinctured his brow. If, like a second Moses on the Heavenly Mount, his countenance shone, he would allow it to be only with a borrowed, reflected lustre: — “the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in” (from) “the face of Jesus Christ.” All the above and similar comparisons, indeed, fall short of his own comprehensive epigrammatic utterance — “The life hid with Christ in God” (Col. iii. 3). Well may the gilded lettering gleam on the baldacchino of the Roman Basilica which tradition claims for his tomb — “Mihi, vivere, Christus est”

On two other occasions alone are St. Paul’s distinguishing words used in the I^ew Testament. One of these is in a historical reference to the Apostle, defining the topic of his preaching before Felix. But even that is coupled with an allusion to the familiar phrase,” concerning the faith IN Christ ‘* (Acts xxiv. 24). The other occurs in the ist Epistle of St. Peter (iii. 16). And may not this latter claim, too, a similar

According to the strong and emphatic meaning of the original, he made his ’ boast ’ in Christ. Although rendered by the same in our translation, there are two different words in the Greek, when he speaks in the commencement of Phil. iii. of *’ rejoicing in the Lord “(xatpere ev KvpicS) (ver. i): and “rejoicing in Christ Jesus” {Kaxrxjuyevoi. ev Xpcarifj ‘ItjctoO), lit. ’ making our boast in Christ Jesus ’ (ver. 3), rising in the latter to the more exultant term. It is the same word which is employed in his great Galatian motto- verse — “God forbid that I should glory (or boast), save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ” (Gal. vi. 14).

pedigree? Is it not more than probable that, like a strain of music, it may have lingered in the memory of the Apostle of the circumcision, as a relic of the hallowed converse enjoyed more than once with “his beloved Brother Paul “: more especially during those never-to-be-forgotten days, when they abode together under the same roof at Jerusalem, and spake together of “the things touching the King” (Gal. i. 1 8)?

If the Monogram, as I have thus ventured to call it, was peculiarly St. Paul’s own in Gospel times, it was not so afterwards. He seems, at all events, to have bequeathed the words as a precious souvenir to those who in a subsequent age followed his steps and shared his crown. To the writer, it is one of the most touching and interesting remembrances of a sojourn in the city of the Apostle’s later years and martyrdom, how, in the Roman Catacombs, with their computed six millions of buried Christians, the mourners and survivors of the martyred dead had served themselves heirs to the same divine “graffito” of the greatest of the Fathers! How remarkable to trace, ever and anon, inscriptions in rude lettering of the In Christo, either found within, or else taken from, these strangest of burial grounds.^ I quote the following, not from

The slabs and inscriptions are chiefly to be seen in the singular collection in the Vatican. Some in the Museum of St. John Lateran, or that of the Capitol. (See note at end of Preface.) Moreover, while the Catacombs have thus largely contributed, it may be well also to state that many of these slabs and sculptured sarcophagi were discovered in the Vestibules or under the pavement of the early Basilicas.

memory, but from the accurate pages of those who have had leisure to transcribe the tracings, often incomplete, and to a hurried visitor, difficult to decipher.

“ViCTORiNA, IN PACE ET IN Christo” (Victorina — in peace, and in Christ).^

“Fortunatus, in his lifetime, made this for himself, in order that when he should rest in peace, IN Christ, he might have his grave prepared.”

“Marius Vitellianus, to his most faithful wife Primitiva... mayest thou live” (vivas) “in Christ.”

“Ursula, thou art accepted IN Christ” (Ursula,

ACCEPTA SIS IN ChRISTO).

This latter is followed by a double * Chrism ’ (the word now generally employed to describe the Christian monogram). An accurate explorer has noted, as a formula common on the sepulchral stones of the primitive Christians — “Spes IN Christo.” “Spes in Deo.” “Spes in Christo Deo.” This, in conjunction not unfrequently with the symbolic Anchor (as in the crypt of St. Lucina). “Which hope” (spes) “we have as an anchor of the soul, sure and steadfast, and which entereth into that within the veil; whither the forerunner is for us entered, even Jesus:” (the hope IN Christ, — the anchor cast in the Rock of Ages), (Heb. vi. 19, 20). A seal found among other smaller articles (see p. XV. of Preface) bears the similar legend — “Spes IN Eo” (Hope IN Him). The following inscription is

Keep reading