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CHAPTER
8
COLUMBA
AND THE CHURCH IN SCOTLAND
Columba possessed a superior education.
He was familiar with Latin and Greek, secular and ecclesiastical history, the
principles of jurisprudence, the law of nations, the science of medicine, and
the laws of the mind He was the greatest Irishman of the Celtic race in mental
powers; and he founded in Iona, the most learned school in the British Islands,
and probably in Western Europe for a long period.1
WHILE the long night of the Dark Ages covered Europe and darkness covered the
people, the lamp of truth was shining brightly in Scotland and Ireland. Here
arose the commanding figure of Columba. Here, the virile churches, one in faith,
but covering two separate islands, proclaimed the truth. Ireland on the western,
and Scotland on the northwestern, brink of the known world, stood like a wall to
resist the advancing menace of religious tyranny. Scotland in particular, like
the Waldenses in northern Italy, found in her rugged mountains strong fortresses
to assist her.
Columba, an Irishman, was born in Donegal in 521, and both of his parents
were of royal stock. He founded a memorable college on the small island of Iona
which was a lighthouse of truth in Europe for centuries. That the Celtic, not
the Latin, race populated the British Isles was a determining factor, for the
Christian churches in which Patrick had been reared received their doctrine, not
from Rome, but from their brethren of the same faith in Asia Minor. Here was the
link which connected the faith of Patrick and Columba with primitive
Christianity.2 The
farthest lands touching the Atlantic saw the rise of a vigorous apostolic
Christianity not connected with the Church of Rome, but independent of it.
The Scottish resistance to the growing European hierarchy had its origins
in the work of Columba. About the time he left the schools established by
Patrick in Ireland to go to Scotland, the reactionary Council of Constantinople
(A.D.
553) was being held. At that council, the churches of the Roman Empire
surrendered their freedom to the Papacy. Offended at the unscriptural
innovations of medieval European compromises, four large communities in the East
- the Armenian, the Coptic, the Jacobite, and the Church of the East (often
falsely called the Nestorian Church) - separated from the western hierarchy.3
The news of these revolutionary
happenings had come to the ears of the Celtic believers throughout the British
Isles. Scotland and Ireland in the west, with the same spirit of independence
which was manifested by these eastern communions toward imperial Christianity,
girded themselves to meet the crisis.
In dedicating his life to the spread of Bible religion, Columba, who was
of royal descent, is said to have renounced his chance to the Irish throne.4
He was a descendant of Niall of the Nine
Hostages, an Irish king so mighty that it is said of him that he held hostages
for the nine kingdoms he had subdued.5 Columba
was also related to the renowned family of Riada who conquered for themselves a
principality in northeastern Scotia (the ancient name for Ireland). The new
state was Dalriada, from Dal, meaning "inheritance," or the kingdom of
the Riadians. This relationship stood Columba well in hand when he decided to
make his headquarters in Iona, because a half a century before this,
members of the Dalradian clan had crossed over from Ireland and had secured for
themselves a goodly portion of west central Caledonia (the former name for
Scotland), and called this new kingdom also Dalriada.6
This act brought the Scots from Ireland,
or Scotia. As, in the course of time, the Scots of the second kingdom of
Dalriada were to conquer the large kingdom in Caledonia of the Picts to the
north and west of them and then the kingdom of the Britons, or Strathclyde, to
the immediate south of them, naturally the name Scotland came to ancient
Caledonia.7 For
several centuries the two Dalriada kingdoms, one in Ireland and one in Scotland,
existed contemporaneously. Thus this clan through Columba not only gave the
spiritual leadership to Scotland, but later through their warriors also gained
the political overlordship of it.
In the providence of God, Columba appeared at this moment to mold these
significant revolutions. Iona, the burial ground of kings and nobles, a sacred
seat of the heathen Druidic learning and religion, became the center of the
Culdee Church and the college of Columba. Here this great apostle developed a
new chapter of Bible Christianity among a warlike and cultured pagan people. The Education of Columba
At his birth Columba, it is said, was
given two names - Crimthann, "wolf," and Colum, "dove."8
However, in his later days of supreme
devotion to Christ and to Bible truth, he was usually known by the second, Colum.
In his early youth, the fame of Ireland's colleges, the outgrowth of Patrick's
early organization and labors, was known far and wide. Columba, it is usually
related, was first taught by Finnian of Moville. After this he removed to
Leinster where he placed himself under the instruction of the bard, Gemman.9
Probably, the most outstanding of all Columba's teachers was the renowned
Finnian of Clonard, widely known for his learning. He was popular, and he placed
the Bible at the foundation of all studies. According to Archbishop Ussher, his
institute had an enrollment of three thousand pupils and was likened to a
university.10 Many
who came there to receive their education gave themselves to the ministry of the
gospel.11 It
was at Clonard that Columba became especially skillful in the art of copying and
illuminating manuscripts. There he remained several years until the urgency of
his spirit to help humanity, to raise up churches, and to plant mission stations
sent him upon extensive labors. Laboring in Ireland
Columba was only twenty-five years of
age when he built the church at Derry, in northern Ireland, where later he
planted a school. This place is now the well-known Londonderry. The youthful
zeal and accomplishments of this missionary greatly impressed the historian Bede
who makes special mention of Derry.12
During the seven years following the establishment of Derry, Columba
founded many churches and Biblical institutes. He is credited with bringing into
existence during this period more than three hundred churches. About one-third
of these were the so-called "monasteries," or church schools. Happy in
his activity for God, he was constantly traveling. The sick and infirm blessed
his name, while the poor always felt that in him they had a friend. Tall of
stature, he had a powerful voice which could be heard at a great distance. No
journey was too great, no labor too arduous for him to undertake while serving
the needs of the people. In Ireland, where the chieftains were constantly waging
war against one another, Columba commanded respect enough to travel in safety.
He was devoted to the study of the Scriptures. His biographer mentions that he
spent much time in writing, that is, in transcribing portions of the Bible. He
is credited with having copied three hundred New Testaments with his own hands.
He was the author, not only of Latin hymns, but also of poems in his native
Irish tongue. A careful examination of his writings shows that in many places he
uses the Itala version of the Bible. Of him Adamnan says: "He could not
pass the space even of a single hour without applying himself either to prayer,
or reading, or writing, or else to some manual labor.13 Journeys into Scotland
There are probably three reasons why
Columba chose Scotland as his mission field. In the first place, a large part of
the island, especially the country of the Picts, was still pagan. Columba longed
for a mission field and a life of service. Secondly, about fifty years previous
to this his own countrymen, the Dalradians, had won a kingdom in the west
central portion of what is now called Scotland. Here was a door open in a dark
land. Thirdly, Columba saw that he could there establish a center which would be
mighty in its influence not only in Scotland, but also in England, Wales, and
Ireland.
After he sailed from his beloved Derry, with about two hundred of his
companions, he was tempted to locate on a near-by island, when he discovered
that from its highlands he could discern the coasts of Ireland. He then gave the
word to sail on. He finally chose the small island of Iona, whose native name
was Hy, having the large island of Mull lying between it and the mainland.14
Here he and his company disembarked in
563. In all probability, the lord of the island of Mull, being a relative of
his, granted to him ownership of Iona. His followers held the island for six
hundred forty-one years, until they were driven out of it in 1204 by the
Benedictine monks.15
Pioneering in all its aspects was the story of Iona. Dwellings had to be
built; crops had to be planted. In the settlement of Iona and of other centers
founded by Columba and his disciples, apparently no effort was made for pomp and
ostentation. These simple missionaries allowed no entanglements either in
politics or worldly affairs to hinder them from obeying the heavenly vision.
Although Columba was needed to direct and oversee the establishment of these new
ventures for Christ, he found time, nevertheless, to convert many persons on the
large neighboring island of Mull.
He founded a Christian school and training institute which later
at-rained the highest reputation for the pursuit of Biblical study and science.16
His work made this center so venerated
that its abbots had the control of the bordering tribes and churches, and even
their pastors (then called bishops), acknowledged the authority of these abbots.
He built up in Iona a glorious center of evangelization which has made the
island famous for all time. Here are buried not only kings of Scotland, but also
kings of Ireland, France, Denmark, and Norway. Even to this day thousands of
visitors come annually to this hallowed soil.17 The Mission Center at Iona
The spirit of God wrought mightily in
Columba, and in humility he chose to dwell in a rude shelter of pioneer
construction. The humble abode of his energetic and learned co-workers at Iona
proves that in their hearts they had brought into subjection the restless spirit
of the age. Even a generation later when one of the renowned apostles of Iona
erected another mission station in northwestern England, it is related that,
"he built a church after the manner of the Scots, not of stone, but of hewn
oak, and covered it with reeds."18 Unlike
the ambassadors of imperial Christianity, who loved the associations of capitals
and courts, these missionaries chose the wilderness if it might be their happy
lot to serve God.
Much ground was required to support the Iona mission. Many acres of land,
orchards, and meadows were maintained by the students and faculty who combined
manual labor with study. A considerable portion of the day was spent in
gathering and winnowing the grain, feeding the lambs and the calves, working in
the gardens, in the bakehouse, and in mechanical pursuits. These duties were
alternated with classes of instruction by learned teachers and also by spending
hours in prayer and in singing psalms. The care with which these theological
students were trained to be the guardians of learning as well as the teachers of
the gospel may be gathered from the fact that frequently eighteen years of study
were required of them before they were ordained.19
In other words, Iona was not a monastery,
but a great mission institute. It can be likened to the schools of the prophets
of the Old Testament, or to the wonderful training centers of the Church of the
East. Doctrines of the Church in Scotland
The fact that Ireland lay outside the
bounds of the Roman Empire kept it from the saint worship, image worship, and
relic worship which flooded the state church at that time. And at Iona there is
no record of the theological students' digging for relics, or sending to Rome
for relics which were reputed to have belonged to some martyred Christian. There
were no processions in which relics were displayed, no burning of incense or
candles before a tomb. In fact, at the time when the apostle to the Picts had
erected his spiritual lighthouse in Scottish Dalriada, England had yet been
untouched by papal monasteries of the continental type.
Happily, Columba had more than a generation in which to work before the
influence of rulers on the Continent brought another type of Christianity to the
shores of England. He built his church on the Bible and the Bible only. He could
look to the authentic copy of the Confession of Patrick, his great predecessor,
who in this short document had used twenty-five quotations from the Holy
Scriptures.20 Columba
taught his followers never to receive as religious truth any doctrine not
sustained by proofs drawn from the Sacred Writings. Bede expressly declares that
Columba sailed away from Ireland to Scotland for the definite purpose of
converting heathen to the word of God.21
It is said of Baithen, the successor of
Columba at Iona, that he had no equal this side of the Alps in his knowledge of
the Sacred Scriptures and in his understanding of science.22
The Columban system of institutions was a confederation of spiritual
centers held together by invisible bonds of grace and truth, each locality
looking to the brotherhood as the final source of authority. It had no pope, and
it had no descending steps of clergy like archbishop, bishop, priest, and
deacon. The headman of each locality was generally the abbot of the mission
institute.23 These
centers of spiritual life and training grew into well-organized institutions
splendidly adapted to the spreading of Bible truths.
For many centuries Iona was recognized as the leading center, whose chief
officer besides being called an abbot, was also known as the coarb, or spiritual
successor, of Columba.24 While
there was a term resembling the word "bishop" sometimes used to
designate the clergy, it did not mean a bishop in the twentieth-century
acceptation of the term.25 The
word "Culdee," meaning "man of God," was later used to
designate the Columban church.
Maclauchlan states that, generally speaking, most of the features which
can be shown to have characterized the Scottish Church, even at the later
period, were such that no Protestant could censure them.26
Success attended these consecrated men as
they pioneered in the conversion of the northern and western parts of Scotland,
and Christianized the center of Scotland and the eastern portion of England by
Iona's colonies. The remains of places of worship, which still stand in the
north and are found to extend to the farthest distance of the Hebrides, testify
to the all-pervading influence of the Culdee Church.27
There was a continual stream of
missionaries from the churches of Ireland and Scotland flowing toward the
continental church, of which we have ample evidence in the numerous Gaelic MSS.
belonging to these churches found in continental monasteries.28 Bible Manuscripts and Bible Studies
If it be true that Columba with his
own hand copied three hundred New Testaments, as well as portions of the Old
Testament, what must have been the output of Iona when all the workers assigned
to the making of manuscripts produced their contribution? It must not be
forgotten that Columba, while supervising the institutions in Scotland, never
relinquished the care of the many training centers he had established in Ireland
during the first forty years of his life. It is small wonder that the Irish and
Scottish Churches covered the British Isles and the continent of Europe with
their thousands of missionary centers in a short period.
Lucy Menzies, in her life of Columba, gives the following excellent
presentation of the copying done by the Scottish Church: In
this as in everything connected with the spread of Christianity in Scotland, we
have to look to Ireland for the history and development of the art. Letters were
known in Ireland before St. Patrick's day; he used to instruct his disciples in
the art of writing. The characters and designs used by these early scribes were
probably of Byzantine origin and would come to Ireland from Ravenna through
Gaul. The Irish adapted them to their own idea of beauty, but though early Irish
manuscripts have features peculiar to Ireland, similar interlacings are found in
early Italian churches, especially in those of Ravenna. These interlacings
symbolized life and immortality, having neither beginning nor end. Designs of
interlaced ribbon work, plaited rushes, bands, cords, and knots are common to
the earliest art of various peoples, and when the first missionaries came to
Ireland bringing copies of the Gospels, they naturally brought this art with
them. The object of the writing was, of course, to multiply copies of the
Scriptures.... There must have been at Iona a separate room or hut where the
writing materials were kept, a library where those engaged in transcribing the
Scriptures might work, where the polaires containing the finished copies hung on
the walls and where the valuable manuscripts were kept."29
The youth in the Culdee schools clung to the fundamental Christian
doctrines, such as the divinity of Christ, baptism, the atonement, inspiration
of the Scriptures, and the prophecies connected with the last days. They did not
accept the doctrines of infallibility, celibacy, transubstantiation, the
confessional, the mass, relic worship, image adoration, and the primacy of
Peter. As Killen says: The
monastery was, in fact, a college where all the branches of learning then known
were diligently cultivated; where astronomy was studied; where Greek as well as
Latin literature entered into the curriculum; where the sons of kings and nobles
received tuition; and where pious and promising youths were training up for the
sacred office.... But theology was the subject with which the attention of the
teachers of the monastery was chiefly occupied; the Bible was their daily
textbook; their pupils were required to commit much of it to memory.30
The last hours of Columba are recorded as follows: Having
continued his labors in Scotland thirty-four years, he clearly and openly
foretold his death, and on Saturday, the ninth of June, said to his disciple
Diermit: "This day is called the Sabbath, that is, the day of rest, and
such will it truly be to me; for it will put an end to my labors."31 The Century After Columba's Death
It is written of Saul in the divine
word that "them went with him a band of men, whose hearts God had
touched." In like manner some members of the noble galaxy surrounding
Columba were so filled with the flame of living fire that they subdued
unconquerable warriors of that northern land for Christ. Standing first among
these contemporaries of Columba was Baithen. Unwilling always to be sheltered
under the wing of Iona, the parent institution, he obtained leave to sail
westward to the island of Tiree where he built a subordinate training center.
Then, after having spread the influence of Iona over northwestern Scotland, he
returned to the original center to become its head after Columba died. Although
privileged to occupy the abbot's seat for only four years prior to his death, he
obtained widespread fame for remarkable learning and courageous labors.
It would be thrilling to read how Kenneth, Ciaran, Colmonnel, Donnan,
Molaise, and others pushed their way southward into the promontories of Kintyre;
to the Western Isles, or Hebrides; to the beautiful counties of Fife,
Forfarshire, Aberdeen, which look out toward the waters of Norway; and above
all, to northern Scotland, especially the counties of Caithness, Sutherland, and
Ross. Here the members of the Celtic Church converted the heathen and built
churches; they founded institutions copied after the model of Iona; they
distributed Bibles, taught the people to read, and fired their converts with
their own missionary zeal. If Iona was the center of the northern Picts, so
Abemethy became the same to the southern Picts. They pushed farther south into
the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Northumbria.
As early as the middle of the seventh century, or about one hundred years
after the founding of Iona, several large and influential mission schools had
sprung up in the British Isles.32 Probably
next to Iona in fame is Lindisfarne on the northeastern coast of England. This
spiritual center is prominently connected with Aidan whose work is considered in
Chapter 12. Battling Against the Northmen and the
Papacy
The four hundred years following the
establishment of Iona are noted for three events in England and Scotland. First,
there was intense rivalry and warfare between the seven kingdoms of England,
known as the Heptarchy, and the three kingdoms of Scotland. Second, all three
countries-England, Ireland, and Scotland, harassed, invaded, and in the case of
England and Ireland, conquered by the Northmen, especially the Danes. Third, and
probably the most far-reaching event, was the intense struggle waged between the
Papacy and the Celtic Church. In Scotland the kingdoms of the Picts and the
Britons were finally absorbed by the ever-increasing Scots. If England suffered
such serious consequences at the hands of the Normans, and Ireland at the hands
of the Danes, it can readily be seen how difficult must have been the struggle
of the Celtic Church to hold its own against the power of the Papacy when backed
by the all-powerful states of the Continent.
Within the one hundred twenty-five years after the death of Columba, the
Picts had been swayed enough by the mighty influence of Rome to adopt the Roman
Easter. Nevertheless, the change in Easter did not represent a complete
surrender to the Papacy. About the same time Nechtan, the Pietish king, expelled
the Columban clergy. When, however, the conquering Kenneth MacAlpine, king of
the Scots, in 846, united under the one crown the Scots and the Picts, he
brought the Columban clergy back in honor. He was the king who removed the seat
of the government from Iona to Forteviot, the ancient capital of the Pictish
kingdom. In his day the Danes were furiously assaulting the coasts, making
inroads among the Western Isles, while they practically seized supreme power in
both Ireland and England. Fierce warriors as they were, they soon learned that
they were no match for the Scots. Scotland must have been a wealthy country at
this time because, in those northern latitudes, it attracted the century-long
invasion of the Northmen. It is interesting to add that in the midst of these
commotions Andrew became the patron saint of Scotland, while the thistle was
chosen for its national emblem. The latter was selected because of a historic
incident: When the Danes were about to make a surprise attack, a warrior
planting his foot on the thistle uttered a cry of pain loud enough to be heard
by the fighting Scots.
Although the Danes frequently burned and pillaged Iona, the veneration
for it was so great and the pilgrimages made to it so many that it could not
long remain in a devastated condition. It was a learned and righteous clergy
which directed the Culdee Church, and they were so beloved by the people that
this communion was deeply rooted in the affections of all. It must be kept in
mind that through the two centuries that the Northmen fought to plant themselves
in Scotland, the Danes were still heathen. It is repeatedly recorded how devout
kings, warriors, and people would seize the remains of Columba and carry them to
a place of safety, sometimes in Ireland, and sometimes further east in Scotland.
For some time the bishop of Armagh in Ireland stood forth as the successor of
both Columba and Patrick, the two offices often being united in the same person.
Through these years as one kingdom sought to conquer another, the warring powers
would naturally call for allies. Here was the chance of the Papacy. As the
centuries passed, the Celtic Church and the civil rulers who were pro-Celtic
would look across to the Continent, but they could discern no great nation which
had not made an alliance with Rome.
The dates, 1058 and 1066, stand for startling changes. There were only
eight years between the time when Malcolm III became king of Scotland, and the
year that William the Norman conquered England. By the time Malcolm III had
reached the throne, the aggressive Scots had succeeded in absorbing Strathclyde,
the northwest kingdom of the Britons. Vigorously they had extended their
territory southward to the River Tweed. As the Northmen were still in possession
of the Western Isles, they had driven a wedge between Ireland and Scotland.
Since it was the Papacy that abetted the Norman invasion of England by William,
the church of Columba in Scotland found herself alone without any strong
political backing in Ireland, England, or on the Continent.
Moreover, Malcolm III, or Malcolm Canmore (that is, "large
head"), had been educated in England in company with the Roman Catholic
king, Edward the Confessor. When he came to the throne of Scotland he was the
least imbued with the Celtic atmosphere and Celtic ideas of any of his
predecessors. Yet as late as 1058, the Scottish Church remained largely as it
had been modeled by its early teachers. But the crowning of Malcolm brought
these believers in early Christianity into a fierce struggle. Malcolm III took
Margaret as his second wife, a girl who had been determined to enter a nunnery.
She was a member of one of the former royal houses of England. In exile in
Hungary, she and her brothers. were brought up in a strong Catholic atmosphere.
Malcolm III was passionately devoted to her because she had renounced her plan
to become a nun to marry him. However, in return she took charge of religious
affairs and, instructed by some of the ablest men of the papal church from
England and the Continent, set in motion the force which for three centuries
placed the church of Columba in the shadows. Queen Margaret and the Scottish Church
Margaret found the Scottish Church a
church of the people; she determined to make it the church of the monarch. The
passion of her life might be summed up in one word - Rome. As Dr. Barnett
writes: "Hungary was a strongly Roman Catholic country.... Here we touch
the first vital source from which Queen Margaret drew her passionate attachment
to the Roman Church."33 And
again he writes, "Zeal for the church literally consumed her."34
What her purposes were in marrying
Malcolm III, king of Scotland, this same writer states further, "Margaret
very soon after her marriage is setting about a movement to Romanize and
Anglicize the ancient Celtic Church in Scotland."35
Still another quotation from the same
author helps to clarify the vast and determined purpose of this queen: It
will be readily understood, therefore, that this saintly queen who had been
brought up among the comparative magnificence of monastic religion, first in
Hungary, and then in England where buildings like Westminster Abbey were being
conceived, would be anxious to bring the church in the land of her adoption into
line with all-powerful Rome.36
The contest which now opened was a strife between the throne and the
people. In herself the queen possessed the weapon of a keen intellect, a strong
memory, a readiness in subtle expression, and a polemic training in the defense
of papal doctrines. She also brought to the battle a group of monastic scholars
who could both prompt and protect her in her attacks on the Celtic Church. When
Margaret landed on the shores of Fife with her retinue, the people witnessed the
largest vessels ever seen on Caledonian shores. The inhabitants of these rural
glades beheld the beauty of the Saxon princess. However, they placed a greater
value upon the grace of God than upon the queen's rubies and diamonds. Both the
Scriptures and the life and deeds of Columba had taught them the love of the
spiritual.
To destroy the glory of Columba was impossible. Margaret might as well
attempt to degrade the apostle Paul. In five hundred years the love of Scotland
for Columba had not dulled. A more feasible avenue to success would be to
legislate against the religious customs of the Celtic Church. Margaret never
hesitated to unite church and state. Like Constantine, she joined together that
which Christ had put asunder. Beginning with a Sunday law, she proceeded to the
demolition of the Celtic Church. How little does the public suspect that
religious legislation to enforce Easter and Sunday has often been the method of
choking the life out of a liberty-loving church.
This procedure was used by Margaret. The queen called an ecclesiastical
congress, and for three days she sat in the chair. She argued, cajoled,
commanded, and within a soft glove manipulated an iron hand. The blunt,
impatient, warlike king stood by her side with his hand on the hilt of the
sword. Did not the emperor Constantine support the episcopal chair at the great
Council of Nicaea, in 325, when a pompous church became the spouse of the Roman
Empire? Did not King Oswy preside in northern England at the Council of Whitby (A.D.
664), when a terrible blow was struck at the Celtic Church amid the
Anglo-Saxons? And so Malcolm's fervent love for his consort led him to place the
full power of the state behind the queen. Problems of the Council
Though details are lacking, it is not
difficult to picture the leaders of Columba's church in Scotland as, for three
days, they were obliged to listen to the proceedings of Margaret's council.
There were points of difference as is recorded in her Life, written by her
priestly confessor, Turgot.37 The
first two points were relative to the age long controversy about Easter. It was
all a matter of religious opinion, with which the government had no right to
concern itself. As to the third point, on the celebration of the mass, some
authorities think this was an indignant threat, because the Culdees conducted
the services of the Lord's Supper not in Latin, as Rome did, but in the native
language.
The question of Sabbath and Sunday was particularly contested. As shown
previously in quotations from Drs. Flick and Barnett,38
the traditional practice of the Celtic
Church was to observe Saturday instead of Sunday as the day of rest. This
position is supported by a host of authors. The Roman Catholic historian,
Bellesheim, gives the claim of the queen and describes the practice of the Scots
as follows: The
queen further protested against the prevailing abuse of Sunday desecration.
"Let us," she said, "venerate the Lord's day, inasmuch as upon it
our Savior rose from the dead: let us do not servile work on that
day."...The Scots in this matter had no doubt kept up the traditional
practice of the ancient monastic Church of Ireland, which observed Saturday
rather than Sunday as a day of rest."39
Andrew Lang writing upon the general practice of the Celtic Church says:
"They worked on Sunday, but kept Saturday in a sabbatical manner."40
Another author states: It
seems to have been customary in the Celtic churches of early times, in Ireland
as well as Scotland, to keep Saturday the Jewish Sabbath, as a day of rest from
labor. They obeyed the fourth commandment literally upon the seventh day of the
week.41
The historian Skene in commenting upon the work of Queen Margaret also
reveals the prominence of the Sabbath question as follows: Her
next point was that they did not duly reverence the Lord's day, but in this
latter instance they seemed to have followed a custom of which we find traces in
the early monastic Church of Ireland, by which they held Saturday to be the
Sabbath on which they rested from all their labors, and on Sunday on the Lord's
day, they celebrated the resurrection.42
As pointed out in the story of Patrick, the opposition to the Ten
Commandments failed to recognize that the culminating reason for the death of
Christ upon the cross was that while becoming man's substitute He was to uphold
the moral law. The papal church denies that it was as man's substitute and
surety that Christ died on the cross.43 Columba,
however, did recognize this truth. A verse from the poem by him addressed to his
Redeemer reads as follows:
As Thou didst suffer on the cross
Nothing so quickly leads to persecution as Sunday laws. In a land like
Scotland there could be the Anglo-Saxon sect observing Sunday, the Celtic Church
consecrating Saturday from the days of the apostles, Moslems observing Friday,
and unbelievers celebrating no day. A law which would single out any one certain
day of the week and exalt it to sacredness would be sectarian legislation. Soon
the favored sect would indulge in feelings of superiority and point the finger
of scorn at those conscientiously observing another day. Bitterness would set in
speedily, followed by persecution.
In this way the Culdees were ordered to conform or to depart. When King
David, the son of Margaret, had confiscated their Loch Leven lands, he ordered
them to conform to the rites of the Sunday-keeping monks, on whom he had
conferred the dispossessed property, or to be expelled.45
Needless to day, they were expelled. This
was in the year 1130. Scotland Subsequent to the Papal
Penetration
The unscrupulousness of the victors
in destroying or in misrepresenting the records of the past has placed a false
face over the true story of the Celtic Church.46
The gulf between that church and the
Papacy was great even as late as 1120. A severe difference arose between King
Alexander, another son of Margaret, and Eadmer, a newly appointed head to the
bishopric of Saint Andrews. When he asked counsel of two Canterbury monks, they
made a remarkable statement, "For they say that Eadmer cannot accommodate
himself to the usages of the Scottish Church without dishonoring his character
and hazarding his salvation."47 Although
Rome admits that as late as 1120 the usages of the Culdees were so far from
those of Rome that a bishop would endanger his eternal salvation to follow them,
yet at the same time she did to Scotland's hero as she had done to Patrick -
enrolled Columba as a Roman Saint. It
is a remarkable fact that those very regions in which the Iro-Scottish mission
work was most successful during the sixth and seventh centuries were precisely
the regions in which the evangelical sects of the later times flourished most.48
The transformations in character and practices wrought by Columba and his
successors elevated the condition of women, brought loving attention to the
children, produced Bible-loving believers, brought proper relations between
church and state, and breathed an enduring missionary life into a vigorous
western people. In Scotland the seeds were sown plentifully and deep. There was
a rich evangelical subsoil. This enrichment endured long, although the growth
was later covered by a layer of papal practices and traditions. When the
Reformation came to this realm, it was to a large extent a reversal of the royal
establishment of popery in Scotland. The Papacy had been unable to wholly
exterminate the faith and simpler system of the ancient Culdees, especially in
those districts which were the earliest abodes and latest retreats of primitive
Christianity. As there were reformers in nearly every country in Europe before
the Reformation, it could not be far wrong to conclude that they also continued
to exist in that country which was the last to register its public protest
against the usurpation of the Church of Rome.
"No religion ever has been destroyed by persecution if the people
confessing it were not destroyed." The ancient faith of Columba was handed
down from father to son enshrouded in lasting love and affection. The sufferings
which the Scots underwent at the hand of the usurping religion also deepened
their faith even as expression deepens impression. Encroachments of the
Romanists were firmly resisted. As appears later, individuals of the Waldensian
communion as well as followers of Wycliffe were found in Scotland during the
days of papal supremacy there. The final and permanent uprising against
religious tyranny came when the Reformation secured this land as one of her
greatest allies. It is not an injustice to history to say that Scotland twice
saved the world for the Reformation. At length the Church in the Wilderness
triumphed, due in no small degree to the impetus given it by the wonderful
organization and godly life of Columba. |