The Early British Church, from the book "Celt, Druid and Culdee" by Elder

The Gospel to Britain #2 Christianity in the first centuries AD in Britain

From the book "Celt, Druid and Culdee" (1973)

by

Isabel Hill Elder

THE EARLY BRITISH CHURCH

THE name by which the British Church was first known in these islands was the Culdee Church, the natural result of Christianity having been introduced by the Culdich or 'refugees'. The ecclesiastics of this Church, composed chiefly of Christianized Druids, became known as the Culdees, and not until the Latin aggression, five centuries later, were they referred to as the British clergy in contradistinction to the clergy of the Roman Church. The fact is well established from the testimony of early writers and councils that through the Culdee church, the National Church of Britain is the Mother Church of Christendom.

The Culdees established Christian churches, monasteries and colleges, chiefly in remote places, where they fled from persecution by the Romans Enlii (i.e. Bardsey), off the coast of Wales, once afforded shelter to twenty thousand Christians. Lindisfarne, Iona and many of the islands off the west coast of Scotland, and inaccessible parts of Ireland, were all inhabited in the early days of Christianity by the Culdees. Eurgan, daughter of Caradoc and wife of Salog, Prince of old Sarum, founded a college of twelve Christian Druids (Culdee initiates) at Caer Urgan(1) or Llantwit Major. This college must therefore have been established in the first century.

The Culdee Church was ruled by bishops(2) and elders - elder and priest (from presbyteros) being synonymous terms.(3) From an ancient authority we learn that the Culdees made no alteration in the terms used by the Druids; and they retained the white dress of the Druidic priests.(4) A superintendent among the Druids in Britain was a 'deon,' i.e. a 'dean.'

The clergy of the early Church came into office hereditarily; the principal of hereditary succession ran through the whole Celtic polity. The crown was hereditary with certain modifications peculiar to the Celts themselves. The bards were hereditary without much reference to qualification. In Ireland there was a hereditary succession in the bishopric of Armagh for fifteen generations.

Giraldus Cambrensis, Bishop of St. David's, in the twelfth century, a strong supporter of the Latin Church, complains of the Celtic Church that 'the sons after the deaths of their fathers, succeed to the ecclesiastic benefices, not by election, but by hereditary right.'(5)

Monasteries, or more correctly, colleges, were attached to the early British churches;(6) seats of learning were styled Cathair Culdich - the Chair of the Culdees.(7) The mode of life in these monasteries, however, was very different from that of the generality of those institutions that have been called monasteries in later ages. In each college there were twelve brethren, and one who was 'provost' or 'abbot'; wherever the Culdees formed a new settlement or college of presbyters, the fixed number of the council was twelve, following the example of the apostles of Jesus Christ.

GILDAS states that in old phraseology - 'sanctorum speluncae' - the monasteries, were the caves of the saints;(8) this makes intelligible the old records of the Culdees that they lived in kells or caves in Britain. Kings and nobility frequently passed their declining years in the peace and seclusion of these monasteries.

According to Jamieson there is a general tradition in the Highlands of Scotland that the Culdees immediately succeeded the Druids as the ministers of religion.(9) The tradition is supported by a circumstance of an interesting nature, which has been mentioned by several writers, that 'Clachan', the name still given in the Highlands to a place where a church stands, belonged originally to a Druidical temple. Hence it is still said, 'Will you go to the stones?' or 'Have you been to the stones?'; that is, 'Will you go to church' or 'Have you been to church ?' At the end of the seventeenth century there was in a Highland parish of Scotland an old man who, although very regular in his devotions, never addressed the Supreme Being by any other title than that of 'Archdruid', accounting every other derogatory to the Divine Majesty.(10)

Toland states that two Druids acted as tutors to the two daughters of Laegaire (Leary), the high king of Ireland, in whose reign St.Patrick conducted his great revival; that Ida and Ono, Lords of Roscommon, were Druids and that Ono presented his fortress of Inlleach-Ono to St.Patrick who converted it into the religious house of Elphin, later an episcopal see; this writer also states that the Druidical college of Derry was converted into a Culdee monastery.(11)

Adamnan, the successor and biographer of St.Columba, states that Columba was wont to say of the Lord Jesus, 'Christ the Son of God is my Druid.'(12)

Every fragment of such evidence is valuable, inasmuch as it manifests the true character of the Druids, and indicates the esteem in which even their memory was held long after Druidism had ceased as the national religion and had become merged in Christianity.

Arch con Munro, who made a tour of the Western Isles in 1549, begins his narrative with the Isle of Man 'which sometimes, as old historiographers say, was wont to be the seat first ordained by Fynan, king of Scotland, to the priests and the philosophers, called in Latin "Druids", in English "Culdees" which were the first teachers of religion in Albion.'(13)

The Culdee, or British Church flourished increasingly from the first to the seventh century; kings and rulers of provinces united in enriching the Church. Sir James Dalrymple observes that the common practice of the Culdees was to dedicate their principal churches to the Trinity, and not to the Virgin or any saint.(14) Sometimes, however, churches were named after their living founders.(15)

An account of the simplicity of the mode of service in the early Christian Church is found in the writings of Justin Martyr. He says: 'We offer up prayers in common for ourselves, for the baptized person, and for all men. . . . Then there is brought to the presiding brother a loaf of bread and a cup of water and mixed wine; he takes it and offers praise and glory to the Father of all, through the name of the Son and the Holy Spirit, and returns thanks to Him at great length for having vouchsafed to give us these things. When he has made an end of the prayer and the thanksgiving the people answer "Amen", which in Hebrew signifies "So be it." Then those who we call deacons give to each person present a portion of the bread, wine and water, over which the thanksgiving has said; and they also carry away to the absent. This food we call the Eucharist which no one may receive except those who believe in the truth of our doctrines, and who have also been baptized for the remission of sins and who live according to the commandments of Christ.' Later, in a communication to the emperor, this ancient writer states: 'On Sunday, as the day is called, the inhabitants of town and country assemble together, and the memoirs of the Apostles and the writings of the Prophets are read as long as time permits. When the reader has finished, the presiding brother makes a discourse, exhorting us to an imitation of those worthies. Then we stand up and pray, and when the prayers are done, bread and wine are brought as I have just described; and he who presides sends up thanksgivings and prayers as well, and the people answer "Amen."'(16)

(I have not a clue as to why Elder brought this in here, for Justin Martyr was a member of what became known as the Roman Catholic Church. Elder is her telling us about what is recorded as how a service in what became the RC church was at the beginning conducted like. All of this has NO bearing on the subject at hand...the early church of Britain, and the Culdee church services - which was not Roman Catholic at all in those early centuries in the gatherings of the Culdees. And further more, it is a recorded historical fact that the Roman Catholic faith did not come to Britain until about 500 A.D. and when the RC leader arrived, being sent by the then Pope, he found a Christianity that was as he himself sent word back to the Pope, "heretical" for they were "Jewish in practice" - they observed Saturday not Sunday and observed not Easter, but Passover - Keith Hunt)

Writing of the early church, Thomas Fuller 1608-1661) says: 'Most of these men seem born under a travelling planet, seldom having their education in the place of their nativity; oft-times composed of Irish infancy, British breeding and French preferment; taking a cowl in one country, a crozier in another, and a grave in a third. Neither bred where born, nor beneficed where bred, but wandering in several kingdom.'

These 'Wandering Scholars', as they were often termed, were learned in the classics as well as in Holy Writ. The Church continued to teach the classics; only for the Church the memory of them would have vanished from Europe.... The Church inherited the Roman respect for eloquence. 'The Holy writings do not teach the art of eloquence,' said Socrates, the historian, 'and by eloquence a man defends the truth.'(17) Clement I insists that 'secular learning is necessary to the right understanding of Holy Writ'.(18) Moses was learned in the wisdom of the Egyptians; Isaiah, the greatest of the prophets, was a gentleman and a scholar; St.Paul, the Apostle par excellence, was as versed in secular letters as afterwards in spiritual. It is to be remembered, however, that in spite of the greatness of the Vulgate its Latin prose is not such a masterpiece as the English of the Authorized Version'.(19)

Surprise is sometimes expressed that there are so few records of the early British Church. The savage edicts of Roman Emperors were directed not alone to the destruction of individuals who confessed the Christian faith, but also to the literature and records of the Church.

There were ten 'high power' persecutions of the Christians under these tyrants, extending from A.D.66 to A.D.303; the last being that of Diocletian which began in A.D.290.(20) Bede says: 'The Diocletian persecution was carried out incessantly for ten years, with the burning of churches, outlawing of innocent persons and the slaughter of martyrs. At length it reached Britain in the year 300, and many persons, with the constancy of martyrs, died in the confession of the Faith.' The records of the Church had now to be written not with pen and ink but in blood and the flames of martyrdom. In the edict of Diocletian the Scriptures were to be carried away or destroyed, being regarded as books of magic; in this he was following older methods of suppression.

The British Church at this time lost the following by martyrdom: Amphibalus, Bishop of Llandaff; Alban of Verulam; Aaron and Julian, citizens and presbyters of Chester; Socrates, Bishop of York; Stephen, Bishop of London; Augulius, his successor; Nicholas, Bishop of Penrhyn (Glasgow); Melior, Bishop of Carlisle; and above ten thousand communicants in different grades of society.(21)

After the Diocletlan persecution had died out, the churches in Britain were rebuilt,(22) and Christianity flourished to so great an extent that at the Council of Arles, A.D.314, the British Church was represented by three bishops and a presbyter, and again at the Council of Sardica and Ardminium in the fourth century. It is interesting to note that the three bishops who represented the British Church at the Council of Arles came from York, London and Caerleon-on-Usk,(23) the former seats of the three Archdruids of Britain.

Against the British Church no charge of heretical doctrine has at any time been made, though the very prince of heretics, Pelagius, was one of its most prominent and learned abbots. The Pelagian heresy, originated by Morien,(24) better known by his Latin name, Pelagius, twentieth Abbot of Bangor-on-Dee, Flintshire, was nothing more than an attempted revival of Druidism, and of the old Druidic ideas with regard to the nature and free-will of man. The beauty of the Latin compositions of Pelagius, his extensive learning and reproachless life, facilitated the spread of the heresy everywhere; it was quickly suppressed in Britain. St.Hilary of Poictiers, in the latter part of the fourth century, wrote to the British Church: 'I congratulate you on having remained undefiled in the Lord, and untainted by all the contagion of damnable heresy. Oh, the unshaken steadfastness of your glorious conscience! Oh, house firm on the foundation of the faithful rock. Oh, the constancy of your uncontaminated will.'(26) During the storm which the Pelagian heresy caused in Britain, one of the brightest lights of the Culdee Church, St.Patrick, was, in the providence of God, being prepared for his great work of revival among the Irish people, Christianity, according to Gildas, having been planted in Ireland before the defeat of Boudicca (otherwise spelling - Boadicea - Keith Hunt) A.D.61. Maelgwyn, or Patrick, the Apostle of Ireland and of the Isle of Man, born at Llantwit Major, Glamorganshire, A.D.363,(27) from whence he was taken prisoner and carried to Ireland, was, by tradition, a Culdee and the son-in-law of a bard;(28) by his own statement the son of a presbyter,(29) and grandson of a deacon, both of the British Church, St. Illtyds, Llantwit Major, to which was attached a college.(30)

Patrick's father, Calpurnius (not Patrick himself, as frequently erroneously stated), would appear to have been principal of this college, acting at the same time as an official of the Roman Empire, probably as broveratius, 'district justiciary and chief'. Patrick would, in such case, have early opportunity of acquiring a knowledge of Roman law and British Church government. Niall of the Nine Hostages, so-called because five provinces in Ireland and four in Scotia delivered hostages to him, changed the name of North Britain from Albania to Scotia at the request of a colony of the Dalriada, the Irish colonists who had been led by Fergus from Antrim to Argyllshire. Niall, in one of his raids, took Patrick prisoner from Llantwit Major to Ireland in A.D.379. The captive escaped to Gaul, returning to Ireland nearly fifty years later as a missionary revivalist.

St. Patrick is said to have introduced the use of the Latin language,(31) the previous missionaries having used chiefly Greek.(32) Latin, did not, however, rapidly supplant Greek. Professor H. Zimmer states: 'It is almost a truism to say that whoever knew Greek on the Continent in the days of Charles the Bald (tenth century), was an Irishman or was taught by an Irishman.(33)

Bede does not mention Patrick for the very obvious reason that the Culdee hierarchy, with its hereditary succession, was obnoxious to Bede as an earnest adherent of the novel Papal Church introduced in A.D.664, but he speaks of his contemporary, Palladius,(34) a Caledonian and a Culdee, who became like Ninian(35) an emissary of the Roman See, which was now resolutely setting itself to grasp the sceptre of universal dominion in the Christian Church. Baronius states: 'The bishops of Ireland were all schismatics, separated from the Church of Rome.'(36) Many saints of the British Church were, at a later date, claimed by the Latin Church, and legends undeserving of the slightest credence grew around their names. Those who owed nothing to Rome in connection with their conversion, and who long struggled against her pretensions, were later claimed by the Latin Church as though they had been her most devoted adherents. This is especially noticeable in the case of St. Patrick, whose conversion was the result of training in a British home, who was all his all his life a Culdee, yet is now given the greatest prominence in Roman Catholic hagiology. Deliberate confusion was created by the Papal Church between the Culdee St.Patrick of the fifth century and a later Patrick of the ninth century, who, according to the 'Chronicles of Ireland', was, in the year 850, Abbot of Ireland, Confessor. For there were two Patricks, the first a very learned and godly man, the second an abbot, given to superstition and founder of the fabulous Purgatory, which goes in Ireland under the name of St.Patrick's Purgatory. During a great rebellion in Ireland, Patrick the Abbot was compelled to flee the country. He fled into Britain and lies buried at Glastonbury. The Martyrology of Sarum reports that in Ireland they kept the feast of Patrick the Abbot on the 24th of August.(37) It was to this second Patrick that the Pope sent the pallium as a reward or his Romanizing zeal, its first appearance in Ireland.

The great St.Columba fourth in descent from Niall of the Nine Hostages, born A.D.522, about fifty years after the death of St. Patrick, was associated with the Church of Iona for thirty-two years, where he arrived from Ireland with his twelve disciples on Pentecost Eve in the year 565. We are here given another instance of the faithfulness of the Culdees to first foundations in the formation of a new settlement. 'Many of the Continental monasteries owed their foundations to Irish scholars. When St.Columba turned his back on Derry with the lament that is one of the loveliest of the ancient Irish poems, and founded the monastery at Iona, it was but the beginning of a movement which brought so many scholars to the Irish schools. But the claim of the Irish schools is not so much in the intricate treasure of their manuscripts, as in the other pattern which they wove into the history of Europe. Bangor was where Columbanus learnt his lighter Greek metres and the secret of his exquisite and melancholy prose.'(38)

The ancient service book of the Abbey of Bangor is still extant in the Ambrosian Library at Milan: it is entitled 'Antiphonary of Bangor'. The primitive church was fundamentally monastic; there was no papal jurisdiction in the primitive church in Ireland.(39) 'There was episcopacy in the Church but it was not diocesan episcopacy.'(40) In 'The Primitive Church of St. Peter' a bold attempt has been made by the author to 'Vaticanize' antiquity.(41)

The island called Inis-pan-Druidneach (Isle of Druids), the native name for Iona, was the abode of Druids whose predecessors had fled there from Roman Imperial persecution.(42) That eventually St.Columba and his disciples settled down with these Druids is a matter of history. They built a monastery for their own accommodation, and then with his missionary disciples St. Columba turned his attention to Scotland where Culdee missionaries had already taken the Gospel. Of St.Columba his friends tell of him that 'he was angelical in look, brilliant in speech, holy in work, clear in intellect and just in council' St.Columba did not recommend long fasts (any more than long faces), but would have the brethren eat every day, that they might be able to work and pray every day. One of his disciples and successors, Baithen, was distin- guished not only for his holy life but for his learning . 'Know', said a learned man of his time, 'that there is no one on this side of the Alps who is equal to him in knowledge of the Scriptures, and in the greatness of his learning.'(43) Montalembert said also: 'I do not compare the disciple with his master. Columba is not to be compared to philosophers and learned men, but with patriarchs and apostles.'(44) 'He (Columba) established the little kingdom of the Scots and set upon the throne the king - Aidan - whose lineal descendant today occupies the throne of Great Britain. Although only a presbyter, he reigned supreme over all the churches of his order. His power was absolute, and for many years after his death the Abbot and Culdees of hyona[Iona] gained so much favor and esteem of the people that even in their cloistered retreats they were at the head of all civil as well as ecclesiastical matters.(45)

Surrounded by the stormy Atlantic a more desolate abode could hardly be imagined than Iona, and were it not for the ruins of the monastery, and the graves of the Norse kings around it, the traveller would never guess that it had once been the resort of princes from distant lands and had echoed to the sound of prayers, psalms and anthems. For two hundred years Iona was the lighthouse for the western nations, whence missionaries went forth in all directions.

It is known that in Iona in ancient times a great collection of books was made, and it is an interesting fact of history that Fergus II Scotland, who in his youth assisted Alaric the Goth at the sack of Rome, A.D.410, brought away as part of the plunder some valuable 'geir"(46) and a chest of books which he afterwards presented to the monastery of Iona. This presentation was made 164 years before St.Columba's date - clear evidence that St. Columba's famous library was founded by the Druids.

AEnius Silvius, afterwards Pope Pius II, sent a legate to Scotland to ascertain if the lost books of Livy should be found among them. At a later date (1525) Master John Campbell, Treasurer to the King, found five old books which then consisted of nothing but broken leaves which were very difficult to read. Boece says that 'the reading sounded more like the eloquence of Salustius than of Livy.'(47)

Fergus 11 is not to be confused with Fergus MacEarc, sixth century, who with his followers from Reland settled in Calendonia. Fergus 11 (grandson of Ethodius, who was banished from Scotland and received by the King of Denmark) succeeded in recovering his birthright possessions and the crown of Scotland.(48)

An acquaintance with our ecclesiastical history will enable us to discover what we should naturally expect to find - that the government of the ancient Church of our land was the same as that of all other churches planted by the apostles, with whom it was in full communion.

1. Iola MSS., p. 343 2. Tertullian terms Bishops "Presidents", De Corona, Milit. 111, 4 (A.D.211). 3. Cyprian in Ep. II, applies the term Levite to a Presbyter. (A.D. 230.) 4. McCallum, History of Culdees, pp.158,159. 5. Book of Llandav, p.279. Topograph. Hebern. Distinct, III, Gap. XXIX. 6. Dugdale, Monasticon, Vol. I, p.2. D. McCallum, 'History of Culdees,' p.159. 7. Jamieson, 'History of Culdees,' p.35, note. 8. De Ex. Brit., CC. XXXIII-XXXVI. 9. James Macpherson, Fingal (Dissertation), p 7. McCallum, 'History of Culdees,' pp.158,159. 10.Jamieson's 'Culdees,' p. 25. I1.'History of the Druids,' pp.86,91. 12.Reeves, 'Life of Columba,' p.74. 'Tare Hill,' pp.205 208. 13.'Miscellanea Scotica,' Vol. II, p.133. 14.'Historic Collections,' p.121. 15.F. E. Warren, 'Liturgy and Ritual of the Celtic Church,' p.55. 16.Justin Martyr, 'Apology for the Christians.' A.D. 140. 17.Soc. History Eccles, III, 16. 18.Clement I. Epist. 4, quoted by Gratean. Decret I, 37, C.14. 19.See Helen Waddell, 'The Wandering Scholars,' XI and XVI. 20.Tillemont, Vol. IV, pp.508ff. Allard, 'La Persecution de Diocletian,' pp.40,41. 21.Haddon and Stubbs, Vol. I, p.32. Zosomen, 'History Eccles,' Vol. I, p.6. Fuller, 'Ch. History Britain,' Vol. I, p.20. 22.Gildas, 'De Exced Brit.' Sect. 10, p.10. 23.Mansi Conciliorum Nova et ampliss. Collectio II, p.476 (new ed.). Eusebius on Secrates, V, 23. Concelio Compiled (i) J.Crabbe. 24.Iolo MSS., pp.42,43. 25.Rev.R.W.Morgan, 'St. Paul in Britain,' p.161. 26.Hilar Pictav, 'De Synodis.' 27.See Fryer's 'Llantwit Major'. 28.Tirechan's 'St.Patrick.' 29.Styled "Presbyter" in 'Book of Durrow,' Vit Reeves ed., p. 242. 30.Cottonian MSS. Vespasian A, XIV, printed in Rees' 'Cambro British Saints.' 31.Scoll, 'De Eccles Brit. Scotor History Fontibus,' p.17. Haddan and Stubbs, 'Councils,' Vol. I, p.175, note. Tripartite 'Life of St. Patrick.' 32.Reeves, 'Adamnan,' p.354. 33.'Celtic Church in Britain and Ireland,' p.92. 34.'Eccles. History,' Chap. XIII. 35.'Vita Ninian' (Aibred), Cap. II, Bede 11, 4,5. 36.'Ecclesiastical Annals.' 37.Meredith Hanmer, A.D.1571. 38.Helen Waddell, 'Wandering Scholars,' p.33. 39.See 'The Celtic Church in Ireland,' by James Heron, D.D., pp. 162,163. 40.Skene's 'Celtic Scotland,' Vol. II, Bk. II, Chap. II, p.44. 41.Rev. Luke Rivington. 42.'Ency. Brit.' (eleventh edition), Vol. XIV, p.727. Llwyd, 'Isle of Mona,' p.49. 43.Fentan. 44.'Monks of the West,' Vol. III, p.93. 45.Fiona McLeod, 'Hist. of Iona.' 46.Celtic for treasure, usually armour or rich clothes. 47.Boece, 'Scotorium Historiae,' ed. J. Bellenden, 1531, p.252 48.Ibid.

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Next I will bring you the full account in Bede's "A History of the English Church and People" on the famous "Synod of Whitby" - which show that right up to 664 A.D. the Culdee ot British Church was observing the Passover (celebration of the Lord's death) on the Jewish date and NOT on Easter as the RC church was doing. It is a very interesting part of English "church history." The British church had LOST some of the original truth over the time of six centuries, but the ground of truth can been seen in this Synod of Whitby "church debate" that took place between the Church of Rome and the British (Culdee) Church.