In St. Athanasius of Alexandria (298-373 AD), we already find a different assessment of both military service and killing in war. In his letter to the Egyptian ascetic elder Amoun, Athanasius writes: “We have different approaches to various life situations, depending on the specific circumstances, for example: it is not allowed to kill, but killing enemies (for Christians, there are no enemies!!! – V.A.) on the battlefield is both lawful and praiseworthy. Great honors are bestowed upon soldiers who are brave in battle, and columns are erected to proclaim their magnificent deeds. Thus, the same act, in light of time and circumstances, is not permitted, but in other favorable circumstances is allowed and permissible.” (St. Athanasius, when he wrote this (that it is permissible to kill in war!?) – was not in the Holy Spirit, was mistaken (see why saints make mistakes in I), or he did not say this at all, and it was later attributed to him by other “benefactors”; his spiritual teacher Anthony the Great says diametrically opposite: “Consider everything around you, and know that officials and rulers have power only over the body, not the soul, – and always keep this in mind. Therefore, when they command, for example, to kill or do something else inappropriate, unrighteous and harmful to the soul, you should not obey them, even if they torture the body…” (see Philokalia, vol. 2, 21)28. And those who compromised with the empire, sing a different, anti-Christian song).
If Athanasius the Great praised soldiers who kill for “a righteous cause”, another great saint of the fourth century, Ambrose of Milan (340-397 AD), already offers prayers for this “righteous cause” to be crowned with success. In his treatise “On Faith” (De Fide), addressed to his spiritual child, the emperor of the Western Roman Empire Flavius Gratian (359-383 AD), Ambrose offers prayers for the victory of Gratian’s legions over the Goths: “Through our own blood and our sufferings, we are now delivered from the deaths of confessors, from the punishment of priests and from the accusation of arrogant impiety… Not the war eagles, not the flight of birds precede the vanguard of our army, but Your Name, Lord Jesus, and reverence. This is no longer the land of infidels, but the land of confessors. Italy, Italy, often tempted, but never fallen. Italy, which Your Majesty has always defended, and now again saved from the barbarians. No hesitation in the minds regarding our emperor, but only firm faith (fides fixa). Show now (Lord) a clear sign of Your Majesty, so that he who believes that You are the true Lord of Hosts, and the Commander of the heavenly army, who believes that You are the true Power and Wisdom of God… let him (the emperor) receive support by Your Great Power (Tuae majestatis fultus auxilio) and merit victory (tropaea mereatur – literally “deserve the monument of victory”) for his faith.”
The 20-year-old Gratian and his army indeed needed support from above. The army already consisted of a significant number of Christians (baptized with water, not with the Holy Spirit! We remind this when we speak scholastically, so as not to forget and not start considering “Christians” as Christians!). Moreover, having renounced at the beginning of his reign the sacred title of “Pontifex Maximus”, which the Roman priests offered him, and throwing the statue of Victory out of the Roman Senate building (in 381 AD), Gratian counted on something more than the penances of Basil the Great or “permissible and allowed” by Athanasius the Great.
The period of “salvation from the barbarians” brings corrections in the understanding of this topic. To maintain the combat readiness of units and avoid desertion of Christians, as had been the case for centuries before, the 3rd Canon of the Council of Arles excommunicates not those who serve in the army, but “those who throw away their weapons in peacetime (in pace)” (the stewards-priests fully serve the empire – whatever music the emperor orders, they play, poor things!!!).
Basil the Great, who earlier proposed, despite the general euphoria about the new phenomenon – the Christian-loving army, to impose a three-year penance on those who shed blood, under new conditions somewhat softens his tone when it comes to soldiers “who defended justice and religion” and simply obeyed orders. With a missionary purpose, he had to recognize the legitimacy of defensive wars, although in the matter of personal defense he remains a strict pacifist: “Those who engage in battle with a robber, if they are not among the servants of the Church, should not be admitted to communion, if they belong to the clergy, they should be deposed from the order.”
Such a position of the Church could not but be welcomed by the Christian emperors. And it was mutual. A few centuries later, the Latin poet Corippus, in his panegyric to Justinian II, will speak of “divine honors, with which the Almighty Father adorned” the emperor (Pater Omnipotens divino ornauit honore), “multiplying Roman victories over the barbarians” (Barbara Romanos augebunt belle triumphos regnaque).