and Persephone for the possession of Adonis, settled by the
agreement that he is to spend a third (or half) of the year
in the lower-world (the seed at first underground and then
reappearing above it), finds a parallel in the story of Tammuz
and Ishtar (see APHRODITE) The ceremony of the Adonia was
intended as a charm to promote the growth of vegetation,
the throwing of the gardens and images into the water being
supposed to procure a supply of rain (for European parallels see
Mannhardt). It is suggested (Frazer) that Adonis is not a
god of vegetation generally, but specially a corn-spirit,
and that the lamentation is not for the decay of vegetation
in winter, but for the cruel treatment of the corn by the
reaper and miller (cf. Robert Burns's John Barleycorn.)
All important element in the story is the connexion of
Adonis with the boar, which (according to one version) brings
him into the world by splitting with his tusk the bark of
the tree into which Smyrna was changed, and finally kills
him. It is probable that Adonis himself was looked upon
as incarnate in the swine, so that the sacrifice to him by
way of expiation on special occasions of an animal which
otherwise was specially sacred, and its consumption by its
worshippers, was a sacramental act. Other instances of a
god being sacrificed to himself as his own enemy are the
sacrifice of the goat and bull to Dionysus and of the bear to
Artemis. The swine would be sacrificed as having caused the
death of Adonis, which explains the dislike of Aphrodite for that
animal. It has been observed that whenever swine sacrifices
occur in the ritual of Aphrodite there is reference to Adonis.
In any vase, the conception of Adonis as a swine-god does not
contradict the idea of him as a vegetation or corn spirit, which
in many parts of Europe appears in the form of a boar or sow.
AUTHORITIES.--H. Brugsch, Die Adonisklage und das
Linoslied (Berlin, 1852); Grove, De Adonide (Leipzig,
1877); W. H. Engel, Kypros, ii. (1841), still valuable;
W. Mannhardt, Wald- und Feldkulte, ii. (1905); M. P.
Nilsson, Griechische Feste (Leipzig, 1906); articles in
Roscher's Lexikon and Pauly-Wissowa's Encyklopadie J.
G. Frazer, The Golden Bough, ii. (2nd ed.), p. 113, and
Adonis, Attis and Osiris (1906); L. R. Farnell, Cults of
the Greek States, ii. p. 646; W. Robertson Smith (Religion
of the Semites, new ed., 1894, pp. 191, 290, 411), who,
regarding Adonis as the swine-god, characterizes the Adonia
as an annual piacular sacrifice (of swine), ``in which the
sacrifice has come to be overshadowed by its popular and
dramatic accompaniments, to which the Greek celebration,
not forming part of the state religion, was limited.''
ADONIS, a genus of plants belonging to the natural order
Ranunculaceae, known commonly by the nomes of pheasant's
eye and Flos Adonis. They are annual or perennial
herbs with much divided leaves and yellow or red flowers.
Adonis autumnalis has become naturalized in some parts
of England; the petals are scarlet with a dark spot at the
base. An early flowering species, Adonis vernalis, with
large bright yellow flowers, is well worthy of cultivation.
It prefers a deep light soil. The name is also given to the
butterfly, Mazarine or Clifton Blue (Polyomreatus Adonis).
ADOPTIANISM. As the theological doctrine of the Logos which
bulks so largely in the writings of the apologists of the
2nd century came to the front, the trinitarian problem became
acute. The necessity of a constant protest against polytheism
led to a tenacious insistence on the divine unity, and the
task was to reconcile this unity with the deity of Jesus
Christ. Some thinkers fell back on the ``modalistic'' solution
which regards ``Father'' and ``Son'' as two aspects of the
same subject, but a simpler and more popular method was the
``adoptionist'' or humanitarian. Basing their views on the
synoptic Gospels, and tracing descent from the obscure sect
of the Alogi, the Adoptianists under Theodotus of Byzantium
tried to found a school at Rome c. 185, asserting that
Jesus was a man, filled with the Holy Spirit's inspiration
from his baptism; and sa attaining such a perfection of
holiness that he was adopted by God and exalted to divine
dignity. Theodotus was excommunicated by the bishop of
Rome, Victor, c. 195, but his followers lived on under a
younger teacher of the same name and under Artemon. while
in the Fast similar views were expounded by Beryllus of
Bostra and Paul of Samosata, who undoubtedly influenced
Lucian of Antioch and his school, including Arius and, later,
Nestorius. There is thus a traceable historical connexion
between the early adoptian controversy and the struggle
in Spain at the end of the 8th century, to which that name
is usually given. It was indeed only a renewal, under new
conditions, of the conflict between two types of thought, the
rational and the mystical, the school of Antioch and that of
Alexandria. The writings of Theodore of Mopsuestia had
become well known in the West, especially since the strife
over the ``three chapters'' (544-553), and the opposition
of Islam also partly determined the form of men's views on
the doctrine of Christ's person. We must further remember
the dyophysitism which had been sanctioned at the council of
Chalcedon. About 780 Ehpandus (b. 718), archbishop of
Toledo, revived and vehemently defended the expression
Christus Filius Dei adoptivus, and was aided by his much
more gifted friend Felix, bishop of Urgella. They held that
the duality of natutes implied a distinction between two
modes of sonship in Christ---the natural or proper, and the
adoptive. In support of their views they appealed to scripture
and to the Western Fathers, who had used the term ``adoption''
as synonymous with ``assumption'' in the orthodox sense; and
especially to Christ's fraternal relation to Christians--the
brother of God's adopted sons. Christ, the firstborn among
many brethren, had a natural birth at Bethlehem and also a
spiritual birth begun at his baptism and consummated at his
resurrection. Thus they did not teach a dual personality,
nor the old Antiochene view that Christ's divine exaltation was
due to his sinless virtue; they were less concerned with old
disputes than with the problem as the Chalcedon decision had left
it--the relation of Christ's one personality to his two natures.
Felix introduced adoptian views into that part of Spain which
belonged to the Franks, and Charlemagne thought it necessary
to assemble a synod at Regensburg (Ratisbon), in 792, before
which the bishop was summoned to explain and justify the new
doctrine. Instead of this he renounced it, and confirmed
his renunciation by a solemn oath to Pope Adrian, to whom
the synod sent him. The recantation was probably insincere,
for on returning to his diocese he taught adoptianism as
before. Another synod was held at Frankfort in 794,
by which the new doctrine was again formally condemned,
though neither Felix nor any of his followers appeared.
In this synod Alcuin of York took part. A friendly letter from
Alcuin, and a controversial pamphlet, to which Felix replied,
were followed by the sending of several commissions of clergy
to Spain to endeavour to put down the heresy. Archbishop
Leidrad (d. 816) of Lyons, being on one of these commissions,
persuaded Felix to appear before a synod at Aix-la-Chapelle
in 799. There, after six days' disputing with Alcuin, he again
recanted his heresy. The rest of his life was spent under the
supervision of the archbishop at Lyons, where he died in 816.
Elipapdus, secure in his see at Toledo, never swerved from
the adoptian views, which, however, were almost universally
abandoned after the two leaders died. In the scholastic
discussions of the 12th century the question came to the front
again, for the doctrine as framed by Alcuin was not universally
accepted. Thus both Abelard and Peter Lombard, in the interest
of the immutability of the divine substance (holding that God
could not ``become', anything), gravitated towards a Nestorian
position. The great opponent of their Christology, which
was known as Nihilianism, was the German scholar Gerhoch,
who, for his bold assertion of the perfect interpenetration
of deity and humanity in Christ, was accused of Eutychianism.
The proposition Deus non factus est aliquid secundum quod
est homo was condemned by a synod of Tours in 1163 and again
by the Lateran synod of 1179, but Adoptianism continued all
through the middle ages to be a source of theological dispute.
See A. Harnack, Hist. of Dogma, esp. vol. v. pp.
279-292; R. Ottley, The Doctrine of the Incarnation,
vol. i. p. 228 ff, vol. ii. pp. 151-161; Herzog-Hauck,
Realenclyk., art. ``Adoptianismus.'' (A. J. G.)
ADOPTION (Lat. adoptio, for adoptatio, from adoptare,
to choose for oneself), the act by which the relations of
paternity and filiation are recognized as legally existing
between persons not so related by nature. Cases of adoption
were very frequent among the Greeks and Romans, and the custom
was accordingly very strictly regulated in their laws. In
Athens the power of adoption was allowed to all citizens who
were of sound mind, and who possessed no male offspring of their
own, and it could be exercised either during lifetime or by
testament. The person adopted, who required to be himself
a citizen, was enrolled in the family and demus of the
adoptive father, whose name, however, he did not necessarily
assume. In the interest of the next of kin, whose rights
were affected by a case of adoption, it was provided that the
registration should be attended with certain formalities, and
that it should take place at a fixed time--the festival of the
Thargelia. The rights and duties of adopted children were
almost identical with those of natural offspring, and could
not be renounced except in the case of one who had begotten
children to take his place in the family of his adoptive
father. Adopted into another family, children ceased to
have any claim of kindred or inheritance through their
natural father, though any rights they might have through
their mother were not similarly affected. Among the Romans
the existence of the patria potestas gave a peculiar
significance to the custom of adoption. The motive to the
act was not so generally childlessness, or the gratification
of affection, as the desire to acquire those civil and
agnate rights which were founded on the patria potestas.
It was necessary, however, that the adopter should have no
children of his own, and that he should be of such an age
as to preclude reasonable expectation of any being born to
him. Another limitation as to age was imposed by the maxim
adoptio imitatur naturam, which required the adoptive
father to be at least eighteen years older than the adopted
children. According to the same maxim eunuchs were not
permitted to adopt, as being impotent to beget children for
themselves. Adoption was of two kinds according to the state
of the person adopted, who might be either still under the
patria potestas (alieni juris), or his own master (sui
juris). In the former case the act was one of adoption
proper, in the latter case it was styled adrogation,
though the term adoption was also used in a general sense to
describe both species. In adoption proper the natural father
publicly sold his child to the adoptive father, and the sale
being thrice repeated, the maxim of the Twelve Tables took
effect, Si pater filium ter venunduit, filius a patre liber
esto. The process was ratified and completed by a fictitious
