THE CHURCH AND THE MINISTRY
IN THE EARLY CENTURIES
The Eighteenth Series of
The Cunningham Lectures
by
Thomas Martin Lindsay, D.D.
Principal of the Glasgow College of
the United Free Church of Scotland
Hodder and Stoughton
London
1903
PREFACE
The aim of these Lectures is to pourtray
the organized life of the Christian Society as that was lived in the thousands of
little communities formed by the proclamation of the Gospel of our Lord during the
first three centuries.
The method of description has been to select writings which seemed
to reveal that life most clearly, and to group round the central sources of information
illustrative evidence, contemporary or other. The principle of selection has been
to take, as the central authorities, those writings which, when carefully examined,
reveal the greatest number of details. Thus, the Epistles of St. Paul, especially
the First Epistle to the Corinthians, have been chosen as furnishing the greatest
number of facts going to form a picture of the life of the Christian Society during
the first century, and the material derived from the other canonical writings such
as the Acts of the Apostles, the Apocalypse and the Pastoral Epistles, have been
arranged around them. Similarly the Didache, the Sources of the Apostolic Canons
and the Epistles of Ignatius have been selected for the light they throw on the
life and work of the Church during the second century. The Canons of
Hippolytus, supplemented by the writings of Irenaeus and of Tertullian, have furnished
the basis for the description of the organization during the first, and the Epistles
of Cyprian of Carthage for that of the second half of the third century.
The method used has
the disadvantage of making necessary some repetitions, which the form of Lectures
rendered the more inevitable; but it puts the reader in possession of the contemporary
evidence in the simplest way.
Quotations from the
original authorities have been given in English for the most part, and, as a
rule, the translations have been taken from well known versions—from the Ante-Nicene
Library, from the late Bishop Lightfoot’s translations of Clement of Rome and
of Ignatius, and from Messrs. Hitchcock and Brown’s version of the Didache.
This has been done after consultation with friends whose advice seemed to be
too valuable to be neglected.
Dr. Moberly, in his
eminently suggestive book, Ministerial Priesthood,
has warned all students of early Church History to beware of mental presuppositions,
unchallenged assumptions, hypotheses or postulates. The warning has been taken
with all seriousness, even when the perusal of his book has suggested the thought
that mental presuppositions, like sins, are more readily recognized in our neighbours
than in ourselves. I feel bound to admit that three assumptions or postulates
may be found underlying these lectures. Whether they are right or wrong the
reader must judge.
My first postulate is
this. I devoutly believe that there is a Visible Catholic Church of Christ consisting
of all those throughout the world who visibly worship the same God and Father,
profess their faith in the same Saviour, and are taught by the same Holy Spirit; but I do not see any Scriptural or even primitive warrant for insisting that
catholicity must find visible expression
in a uniformity of organization, of ritual of worship, or even of formulated
creed. This visible Church Catholic of Christ has had a life in the world historically
continuous; but
the ground of this historical continuity does not necessarily
exist in any one method of selecting and setting apart office-bearers who rule
in the Church; its basis is the real succession of the generations of faithful
followers of their Lord and Master, Jesus Christ. It is with devout thankfulness
that I can make this assumption with perfect honesty of heart and of head, because
it relieves me from the necessity—sad, stern and even hateful it must seem to
many pious souls who feel themselves under its power—of unchurching and of excluding
from the “covenanted” mercies of God, all who do not accept that form of Church
government which, to my mind, is truest to scriptural principles and most akin
to the ecclesiastical organization of the early centuries.
My second postulate
concerns the ministry: There is and must be a valid ministry of some sort in
the churches which are branches of this one Visible Catholic Church of Christ; but I do not think that the fact that the Church possesses an authority which
is a direct gift from God necessarily means that the authority must exist in
a class or caste of superior office-bearers endowed with a grace and therefore
with a power “specific, exclusive and efficient,” and that it
cannot be delegated to the ministry by the
Christian people. I do not see why the thought that the authority comes from
“above,” a dogmatic truth, need in any way Interfere with the conception that
all official ecclesiastical power is representative and delegated to the officials
by the membership and that it has its divine source in the presence of Christ
promised arid bestowed upon His people and diffused through the membership of
the Churches. Therefore when the question is put: “Must ministerial character
be in all cases conferred from above, or may it sometimes, and with equal validity, be evolved from below?” it appears to me that a fallacy
lurks in the antithesis. “From below” is used in the sense “from the membership of
the Church,” and the inference suggested by the contrast is that what comes
“from below,” i.e. from the membership of the Church, cannot come “from above,”
i.e. cannot be of divine origin, warrant and authority. Why not? May the Holy
Spirit not use the membership of the Church as His instrument? Is there no
real abiding presence of Christ among His people? Is not this promised Presence
something which belongs to the sphere of God and may it not be the source of
an authority which is “from above”? The fallacious antithesis has apparently
given birth to a formula,—that no valid ministry can be evolved from the membership
of the Christian congregation; and this formula has been treated as expressing
a dogmatic truth which has been compared with the truth of the dogma of the
Incarnation, and which has been used as a guiding principle in the interpretation
of the references in the New Testament writings and in other early Christian
literature to the origin and growth of the Christian ministry. Fortified by
this supposed dogmatic truth one Anglican divine can contentedly rest the Scriptural
warrant for the theory of “Apostolic Succession” and all the sad and stern
practical consequences he deduces from it, on an hypothesis and on a detail
in a parable, and another can find evidence for the same “gigantic figment” in a statement of Clement of Rome which describes the earliest missionaries
of the Christian Church doing what missionaries of all kinds, from those of
the Church of England to those of the Society of Friends, have done in all generations
to secure the well-being and continuance of the communities of believers who
have been converted to the faith of Jesus.
My third postulate belongs to an entirely different sphere from
the two already mentioned, but it has been so much in my mind that it ought to be mentioned.
It is that analogies in organization illustrative of the life of the primitive
Christian communities can be more easily and more safely found on the mission
fields of our common Christianity than among the details of the organized
life of the long established Churches of
Christian Europe. In the early centuries and on the Mission field we are studying
origins. It was my good fortune some years ago to spend twelve months in India,
examining there the methods, work and results of the Missions of the various
branches of the Church of Christ. One seemed at times to be transported back
to the early centuries, to hear and to see what the earliest writers had recounted
and described. Portions of the Didache, of
the Sources of the Apostolic Canons, of
the Canons of Hippolytus were living practices
there. One lived among scenes described by Tertullian and by Clement of Alexandria.
The Arabian Nights tell us of the fortunate possessor of a magic carpet who,
when seated on his treasure,
had only to wish it to be carried anywhere in space he desired. Historians might
long to be owners of a similar mat to carry them anywhen backwards and forwards
throughout the past centuries. A visit to the Mission field, especially to one
among a people of ancient civilization who have inherited those original speculations
which were the fertile soil out of which sprang the earliest Christian Gnosticism,
is the magic carpet which transports one back to the times of primitive Christianity.
The visitor sees the simple meaning of many a statement which seemed so hard
to understand with nothing but the ancient literary record to guide him He learns
to distrust some of the hard and fast canons of modern historical criticism,
and to grow somewhat sceptical about the worth of many of those “subjective
pictures” which some modern critics first construct and then use to estimate the
date, authorship and intention of
ancient documents. He learns that the modern western mind cannot so easily gauge
the oriental ways of thought as it persistently imagines. Modern missionary
work appears to me to be full of helpful illustrations of the life and organization
of the early centuries:
These Lectures are the fruit of long, careful, and, I trust,
reverent study of the literary remains of the early Christian centuries. The
last quarter of a century has brought many ancient documents to light which
were formerly unknown, and these have not been passed over. The extent of my
obligations to others may be seen in the notes; but the debt owed to such writers
as Bishop Lightfoot, Professor Harnack and Dr. Hort far exceeds what can be
acknowledged in such a way.
I have to express my sense of the great assistance given
to me by my old friend, the Rev. A. O. Johnston, D.D., who read the lectures
in MS., and who has also gone over the proofs with great care. The book owes
much to his labour and to his criticisms.
THOMAS M. LINDSAY.
EXTRACT DECLARATION OF TRUST.
March 1, 1862.
I, William Binny Webster,
late Surgeon in the H.E.I.C.S., presently residing in Edinburgh,—Considering
that I feel deeply interested in the success of the Free Church College, Edinburgh,
and am desirous of advancing the Theological Literature of Scotland, and for this end to establish
a Lectureship similar to those of a like kind connected with the Church
of England and the Congregational body in England, and that I have made over to the General Trustees of the Free Church of Scotland
the sum of £2,000 sterling, in trust, for the purpose of founding a Lectureship
in memory of the late Reverend William Cunningham, D.D., Principal of the Free
Church College, Edinburgh, and Professor of Divinity and Church History therein,
and under the following conditions, namely,—First, The Lectureship shall bear
the name, and be called, ‘The Cunningham Lectureship.’ Second,
The Lecturer shall be a Minister or Professor of the Free Church of Scotland,
and shall hold the appointment for not less than two years, nor more than three
years, and be entitled for the period of his holding the appointment to the
income of the endowment as declared by the General Trustees, it being understood
that the Council after referred to may occasionally appoint a Minister or Professor
from other denominations, provided this be approved of by not fewer than Eight
Members of the Council, and it being further understood that the Council are
to regulate the terms of payment of the Lecturer. Third, The Lecturer shall
be at liberty to choose his own subject within the range of Apologetical, Doctrinal,
Controversial, Exegetical, Pastoral, or Historical Theology, including what
bears on Missions, Home and Foreign, subject to the consent of the Council.
Fourth, The Lecturer shall be bound to deliver publicly at Edinburgh a Course
of Lectures on the subjects thus chosen at some time immediately preceding the
expiry of his appointment, and during the Session of the New College, Edinburgh; the Lectures to be not fewer than six in number, and to be delivered in presence
of the Professors and Students under such arrangements as the Council may appoint; the Lecturer shall be bound also to print and publish, at his own risk, not
fewer than
750 copies of the Lectures within a year after their delivery, and to deposit three
copies of the same in the Library of the New College; the form of the publication
shall be regulated by the Council. Fifth,
A Council
shall be constituted, consisting of (first) Two Members of their own body, to
be chosen annually in the month of March, by the Senatus of the New College,
other than the Principal; (second) Five Members to be chosen annually by the
General Assembly, in addition to the Moderator of the said Free Church of Scotland; together with (third) the Principal of the said New College for the time being,
the Moderator of the said General Assembly for the time being, the Procurator
or Law Adviser of the Church, and myself the said William Hinny Webster, or
such person as I may nominate to be my successor: the Principal of the said College to be Convener of
the Council, and any Five Members duly convened to be entitled to act notwithstanding
the non-election of others. Sixth, The duties of the Council shall be the following:—(first), To appoint the Lecturer and determine
the period of his holding the appointment, the appointment to be made before
the close of the Session of College immediately preceding the termination of
the previous Lecturer’s engagement; (second), To arrange details
as to the delivery of the Lectures, and to take charge of any additional income
and expenditure of an incidental kind that may be connected therewith, it being
understood that the obligation upon the Lecturer is simply to deliver the Course
of Lectures free of expense to himself. Seventh, The Council shall be at liberty,
on the expiry of five years, to make any alteration that experience may suggest
as desirable in the details of this plan, provided such alterations shall be
approved of by not fewer than Eight Members of the Council.
CHAPTER I
THE NEW TESTAMENT CONCEPTION OF THE CHURCH
And I say also unto thee,
that thou art Petros, and on this
petra I will build My Church (Ecclesia); and the gates of Hades shall not prevail
against it.”Matt. xvi. 18. Some modern critics (cf. Schmiedel in the Encyc.
Bibl., p. 3105) declare that this passage could not have come from the lips of our Lord
in the form in which it has been recorded, and in particular that He could not
have used the word “ecclesia”; the main reason given being that our Lord
sought to reform hearts and not external conditions. To argue from that statement,
however true it may be, that Jesus had no intention of founding a religious
community and could not have used the word “church,” seems to me
to be purely subjective and therefore untrustworthy reasoning. Besides, the
use of the word by St. Paul in Gal. i. 13, shows that St. Paul found the word
existing within Christian circles when he embraced the new faith; and to find
it in common use at so early a period entitles us, in my judgment, to trace
it back to Jesus Himself. The trend of modern criticism has been to place St.
Paul’s conversion much closer to the crucifixion than it was formerly held to
be. St. Paul implies that the words of the eucharistic formula (Mk. xiv. 22-24,
Matt. xxvi. 26-28) came from Jesus; he takes it for granted that every one
who becomes a Christian (himself included) must be baptized. We have thus, quite
independently of the Gospels or of the Acts, “church,” “baptism,”
“the eucharist”—all implying a religious community, all in common use at a time scarcely two years
after the death of our Lord, That entitles us to attribute them to Jesus Himself. Our Lord was far from
Galilee and farther from Jerusalem when He uttered these words. He was sojourning
in an almost wholly pagan land. The rocks overhanging the path were covered
with the mementos of a licentious cult; and in the neighbouring city of Caesarea
Philippi Herod Philip had built and consecrated a temple to the Emperor Augustus,
who was there worshipped as a god.Compare Josephus, Antiq. XV. x. 3; Bell. Jud. I, xxi. 3. See also
Schürer, Geschichte des Jüdischen Volkes (1898, 3rd ed.), ii. 158 f.; G. A. Smith,
Historical Geography of Palestine, p. 473 ff.; Wissowa, Religion and Kultus der Römer
(1902), p. 284, n. 3. It was among
scenes which showed the lustful
passions of man’s corrupt heart and the statecraft of Imperial Rome seating
themselves on the throne of God, that Jesus made to His followers the promise
which He has so marvellously fulfilled.
The word translated Church is Ecclesia—a
word that had a history
both theocratic and democratic, and that came trailing behind it memories both
to the Jews who were then listening to Him, and to the Greeks, who, at a later
period, received His Gospel. To the Jew, the Ecclesia had been the assembly of
the congregation of Israel,Numbers x. 2, 3. In the Old Testament two words are used to denote the assembling of
Israel, qāhāl and ’edāh; the former is translated “assembly” and the latter
“congregation” in the Revised Version. In the Septuagint ἐκκλησία
is almost always always used to translate qāhāl, and συναγωγὴ
to translate ’edāh. Both Greek words appear continually in the later Hellenistic
Judaism, and it is difficult to distinguish their meanings; but Schürer is inclined to think that συναγωγὴ
means the assembly of Israel as a matter of fact; while ἐκκλησία
has always an ideal reference attached to it. Compare Schürer, Geschichte des Jüdischen Volkes (3rd ed. 1898), ii.
432, n. 10; Hort, The Christian Ecclesia, pp. 5-7. summoned to meet at the door of the Tabernacle
of Jehovah by men blowing silver trumpets. To the Greek the Ecclesia was the sovereign assembly
of the free Greek city-state,This is the common use of the word in classical Greek; in the later Greek the word
denotes any popular assembly, even a disorderly one; it is this use that is
found in Acts xix. 41. Dio Cassius uses the word to denote the Roman comitia
or ruling popular assembly of the sovereign Roman people. The ruling idea in
the word, whether in classical or in Hellenistic Greek, is that it denotes
an assembly of the people, not of a committee or council. Against this view
compare Hatch, The Organization of the Early Christian Churches (1881), p. 30,
n. 11; and for a criticism of Hatch, see Sohm, Kirchenrecht (1892), i. 17, n. 4. summoned by the herald blowing his
horn through the streets of the town. To the followers of Jesus it was to be
the congregation of the redeemed and therefore of the free, summoned by His
heralds to continually appear in the presence of their Lord, who was always
to be in the midst of them. It was to be a theocratic democracy.
The New, if it is to be lasting,
must always have its roots in the Old; and the phrase “My Ecclesia” recalled
the past and foretold the future. The roots were the memories the word brought
both to Jew and to Greek; and the promise and the potency of the future lay
in the word “My.” The
Ecclesia
had been the congregation
of Jehovah; it was in the future, without losing anything of what it had possessed,
to become the congregation of Jesus the Christ. Its heralds, like James, the
brother of our Lord, could apply to it the Old Testament promises, and see in
its construction the fulfilment of the saying of Amos about the rebuilding of
the Tabernacle of David;Acts xv. 16; cf. Amos ix. 11. or, like St. Paul, could call it the
“Israel of God,” and repeat concerning it the prayer of the Psalm, “Remember
thine ecclesia, which Thou hast purchased
of old, which Thou hast redeemed to be the tribe of Thine inheritance.”Gal. vi. 16; Acts xx. 28; cf. Ps. lxxiv. 2.
It had been the self-governing Greek republic, ruled by elected office-bearers; hereafter the communities of Christians, which were to be the
ecclesiae, were to be little self-governing societies where the individual rights and responsibilities of the members would
blend harmoniously with the common good of all.
The word with
its memories and promises appealed to none of our Lord’s “Sent Ones” more
strongly than to St. Paul, who was at once an “Hebrew of the Hebrews,” and
the apostle to the Gentiles. The term “ecclesia” has its home in the Pauline
literature.Weizsäcker, Jahrbücher für deutsche Theologie, xviii, 481. It is met with 110 times within the New Testament, and of these
86 occur in the Epistles of St. Paul and in the Acts of the Apostles. We naturally
turn to the writings of St. Paul to aid us in expounding the thought which is
contained in the term. When we do so we are entitled to say that the conception contains at least five different ideas which embody
the essential features of the “Church of Christ.”
The New Testament Church is fellowship with Jesus and with
the brethren through Him; this
fellowship is permeated with a sense of unity; this united fellowship is to
manifest itself in a visible society; this visible society has bestowed upon
it by our Lord a divine authority; and it is to be a sacerdotal society. These
appear to be the five outstanding elements in the New Testament conception of
the Church of Christ.
1. The Church of Christ is a fellowship. It is a fellowship with
Jesus Christ; that is the divine element in it. It is a fellowship with the
brethren; that is the human element in it. The Rock on which the Church was
to be built was a man confessing—not the man apart from his confession,
as Romanists insist, nor the confession apart from the man, as many Protestants
argue. It was a man in whom long companionship with Jesus and the revelation
from the Father had created a personal trust in His Messianic mission;The rock on which the Church is founded is
“a human character acknowledging our Lord’s divine Sonship.” Gore,
The Church and the Ministry, 3rd ed. p. 38. “In virtue of this personal faith vivifying their discipleship, the
Apostles became themselves the first little Ecclesia, constituting a living
rock upon which a far larger and ever enlarging Ecclesia should very shortly
be built slowly up, living stone by living stone, as each new faithful convert
was added to the society.” Hort, The Christian Ecclesia, p. 17. and
the faith which had grown out of the fellowship had the mysterious power of
making the fellowship which had created it more vivid and real; for faith,
in its primitive sense of personal trust, is fellowship become self-conscious.
Faith is what makes fellow-ship know itself to be fellowship, and not haphazard
social intercourse.
The faith of Peter, seer as he was into divine mysteries, and prophet
as he was, able to utter what he had seen, did not involve a very adequate apprehension of the fellowship
he had confessed. He knew so little about its real meaning that shortly
after his confession he made a suggestion which would have destroyed it;Matt xvi. 22, 23. The suggestion of the Evil One to Peter, and presented to our Lord
by Peter—the possibility of Messiahship without suffering—met
the Saviour at the great moments of His earthly ministry;
at the beginning, in the Temptation scene; here, when he had the vision
and gave the promise of the Church; at the end, in the Garden of Gethsemane. There
are indications in the Gospels that it was the temptation never absent from
his mind. In the form in which it presents itself to His followers—the possibility
of saving fellowship with Jesus apart from trust on a suffering Saviour—it has
perhaps also been the crowning temptation of His Church and followers. If our
Lord alluded to this special temptation when He said to St. Peter, near the
end, “Simon, Simon, behold Satan asked to have you that he might sift you as
wheat,” as is most likely from His references to His own temptations and to St. Peter’s
relation to his brethren, there is a delicate suggestion of fellowship softening
rebuke and vivifying the promise; Luke xxii. 31.
a thought prompted by the Evil One succeeded the revelation
from the Father—so strangely and swiftly do inspirations of God and temptations
of the Devil succeed each other in the minds of men. The sad experience of Peter
has been shared by the Church in all generations. He did not cease to be the
Rock-Man in consequence; nor has the promise failed the Church which was founded
on him and on his confession, although it has shared his weakness and sin.
St. Paul rings the changes on this thought of fellowship with Jesus which makes the Church.
The churches addressed in his epistles are described as in
Christ Jesus. He is careful to impress on believers the personal relation in which they stand to their Lord,
even when he is addressing the whole Church to which they belong. If he writes
to the Church of God which is in Corinth,1 Cor. i. 2. he is careful to add “to them that
are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints”; and in his other epistles
he addresses the brethren individually as “saints,” “saints and faithful brethren,”
“all that are in Rome, beloved of God, called to be saints.”Phil. i. 1; Eph. i. 1; Col. i. 2; Rom. i. 7. The
individual believer is never lost in the society, and he is never alone and
separate. The bond of union is not an external framework impressed from without,
but a sense of fellowship springing from within. The believer’s union to Christ,
which is the deepest of all personal things, always involves something social,
The call comes to him singly, but seldom solitarily.
Perhaps, however, St. Paul’s conception
of the fellowship with Christ which is the basis of the Church, comes out most
clearly in the way he speaks of the “gifts” of grace, the charismata, which manifest the abiding
presence of our Lord in His Church and His continuing fellowship with His people.1 Cor. xii.; Eph. iv. 4-13; Rom. xii. 3-16. It is important to notice that
St. Paul, in Rom. xii. 7, makes διακονία a “gift” which manifests
the presence of Christ, and that this word is used to mean any kind of “ministry”
within the Church. See below p. 62.
He enumerates them over and over again. He points to “apostles,” the missionary
heralds of the Gospel; to “prophets,” to whom the Spirit had given special
powers for the edification of the brethren; to “teachers,” who are wise with
the wisdom of God, and have those divine intuitions which the apostle calls
“knowledge”; to “pastors,” who feed the flock in one community. He speaks
of “helps” (ἀντιλήψεις) or powers to assist the
sick, the tempted and the tried; of “insight” to give wise counsels; of
gifts of rule (κυβερνήσεις); of gifts of healing, and
in general of all kinds of service. They are all gifts of the Spirit, and are
all so many different manifestations of the presence of Jesus and of the living
fellowship which His people have with Him.See p. 63 n.
These various gifts are bestowed
on different members of the Christian society for the edification of all, and
they serve to show that it is one organism, where the whole exists for the parts,
and each part for the whole and for all the other parts. They also show that
the Christian society is not a merely natural organism; there is divine life
and power within it, because it has the abiding
presence of Christ; and the proof of His presence is the possession
and use of these various “gifts,” all of which come from the one Spirit of
Christ in fulfilment of the promise that He will never leave nor forsake His
Church. Their presence is a testimony to the presence of the Master which each
Christian community can supply. It is a Church of Christ if His presence is
manifested by these fruits of the Spirit which come
from the exercise of the “gifts” which the Spirit has bestowed upon it; for the
Church as well as the individual Christian is to be known by its fruits.For St. Paul’s statement about the “gifts’: compare Hort, The Christian Ecclesia,
pp. 153-70; Heinrici, Das Erste Sendschreiben des Apostel Paulus an die Korinther (1880), pp. 347-463; Kühl,
Die Gemeindeordnung in den Pastoralbriefen (1885), pp. 42-49.
This sense of hidden fellowship with its Lord was the secret of the Church. It was a bond
uniting its members and separating them from outsiders more completely than
were the initiated into the pagan mysteries sundered from those who had not
passed through the same introductory rites. While Jesus lived their fellowship
with Him was the external thing which distinguished them from others. They
were His disciples (μαθηταὶ) gathered round a centre,
a Person whom they called Rabbi, Master, Teacher—names they were taught not
to give to another. They shared a common teaching and drank in the same words
of wisdom from the same lips; but even then they could not be called a “school,”
for they were united by the bond of a common hope and a common future. They
were to share in the coming kingdom of God in and through their relation to
their Master. After His departure the other side of the fellowship became the
prominent external thing—their relation to each other because of their relation
to their common Lord. New names arose to express the change, names suggesting
the relation in which they stood to each other. They were the “brethren,” the
“saints,” and they had a fellowship (κοινωνία)
with each other.Weizsäcker, The Apostolic Age (English translation), I. p. 44 ff. This thought of fellowship, as we shall see, was the ruling idea in all Christian organization.
All Christians within one community were to live in fellowship with each other; different Christian communities were to have a common fellowship. Visible
fellowship with each other, the outcome of the hidden fellowship with Jesus,
was to be at once the leading characteristic of all Christians and the bond
which united them to each other and separated them from the world lying outside.
2. The second characteristic of the Church of Christ is that it is a Unity.
There was one assembly of the congregation of Israel; one sovereign
assembly of the Greek city-state. There is one Church of Christ.
It must be admitted
that the word Church is seldom used
in the New Testament to designate one universal and comprehensive society.
On the contrary, out of the 110 times in which the word occurs, no less than
100 do not contain this note of a wide-spreading unity. In the overwhelming
majority of cases the word “church” denotes a local Christian society, varying
in extent from all the Christian congregations within a province
of the Empire to a small assembly of Christians
meeting together in the house of one of the brethren. St. Paul alone,It ought to be noted, however, that although we do not find the word “ecclesia” in
1 Peter, we do find the thought of the unity of all believers strongly expressed
in a variety of ways: “Ye are an elect race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation,
a people for God’s own possession” (1 Peter ii. 9); and in v. 17
we have the word “brotherhood” used to bring out the same idea: This word
in the early centuries was technically used as synonymous with ecclesia. See below p. 21. The double meaning
of ecclesia is found in Matt. xvi. 18 compared with
Matt. xviii. 17. In the Apocalypse the unity is expressed in the phrase “the
Bride, the Lamb’s wife,” and the plurality in the “Seven Churches” (Rev. xxi. 9;
ii. 1, etc).
if we except the one instance in Matt. xvi., uses the word in its universal
application; and he does it in two epistles only—those to the Ephesians and
to the Colossians—both of them dating from his Roman captivity.The various passages in which the word “ecclesia” occurs in the sense of the Christian
society have often been collected and grouped. The following classification is based on that of Dr. Hort.
i. The word “ecclesia,” in the singular and with the article, is used to denote:—
1. The original Church of Jerusalem and Judea, when there was no other; Acts v. 11;
viii. 1, 3; Gal. i. 13; 1 Cor. xv. 9;
Phil. iii. 6.
2. The sum total of the churches in Judea, Samaria and Galilee; Acts ix. 31.
3. The local church:—Jerusalem, Acts xi. 22; xii. 1, 5;
xv. 4. Thessalonica, 1 Thess. i. 1;
2 Thess. i. 1. Corinth, 1 Cor. i. 2;
vi. 4; xiv. 12, 23; 2 Cor.
i. 1; Rom. xvi. 23. Cenchrea, Rom. xvi. 1. Laodicea, Col. iv. 16.
Antioch, Acts xiii. 1; xv. 2. Each of the Seven Churches of Asia,
Rev. ii. iii. Ephesus,
Acts xi. 26; xiv. 27; xx. 17;
1 Tim. v. 16. Caesarea, Acts xviii. 22. Also in Jas. v. 14;
3 John 9, 10.
4. The assembly of a local church:—Acts xv. 22; 1 Cor. xiv. 23.
5. The House Church:—at Ephesus, 1 Cor. xvi. 19; at Rome,
xvi. 5; at Colossae, Col. iv. 15; Philem. 2.
ii. The word “ecclesia,” in the singular and without the article, is used to denote:—
1. Every local church within a definite district:—Acts xiv. 23.
2. Any or every local Church:—1 Cor. xiv. 4; iv. 17;
Phil. iv. 15; and probably 1 Tim. iii. 5, 15.
3. The assembly of the local church:—1 Cor. xiv. 19, 35;
xi. 18; 3 John 6.
iii. The word “ecclesia” in the plural is used to denote:—
1. The sum of the local churches within a definite district. the name being given or implied:—Judea,
1 Thess. ii. 14; Gal. i. 22. Galatia, 1
Cor. xvi. 1; Gal. i. 2. Syria and Cilicia, Acts xv. 41. Derbe and
Lystra, Acts xvi. 5. Macedonia, 2 Cor. viii. 1, 19. Asia,
1 Cor. xvi. 19; Rev. i. 4, 11, 20; ii. 7, 11, 17, 29;
iii. 6, 13, 22; xxii. 16.
2. An indefinite number of local churches:—2 Cor. xi. 8, 28;
viii. 23, 24; Rom. xvi. 4, 16.
3. The sum total of all the local churches:—2 Thess. i. 4;
1 Cor. vii. 17; xi. 16;
xiv. 33; 2 Cor. xii. 13.
4. The assemblies of all the local churches:—1 Cor. xiv. 34.
iv. The word “ecclesia” is used in the singular to denote:—
1. The one universal Church as represented in the individual local Church:—l Cor. x. 32;
xi. 22; (and probably) xii. 28;
Acts xx. 28; (and perhaps) 1 Tim. iii. 5, 15.
2. The one universal Church absolutely:—Col. i. 18, 24; Eph. i. 22;
iii. 10, 21; v. 23, 24, 25, 27, 29, 32.
Compare also Bannerman, The Scripture Doctrine of the Church, p. 571 ff.; Hort, The Christian Ecclesia, pp. 116-118.
But there are
numberless indications that the thought of the unity of the Church of Christ was never
absent from the mind of the Apostle. The Christians he addresses are all brethren, all saints, whether
they be in Jerusalem, Damascus, Ephesus or Rome. The believers in Thessalonica
are praised because they had been “imitators of the churches of God which are
in Judea,” who “are in Jesus Christ “ as the Thessalonians “are in Jesus Christ.”1 Thess. ii. 14; cf. i. 1.
The Epistles to the Corinthians are full of exhortations to unity within the local
church, and the warnings are always
based on principles which suggest the unity of the whole wide fellowship of
believers. The divisions in the church at Corinth had arisen from a misguided
apostolic partizanship which implied a lack of belief in Christian unity at
the centre; the apostle repudiates this by holding forth the unity of Christ,
and by pointing to the one Kingdom of God to be inherited.1 Cor. i. 12, 13; vi. 9. He has the same
message for all the local churches. However varied in environment they
may be, these local churches have common
usages, and ought to unite in showing a common sympathy with each other.1 Cor. iv. 17; vii. 17;
xi. 2, 23; xvi. l.
Besides these minor indications
of the thought, we have, in various of his epistles what may be called its poetic
expression. The Church of Christ is such a unity that it has thrown
down all the walls of race, sex, and social
usages which have kept men separate.Gal. iii. 28. It has reconciled Jew and Gentile.
It has bridged the gulf between the past of Israel and the present of apostolic
Christianity.Rom. xi. 17.
These thoughts and phrases, which run through all the epistles
of St. Paul, lead directly to the description of the glorious unity of the one
Church of Christ which fills the great Epistle to the Ephesians. Thus, though
it is true that we cannot point to a single use of the word “church” in the
earlier epistles which can undoubtedly be said to mean a universal Christian
society, the thought of this unity of all believers runs through them all. The
conception of the unity of the Church of Christ is one of the abiding possessions
of St. Paul in the earliest as in the latest of his writings; but it is only
in the writings of his Roman captivity that it attains to its fullest expression.Professor Ramsay traces a growth of definiteness in St. Paul’s use of the word “Church” from its application to a single congregation to its use to denote what he
calls the “Unified Church,” and ingeniously connects the use in each case
with political parallels. Thus the phrase “the Church of the Thessalonians” corresponds in civil usage to the ecclesia
of the Greek city-state, while the phrase “the Church in Corinth,” suggesting as it does,
“the Church” in other places as well as in Corinth, corresponds in civil usage to a universal and all-embracing political organization
like the Roman Empire. Ramsay, St. Paul the Traveller, pp. 124-7.
Whether this be true or not, few will fail to find a connexion between the wide
meaning the apostle puts into the word “Church” in the Epistles to the Ephesians
and to the Colossians, and the imperial associations of the city from which
he wrote. “Writing now from Rome, he (St. Paul) could not have divested himself, if he would, of a sense of writing
from the centre of all earthly human affairs; all the more since we know from the narrative
in Acts xxii. that he himself was a Roman citizen, and apparently proud to hold
this place in the Empire. Here then he must have been vividly reminded of the
already existing unity which comprehended both Jew and Gentile under the bond
of subjection to the emperor at Rome, and similarity and contrast would alike
suggest that a truer unity bound together in one society all believers in the
crucified Lord.” Hort, The Christian Ecclesia, p. 143.
This unity of the Church of Christ which filled the mind of St. Paul was something essentially
spiritual. It is a reality, but a reality which is more ideal than material.
It can never be adequately represented in a merely historical way. It is true
that we can trace the beginnings of the formation of Christian communities,
and the gradual federation of these Christian societies into a wide-spreading
union of confederate churches; but that only faintly expresses the thought
of the unity of the Church of Christ. It is true that we can see in the fellowship
of Christians the illustration of the pregnant philosophical thought that it
is not good for man to be alone, and that personality itself can only be rightly
conceived when taken along with the thought of fellowship.“Not in abstraction or isolation, but in communion lies the very meaning of personality
itself,” Moberly, Ministerial Priesthood, p. 5. “Fellowship is to the higher life what
food is to the natural life—without it every power flags and at last perishes,”
Hort, Hulsean Lectures, p. 194. Apart, however,
from all surface facts and philosophical ideas, there is something deeper in
the unity of the Christian Church, something which lies implicitly in the unformed
faith of every believer, that in personal union with Christ there is union with
the whole body of the redeemed, and that man is never alone either in sin or
in salvation.
The unity of the Church of Christ is a primary
verity of the Christian faith: “There is One Body, and One Spirit, even as
ye are called in one hope of your calling; One Lord, One Faith, One Baptism,
One God and Father of all, Who is over all and through all and in all.”Eph. iv. 4-6.
And because the Unity of the Church of Christ is a primary verity of the Christian faith, it can never
be adequately represented in any outward polity, but must always be, in the
first instance at least, a religious experience. Its source and centre can never
be an earthly throne, but must always be that heavenly place where Jesus sits
at the Right Hand of God.This thought has been beautifully expressed by Dr. Sanday,
The Conception of Priesthood (1898), pp. 11-14.
This enables us to see how the word “church” can be used, as it is in the New Testament, to denote
communities of varying size, from the sum total of all the Christian communities
on earth down to the tiny congregation which met in the house of Philemon.
For the unity of the Christian Church is, in the first instance, the oneness
of an ideal reality, and is not confined within the bounds of space and time
as merely material entities are. It can be present in many places at the same
time, and in such a way that, as Ignatius says, “Where Jesus Christ is, there
is the whole Church.”To the Smyrnaeans, 8. The congregation
at Corinth was, in the eyes of St. Paul, the Body of Christ or the whole Church
in its all-embracing unity—not a Body of Christ, for there is but one Body of
Christ; not part of the Body of Christ, for Christ is not divided; but
the Body of Christ in its unity and filled with the fulness of His powers.Exegetes differ about the exact translation of 1 Cor. xii. 27:
ὑμεῖς δέ ἐστε σῶμα Χριστοῦ
A few (such
as Godet) translate it: “a body of Christ”; by far the largest number translate: “the Body of
Christ”; many “Christ’s
Body,” leaving the exact thought indeterminate. It seems to me that the exact rendering, a or the,
cannot be reached from purely grammatical reasoning. St. Paul is completing his metaphor
or interpreting his parable, He has been emphasizing the fact that the
Christian community at Corinth is an organism with a variety of parts differing in structure
and function. It is a perfect organism in the sense that there is no necessary
part lacking that is required for the purpose the organism is intended, to serve
for its support or increase or for work. The life which pervades the organism
in its totality and in every minutest part is Christ (Col. iii. 14). The organism
is the Body of Christ.
It is in this One Body, present in every Christian society, that our Lord has placed His
“gifts” or charismata, which enable the Church to
perform its divine functions; and all the spiritual actions of the tiniest
community, such as the Church in the house of Nymphas—Prayer, Praise, Preaching,
Baptism, the Holy Supper—are actions of the whole Church of Christ.
The Christians of the early centuries clung to this thought, and we have a long series of writers,
from Victor of Rome,“Este potius . . . Christianus, pecuniam tuam adsidente Christo
spectantibus angelis et martyris praesentibus super mensam dominicam sparge.” De Aleatoribus,
11; Harnack and v. Gebhardt, Texte u. Untersuchungen, V. i. 29. in the second century, down to Clement of Alexandria and
Origen,Origen, De Or. 31:—“Καὶ ἀγγελικῶν δυνάμεων ἐφισταμένων τοῖς
ἀθροίσμασι τῶν πιστευόντων καὶ αὐτοῦ τοῦ κυρίου καὶ σωτῆρος ἡμῶν
δυνάμεως ἤδη δὲ καὶ πνευμάτων ἁγίων, οἶμαι δὲ, ὅτι καί προκεκοιμημένων·
σαφὲς δὲ, ὅτι καὶ ἐν τῶ βίῳ περιόντων, εἰ καὶ τὸ πῶς οὐκ εὐχερὲς εἰπεῖν.” who tell us that the whole Church of the redeemed, with Christ and the
angels, is present in the public worship of the individual congregation. The
promise of the Master, that where two or three were gathered together in His
Name there would He be in the midst of them, was placed side by side with the
thought in the Epistle to the Hebrews that believers are surrounded with a great
cloud of witnesses; and the combination suggested that in the simplest action
of the smallest Christian fellowship there was the presence and the power of the whole Church of Christ.
Tertullian pushes the thought to its furthest limits when he says in a well-known
passage: “Accordingly, where there is no joint session of the ecclesiastical
order, you Offer, Baptize, and are Priest alone for yourself; for where three
are there the Church is, although they be laity.”Tertullian, De exhortatione castitatis, 7; compare De poenitentia, 10; De pudicitia, 21;
De fuga in persecutione, 14.
3. The Church of our Lord’s promise was to be a visible community.
This note of visibility is suggested by the word ecclesia itself, and by the whole environment of its earliest Christian
use.
The “congregation of Israel” and the “sovereign assembly”
of the Greek city-state had been visible things. The time of the promise suggested
a visible community. It came when the visible people of Israel had manifestly
refused to accept Jesus as the Messiah. His Church was set over against the
Israel which had denied Him—one visible community against another. The earliest uses of the word
ecclesia refer unmistakably to visible communities. When St. Paul persecuted the “Church of God,” he made
havoc of something more than an abstraction. He haled men and women to prison
and confined real bodies within real stone walls. The churches spoken of in
the Acts and in the Epistles were societies of men and women, living in families,
coming together for public worship, and striving in spite of many infirmities
to live the life of new obedience to which they had been called. They were little
societies in the world, connected with it on all sides and yet not of
it—lamps set on lamp-stands to enlighten the darkness of surrounding
paganism. The “gifts” of the Spirit, which manifested the presence of Christ,
were seen at work in the public assembly of the congregation, and were given
to edify a visible society.
The two universal rites of the new society—Baptism and the
Lord’s Supper—show that it was a visible thing. St. Paul makes it
clear that entrance into the Church was by the visible rite of Baptism, and
that he himself had come into the Church by this door.Rom. vi. 3-8.; Gal. iii. 27. The Lord’s Supper was
a visible social institution, and could only occupy the place it did in a visible
society.2 Cor. xi. 23-27.
Even the Church Universal, which is described in the Epistle to the Ephesians, is a visible
Church. It is an ideal reality; but an ideal Church is not
invisible because it is ideal. It can be seen in any Christian community, great or small; seen in a
measure by the eye of sense, but more truly by the eye of faith. For it is one
of the privileges of faith, when strengthened by
hope and by love, to see the glorious ideal in the somewhat
poor material reality. It was thus that St. Paul saw the universal Church of Christ
made visible in the Christian community of Corinth.
St. Paul has described the Church in that great trading and manufacturing city
of Corinth, where the rich were very rich and the poor were very poor; where
the thoroughness of character, inherited from the early Roman colonists, had
pushed the sensuous side of Greek civilization into all manner of excesses,
until the city had become a by-word for foul living, and religion itself had
become an incentive to lust.Compare Dobschütz, Die Urchristlichen Gemeinden, Sittensgeschichtliche Bilder (1902), pp. 18 ff. This environment had tainted the Christian society.
St. Paul saw it all and has described it. He has made us see the very Love-feasts,
which introduced the Holy Supper, changed into banquets
of display on the part of the rich, while the poor were swept
into corners or compelled to wait till their wealthier brethren were served. He
has shown us petty rivalries disguising themselves under the mask of faithfulness to eminent apostolic teachers. He has depicted the tainted morals of the
city appearing unchecked within the Christian society. What a picture the heathen
satirist Lucian, with his keen eye and his outspoken tongue, would have drawn
of such a community! St. Paul saw all the frailty, the feebleness to resist the
evil communications and the fickleness; and yet he saw in that community
the Body of Christ. He needed the love that “beareth all things, that believeth all things, and
that hopeth all things,” to make his vision clear—and that is perhaps the reason
why the wonderful chapter on Christian love comes in the middle of this epistle;
but his vision was clear, and he saw the life there with its
potency and promise. He could say to that Church Ye are the Body of Christ. He
could see it, as he saw the Ephesian Church,
becoming gradually rooted and grounded in love, gradually strengthened to apprehend
with all saints the height, the depth, the length and the breadth of that love
of Christ which passeth knowledge, and at last filled with all the fulness of God.
All things earthly have a double element, whether they be of good or evil report.
They are in the present and they are making for the future. They are what they
are to be. It is the same with all things belonging to Christianity on the human
side. We are “sons of God,” and yet we “wait for the adoption”; we are
redeemed, and yet our redemption “draweth nigh.” Those who “have been
saved” are enjoined to “work out their own salvation.”
So it is with the Church of God. It is what it is to be.Compare Robertson, Regnum Dei, p. 54:—“It (the kingdom of Christ) is the Kingdom of God in its idea—in potency
and in promise: but visibly and openly not yet. This is St. Paul’s
well-known paradox of the Christian life. Our whole task as Christians is to
become what we are.” And we are definitely
taught by the very ways in which St. Paul uses the word “ Church “ to see the
Church Universal in the individual Christian community.As in 1 Cor. x. 32; xi. 22;
and xii. 28; compare above p. 11, note 2, § iv. 1.
It will be admitted, however, that ideals are given us to be made manifest to
the eye of sense as well as to the vision of faith. and that a
duty is laid upon every Christian and upon every Christian society
to make the universality of the Church of Christ which is manifest to faith
plainly apparent to the eyes of sense. If the duty has been but scantily performed
since the beginning of the third century, we may find that the neglect has come
from abandoning apostolic methods in favour of others suggested by the great
pagan empire of Rome. The duty of trying to make visible to the senses the inherent
unity of the Church of Christ was always distinctly present to the mind of the
great apostle to the Gentiles, and it may be useful to see how he set himself
to the task.
One thing meets us at the outset. He would not for the sake
of an external universality agree to anything which would set limits on the
real universality of the Church of Christ. The preservation of the liberty with
which Jesus had made His people free was of more importance in His eyes than
the manifestation of the visibility of the universal fellowship of Christians
with each other. Jewish believers were inclined to think that the practice of
circumcision “embodied the principle of the historical continuity of the Church,”The principle which underlies the claim generally associated with the ambiguous
phrase “apostolic succession” is so curiously like the demand made by “those
of the sect of the Pharisees who believed” in the, days of St. Paul, that it
can be most naturally expressed in the same language if only a “succession
of bishops” takes the place of “circumcision.”
and that no one who was outside the circle of the “circumcised,” no matter
how strong his faith nor how the fruits of the Spirit were
manifest in his life and deeds, could plead the “security of the Divine Covenant,”
For this they could give reasons stronger than are brought forward by many who,
in our own day, insist on different external “successions” as marks of catholicity.
The Scripture had said: “My covenant shall be in your flesh, an everlasting
covenant.”Gen. xvii. 13. The Saviour himself had been circumcised on the eighth
day. He had never, in so many words, either publicly to the people or privately
to His disciples, declared that circumcision was no longer to be the sign of
the covenant of God.
St. Paul recognized that to limit “the security of the covenant” to something
defined by what the Jews believed to be the “principle of the historical continuity
of the Church,” would be to destroy the real for a limited, though more sensibly
visible, universality. He bent his whole energies to break down this false principle
of continuity which placed the “succession” in something external, and not
in the possession and transmission from generation to generation of the “gifts” of the Spirit within the community. This done, he used his administrative
powers, and they were those of a statesman, to create
channels for the flow of the manifestation of the visible unity of the Church
of Christ.
His ruling thought was to provide that all the various Christian communities
should manifest their real brotherhood in the cultivation of the “fruits of
the Spirit.” The method of carving out a visibly universal Church by means of
regulations affecting organization and external form is not without its attractions,
which are irresistible to minds of the lawyer type and training, such as we
see afterwards in Cyprian of Carthage. It seems a short and easy method of showing
that the whole Church is visibly one. But it was not Paul’s method. He seems
to have thought as little about the special “construction of sheep-folds”
as his Master. What concerned him was that the sheep should be gathered into
one flock around the One Shepherd. He nowhere prescribed a universal ecclesiastical
polity, still less did he teach that the universality of the Christian brotherhood
must be made visible in this way. He regarded all the separate churches of Christ
as independent self-governing societies. He strove to implant in all of them
the principle of brotherly dealing with one another, and he dug channels in
which the streams of the Spirit might flow in the practical manifestation of
Christian fellowship.
Fellowship (κοινωνία),
word and thought, is what filled his mind. All the brethren within one Church
were to have fellowship with each other. The local churches within a definite
region were to be in close fellowship. The churches among the Gentiles were
to maintain brotherly relations with the Mother-Church in Jerusalem. What this
fellowship primarily meant can be learnt from what the apostle says in Gal.
ii. 9.Gal. ii. 9: “And when they perceived the grace that was given unto me, James and Cephas
and John, they who were reputed to be pillars, gave to me and Barnabas the right
hands of fellowship, that we should go unto the Gentiles, and they unto the circumcision.” He tells us that the apostles to the Jews, and he the apostle to the
Gentiles, gave each other the right hand of fellowship,
because they recognized that they had a common faith in the same Christ. It
was the recognition of a common belief in the One Christ, the knowledge that
they all had within them a new faith which had revolutionised their lives, and
was to express itself in their whole character and conduct, that made them feel
the kinship with each other
which
was expressed in the common name “brethren.” All down through the early centuries
this idea that Christians form one brotherhood finds abundant expression.
Brotherhood alternates with Ecclesia in the oldest sets of ecclesiastical canons,See Sources of the Apostolic Canons, where ἐκκλησία
appears in § 1 and ἀδολφότης in § 2;
Texte u. Untersuchungen, II. v. 7. 12.
while omnis fraternitas and πᾶσα ἡ ἀδελφότης
are used to denote the whole of Christendom.For universa fraternitas, see the tract De Aleatoribus, 1;
Texte u. Untersuchungen, V. i. 11; omnis fraternitas, V. i.
14; compare Tertullian, Apologia, 39; De praescriptione, 20; De pudicitia, 13. For
πᾶσα ἡ ἀδολφότης, see 1 Clem. ii. 4; and
Harnack’s note on the passage; also 1 Peter ii. 17.
The graceful deference which St. Paul always showed to the
leaders in Jerusalem, who had been in Christ before himself; his anxieties
about the welfare of the poor “saints” at Jerusalem, and his care to provide
for their needs;Acts xi. 30; cf. xii. 25. the letters he asks to be read to all the members of the churches
to which they are addressed, and sometimes to other churches also;Col. iv. 16; where St. Paul asks that his letter be read to the Church of Laodicea.
the eagerness with which he communicates the fact that the
church he is writing to enjoys a reputation for hospitality towards wayfaring
brethren;1 Thess. iv. 9-11. the salutations his letters contain from one church to
another,Rom. xvi. 16; 1 Cor. xvi. 19. and from individual Christians to the
churches;Rom. xvi. 21-23; 1 Cor. xvi. 19;
Gal. i. 2; Phil. iv. 21, 22; Col. i. 1, 2. the messages sent by his
assistants; his and their frequent journeyings from church to church—are all
evidences of his unwearied efforts to make the universality of the Christian
brotherhood widely manifest.
He did more. He grouped his churches in a statesmanlike
way so that each could
support the others. His statesmanship discerned the advantages which the imperial
system, with its trade routes, its postal arrangements and its provincial capitals,
gave not merely for the propagation of the Gospel, but for the fellowship of
the churches. Corinth was the centre for the churches of Achaia, and the second
Epistle to the Corinthians is addressed to all the Christians within that important
Roman province.2 Cor. i. 1. Round Ephesus1 Cor. xvi. 19; Acts xix. 10. were grouped the churches of Asia—Smyrna, Pergamos,
Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, Laodicea, with Troas and others on the coast,
and Colossae and Hierapolis in the Lycus valley.Ramsay, St. Paul the Traveller, p. 274. The churches of Macedonia
were, in al: probability, grouped round Thessalonica,1 Thess. iv. 1O. and those
of Galatia formed another group, although we are not told what the centre was.1 Cor. xvi. 1.
While engaged in giving visibility to the unity of the churches he had planted St. Paul was never unmindful
that he wished also to see them united visibly with the churches of Jerusalem
and Judea. He had started with the thought of a visible fellowship between
Jew and Gentile, and the union which was symbolised when Barnabas and he gave
and received the right hand of fellowship with Peter, James and John, was never
far from his thoughts. He thought of One Church of Christ which embraced Jew
and Gentile all the world over.1 Cor. x. 32; xii. 13;
Rom. iii. 29.
But perhaps the evidence
of the apostle’s method of implanting a sense of a visible unity
within the Church of Christ is best seen in the methods, plan and motive of the great collection
for the saints at Jerusalem, which fills so large a place in his epistles.
This great collection was no mere spontaneous outburst of Christian charity like the previous succours
sent to the poor of Jerusalem. It was a carefully-planned attempt to unite a
host of independent churches, which represented wide areas,
in co-operative brotherly
action. The preparations occupied more than a year’s time. The principle of
representation was introduced. Each group of contributing churches sent deputies,
all of whom joined the apostle at different places and at different dates, and
accompanied him to Jerusalem, bearing with them the money collected. The anxiety
which the apostle displayed in the careful arrangement of all the details;
the patience with which he awaited the complete mustering of the delegates on
the road; the determination that nothing should prevent him from accompanying
the delegates to Jerusalem—not even prophetic warnings of danger nor the hindrance
of cherished plans to visit Rome—all combine to show that he regarded it as
the fulfilment of long cherished plans for making visible the fellowship of
all believers in the way that best commended itself to his mind.Rendall, The Pauline Collection for the Saints, Expositor, Nov; 1893.
For St. Paul’s conception of what was meant by “fellowship” and the methods
he took to make it visible, see Weizsäcker, The Apostolic Age of the Christian Church (Eng. Trans.)
I. p. 46 ff.; II, pp. 307-9; and Ramsay, St. Paul the Traveller, pp. 54, 130 ff.
It may be that the success of this mustering of his mission churches, this triumphant experiment of co-operation
and re-presentation, combined with the assurance that Jew and Gentile were at
last dwelling harmoniously within the One Household of God, kindled the thoughts
which find expression in the epistles of his Roman captivity. The unity of the
wide-spreading Church of Christ was at last made visible to the eyes of sense,
not by uniformity of external polity, but by the manifestation of brotherly
love. The actual unity of all believers was conspicuous in this great fruit
of the Spirit of Christ.
If we follow the accounts given us in the Acts, the tests of
what was required for visible fellowship by the leaders of the church in Jerusalem
did not differ greatly from those demanded by St. Paul. It seemed to be their
custom when they heard of some new and unexpected appearance of faith in Jesus
to send down
some one to inquire about it. Peter and John were sent to Samaria to inquire
into the conversions among the Samaritans made by the preaching of Philip.Acts viii. 14-27.
Barnabas was sent down to Antioch on a similar errand.Acts xi. 22, 23. The tests applied in
both cases seem to have been: Are there any manifestations of the fruits of
the Spirit in the lives of the new converts? The case of Antioch is most instructive.
The Gospel had been proclaimed there, we know not how or by whom. The apostles
at Jerusalem seem to have had nothing to do with the proclamation. An infant
church had come into being without their guidance or assistance. Its birth is
unrecorded; its earliest history unknown; the congregation is in being before
the apostles seem to have heard of it. When the delegate from Jerusalem appeared
and made his inquiries, what satisfied him was that the grace of God was manifestly
with the brethren there. The believers in Antioch and the delegate from Jerusalem
had the same faith in the same Saviour, and their faith found its proper outcome
in a renewed life. That was enough for fellowship or visible and fraternal union.
We see no attempt to impose any external ecclesiastical ordinances, no suggestions
about the need for showing themselves to be in the line of the “historic
continuity of the church” by accepting circumcision or otherwise. Whether we
take the reception of Cornelius, the welcome accorded to the Samaritan converts,
or the joy of Barnabas when he perceived that the grace of God was manifest
in Antioch, the unity of the Christian Church was made visible to the eyes of
sense, not by uniformity of organization, but by the manifestation of the fruits
of the Spirit; that was the one feature that was regarded as proof that it
was worthy of being received into the common fellowship.
IV. To this visible society belongs Authority. The
very thought of a Christian Church visible suggests the idea of a separate community with a distinct sphere of
religious life; and this in turn implies that the society must have, like every form of corporate
social existence, powers of oversight and discipline to be exercised
upon its members. But the authority which the Church possesses is altogether
different from what a voluntary association of men may exercise upon its members,
and of another kind from what is possessed by lawful civil government. The authority
comes from Christ Himself. The Christian Democracy is also a Theocracy; it
combines the two ideas of rule associated with the Greek and the Hebrew uses
of the word “ecclesia.” While the authority belongs to the whole member-ship,
and is therefore democratic; it nevertheless comes from
above, and is therefore theocratic.Some Anglican divines make strange deductions from the truth that the authority which belongs
to the Church comes from above. They at once infer that inasmuch as the authority comes from above it cannot come
directly to the whole Christian society; but must come through an official
class of ministers who act as a species of plastic medium between
our Lord and His people. Strange how Gnostic and Arian ideas banished from the
creeds of the Church linger in thoughts about Orders! Then by a confusion of
ideas they transfer the phrase “from above” to the human sphere, and make
it an essential idea of legitimate ecclesiastical rule that it must be invariably
communicated from a higher to a lower order of ministry! Why should authority
imparted through the Christian Society be regarded as “from beneath,” as of the earth earthy? It comes from Jesus Christ, who is the Head
of the Church.Ephes. v. 23; Col. i. 18.
Our Lord has intimated that He has imparted this authority
to His Church in many recorded sayings, and in particular in three well-known
passages: in Matt. xvi. 13-19; Matt. xviii. 15-20, and in John xx. 21-23.
The first promise was made to St. Peter in very special circumstances.
Our Lord had asked a question of all His disciples. St. Peter, answering impetuously
in their name, made himself their representative. His answer was an adoring
confession of his faith in the Person of Christ“There is a tone of loving reverence and worship in the words ‘Thou
art the Christ, the Son of the Living God.’ They answer to our Lord’s
picture of the spiritual experience
of His disciples in His great intercessory prayer; ‘I manifested Thy name unto
the men whom Thou gavest Me out of the world; Thine they were, and Thou gavest them
to Me; and they have kept Thy word. Now they know that all things, whatsoever
Thou hast given Me, are from Thee; for the words which Thou gavest Me, I have
given unto them; and they received them, and knew of a truth that I came forth
from Thee, and they believed that Thou didst send Me.” Bannerman, The Scripture Doctrine of the Church, p. 169.—a confession
which contained in germ all the future confessions of the Church of Christ, and which made
him the spokesman for the mighty multitude which
no man can number, who were to make the same confession of adoring trust in their Saviour. The confession
was an inspired one; it had been revealed to St. Peter by the Father; there
was divinity in it, for God gave the revelation which prompted the confession
; and there was humanity in it, for the man appropriated and made his own what
the Father had revealed to him. It was the first of what was to become a multitudinous
sea of voices of men inspired by the Father to know and to confess that Jesus
was the Christ, the Son of the Living God. It was to the Peter who answered
as representing the Twelve, to Peter who was the spokesman for countless thousands
of the faithful who down through the march of Time would make the same glad
confession, that the promise was given.
The promise was of authority
to bear the key of the household of the faithful, to have the power to let in
and keep out from the household. The words and metaphor used were the familiar
Jewish terms to denote a delegated authority. The thought conveyed is commonly
and correctly explained by a reference to the substitution of Shebna for Eliakim
in the stewardship of the House of David;Isaiah xiii. 20, 22. Compare Gore, The Church and the Ministry, p. 223. and it is implied that our Lord,
in the word He used, made St. Peter, and those he represented, stewards of the
Household of the faithful with the authority to “bind” and to “loose,”
to “prohibit” and to “permit,” to “admit” and “exclude.”
Other passages in the New Testament, making use of the same simile of the major-domo
with his key and his power of letting in or locking out, assist us to see the
fuller meaning of the promise recorded. The one is a warning and the other
an encouragement. Our Lord called the attention of his followers to the scribes and Pharisees, who
“sat in Moses’
seat,” and had to be obeyed. They had the keys and they used them to shut the
door of the kingdom of heaven against men.Matt. xxiii. 2, 3, 13:—ὅτι κλείετε τὴν βασιλείαν
τῶν οὐρανῶν ἔμπροσθεν τῶν ἀιθρώπων. Jesus pronounces woe on them for
using the keys in this way. Their shutting out, although they have the keys
officially, was evidently not ratified in heaven. Hence we must infer that the
mere official position of being the bearer of the “keys” does not always
ensure that what is done on earth by the bearer will be ratified in heaven.
Then in the message to the Church in Philadelphia, the brethren there were told
that the real bearer of the “keys” is the Lord Himself.Rev. iii. 7:—τάδε λέγει ὁ ἅγιος, ὁ ἀληθινός, ὁ ἔχων τὴν κλεῖν
Δαβίδ, ὁ ἀνοίγων καὶ οὐδεὶς κλείσει, καὶ κλείων καὶ οὐδεὶς ἀνοίγει. It is only when
He
lets in that there can be no exclusion; it is only when He shuts out that there
is any real exclusion. A real authority is bestowed, and real powers are given; but just as Peter’s confession depended on the inspiration of the Father,
so the ratification of the exercise of power depends on its Christ-like use.
It is doubtful whether the second saying was addressed to the Twelve, or to a larger group of disciples,
but the advice which precedes the promise is to be applied and can only be applied
to all the followers of Jesus within a community. It gives directions for dealing
with offences and offenders within the Christian society, and has been commonly
regarded as the Scriptural warrant for the exercise of discipline within the
Church. It proceeds on the idea that offences may arise from thoughtlessness
as well as from wilful sin, and that the offender, in spite of his offence,
is a brother to be won back to brotherliness. It prescribes a threefold attempt
to win back the erring brother to a state of brotherly feeling. If everything
fails, if the offender has refused to hear the offended person pleading with
him in his own person, if he has rejected the remonstrances of two or
three fellow-Christians pleading with him, if he finally spurns the warnings
of the Church or whole Christian society, then, and not till then, does the
thought of punishment enter. The punishment, if punishment it can be called,
is expulsion of a certain kind from the Christian communion. The offender is
to be treated as the Jewish Synagogue acted towards a Gentile or a publican.
He was to be looked on as if he had never belonged to the society, or as if
he had voluntarily excluded himself by the course of life he had chosen to persist
in.
We are told that the decisions of the Church on earth in such
cases as those described will be ratified in Heaven. This is a confirmation
of the promise given to St. Peter, and like it is strictly conditional. The
condition attached is that there must be a real and living communion between
the Church and its Head the Lord Jesus Christ, so that the Church decides in
a Christ-like spirit. It is impossible to separate the promise from the verses
which immediately follow. Our Lord Himself joins them together by very solemn
words. This condition does not render the promise of ratification deceptive.
The fellowship with Christ, which is the condition, is to be had provided it
is sought for earnestly, honestly and trustingly in prayer (v. 19).
The authority is given to the society of believers, whether
two or three meeting together in a place far from any others, or a great and
organised community. It is not entrusted by our Lord directly to any official
class; it is not given to any human power not rising out of the company of
the faithful. It is given to the visible fellowship, and it belongs to them
in reality, as well as in name, in the measure in which they have living communion
with Him Who is their Head.
The third promise seems to have been made to the nucleus of the infant Church
in Jerusalem, if we are to accept Luke xxiv. 33 ff. as the parallel passage—to
“the disciples and those who were with them.” It is commonly held to include
all that is bestowed in the other two, and perhaps something even more solemn—the
power to pronounce the divine sentence of pardon
involved in the proclamation of the Gospel of Christ. Whatever be the powers granted,
they are given to the whole company of believers and not to any class among
them. They are also, as in the earlier passages, given under conditions. The
power can only manifest itself in those who are filled with the Spirit of Christ.John xx. 22, 23:—καὶ τοῦ̂το εἰπὼν ἐνεφύσησεν καὶ
λέγει αὐ̓τοῖς, Λάβετε Πνεῦμα Ἅγιον ἄν τινων
ἀ̓φῆτε τὰς ἁμαρτίας, ἀφίενται (ἀφέωνται Ti., W. H.)
αὐτοῖς, ἄ́ν τινων κρατῆτε
κεκράτηνται.
In virtue of this promise with its gift of power the visible Church of Christ
can with absolute confidence declare the gospel of pardon through the work of
Christ, and can assert that the divine conditions are those which it proclaims.
In virtue of the same promise every individual Christian is entitled to affirm
with absolute certainty to every penitent sinner that God pardons his sins if
he accepts Jesus as his All-sufficient Saviour.“The main thought which the words convey is that of the reality of the power of absolution
from sin granted to the Church and not of the particular organization through
which the power is administered. There is nothing
in the context to show that the gift was confined to any particular
group (as the apostles) among the whole company present. The commission must therefore
be regarded as properly the commission of the Christian society, and not as
that of the Christian ministry (cf. Matt. v. 13, 14). The great mystery of the
world, absolutely insoluble by thought, is that of sin; the mission of Christ
was to bring salvation from sin; and the work of the Church is to apply to
all that which He has gained. Christ risen was Himself the sign of the completed
overthrow of death, the end of sin, and the impartment of His life necessarily
carried with it the fruit of His conquest. Thus the promise is in one sense
an interpretation of the gift. The gift of the Holy Spirit finds its application
in the communication or withholding of the powers of the new life. . . . The promise,
as being made not to one but to the Society, carries with it of necessity . . .
the character of perpetuity: the society never dies. . . . The exercise of the
power must be placed in the closest connexion with the faculty of spiritual
discernment, consequent on the gift of the Holy Spirit.” Westcott, Gospel of St. John, p. 295.
The authority was given in the first passage to one man; in the second probably
to the Twelve; in the third to the whole Christian community. In each case
the more particular is absorbed in the more general. The power given to St. Peter
in the first passage is merged in the authority given to the Twelve in the second; and the authority
given to the Twelve is in turn merged in the authority given to the whole congregation.
St. Peter received the power because he represented the Twelve directly, and
the whole Church founded on him and on his confession indirectly. The Twelve
received it because they represented the Church which was to come into existence
through their ministry. After the Resurrection the whole infant Church received
the same, if not greater, authority. St. Peter was to
die; the Twelve also were to go the way of
all flesh; but the society was to remain, and with it the authority bestowed
upon it by its Lord.
It is needless to say that very varying interpretations of these three passages
have been given by different schools of theologians; that Romanists found
on the promise given to St. Peter, and that some Anglicans insist that the third
promise was made to the Eleven only, even if the company included other disciples,
and build up the edifice of Apostolic Succession on this narrow foundation;
and that both affirm that the authority which our Lord gave to His Church was
placed directly in the hands of office-bearers, and not in those of the whole
membership.
To examine at length the various exegetical arguments brought forward in support
of these positions would lead far beyond the space at our disposal; but two
general considerations may be adduced. Such an interpretation seems to be against
the analogy of our Lord’s teaching; and He was not so understood by His New
Testament Church.
While our Lord chose Twelve to form an inner circle of disciples, while He trained
them by close companionship with Himself for special service, while He weaned
them in half-conscious ways from their old life, it nowhere appears that He
bestowed upon them a special rank or instituted a peculiar or exceptional office
of stewardship of divine mysteries in their persons.Cf. 1 Peter iv. 10: “According as
each hath received a gift, ministering
it among yourselves, as good stewards of the manifold grace of God.” It
is improbable that He bestowed on them the name
apostles to be a general and distinguishing title, and one unshared in by other
disciples besides the Twelve. Our Lord called them apostles when He sent them
on a special mission among the villages; they were apostles while this mission
lasted; when it came to an end they were the Twelve or inner circle of intimates
of the Master.The relations of the Twelve to the Church of Christ are strikingly brought out by Dr. Hort in his
Christian Ecclesia, pp. 23-41. On the title apostle he says: “Taking these
facts together respecting the usage of the Gospels, we are led, I think, to
the conclusion that in its original sense the term Apostle was not intended
to describe the habitual relation of the Twelve to our Lord during the days
of His ministry, but strictly speaking only that mission among the villages,
of which the beginning and the end are recorded for us.” . . . “If they (the
Twelve) represented an apostolic order within the Ecclesia then the Holy Communion
must have been intended only for members of that order, and the rest of the
Ecclesia had no part in it. But if, as the men of the apostolic age and subsequent
ages believed without hesitation, the Holy Communion was meant for the Ecclesia
at large, then the Twelve sat down that evening as representatives of the Ecclesia
at large; they were disciples more than they were apostles.” After the Death and Resurrection of the Lord the task to which
they had been trained by companion-ship with the Saviour and in the apprentice
mission among the villages, became their life work, but it was shared in from
the very beginning by others who bore with them the common name apostle.St. Paul in his account of the appearances of our Lord after His Resurrection distinguishes between the Twelve
and apostles; 1 Cor. xv. 5-8; cf. below, pp. 74-85. Nor
does our Lord make any promises to the Twelve which imply that He had bestowed
upon them a special rank in the Church which was to come. He told them that
whoever received them received Him; but this was a privilege shared in by the
least of His followers, for whoever received a little child in His name received
Him.Matt. x. 40; cf. Luke x. 16; Matt. xviii. 5;
Mark ix. 37; Luke ix. 48. It is impossible to avoid noticing how the ancient manuals
of church organization have caught the spirit of Christ’s teaching, that there
are to be no lordships in His Church. The qualifications set forth for office
are those which every Christian ought to possess; and the duties said to belong
to office are those which for the most part all Christians ought to perform.
We do not see orders in the sense of ecclesiastical rank whose authority does not come from the people; we see ecclesiastical
order and arrangement of service. Whatever power and authority the
Church of Christ possesses in gift from the Lord resides in the membership of
the Church and not in any superior rank of officials who have received an authority
over the Church directly from Christ Himself.
The Church of the New Testament evidently interpreted the
words of our Lord to mean that He placed the authority which He had bestowed
upon His Church in the hands of the membership, of the community which formed
the local church.
Even in the Primitive Church in Jerusalem, where the presence
of an apostle was seldom lacking, the community was self-governing, and acted
on the conviction that the authority bestowed by Christ on His Church belonged
to the whole congregation of the faithful and not to an apostolic hierarchy.
The assembly of the local church appointed delegates and elected office-bearers.
The vice-apostle Matthias and the Seven were, elected by the assembly,Acts i. 23; vi. 5. and
a similar assembly appointed Barnabas to be its delegate to Antioch.Acts xi. 22. The assembly
of the local church summoned even apostles before it, and passed judgment upon
their conduct.On the conduct of St. Peter at Caesarea, Acts xi. 1-4; on the opinions and practices of St.
Paul, xv. 12, 22-29, and whatever differences may be found in the account of
the proceedings in this chapter and in St. Paul’s statement in the Epistle to
the Galatians (Gal. ii. 1 ff.) there is no question that both recognize the
supremacy of the assembly of the Church. The apostles might suggest, but the congregation ruled.
When we pass from the Church at Jerusalem to the churches
planted by the ministry of St. Paul, the proofs of democratic self-government
are still more abundant. When the apostle urges the duty of stricter discipline,
or when he recommends
a merciful treatment of one who had lapsed, he writes to the whole
community in whose hands the authority resides. He pictures himself in their
midst while they are engaged in this painful duty. He assures them that they
have the authority of the Lord for the exercise of discipline. For however thoroughly
democratic the government of the New Testament Church was, it was still as
thoroughly theocratic. The presence of the Lord Himself was with them in the
exercise of the authority He had entrusted to their charge.1 Cor. v. 3-5; Gal. vi. 1. The evidence of
the presence of Christ was of the same kind as witnessed His presence in the
actions of public worship. The local churches recognised His presence in the
manifestation of the “gifts” of His Spirit bestowed upon them. These “gifts” included not only the bestowal of grace needed for exhortation to edification,
but also the wisdom to “govern” and to “guide.” The theocratic element was
not given in a hierarchy imposed upon the Church from without; it manifested
itself within the community. It appeared in the presence, recognition and use
made of gifts of government bestowed upon its membership which were none the
less spiritual, divine and “from above,” because they concerned the ordinary
duties of oversight and manifested themselves in the natural endowments of members
of the community. The presence of Christ among His people may be as easily manifested
in the decision which the assembly of the local church arrives at by a majorityThe censure inflicted on the member of the Corinthian Church who had disobeyed the
Apostle Paul was carried by a majority: 2 Cor. ii. 6.
ἡ ἐπιτιμία αὕτη
ἡ ὑπὸ τῶν πλειόνων.
of votes as in the fiat launched from an episcopal chair. The latter is not
necessarily from above, and the former is not of necessity from beneath.
V. Lastly, the Church of Christ is a sacerdotal society.
The Church of Christ is continually represented as the “ideal Israel.” This
is a favourite thought of St. Paul’s, and it implies that the special function
of the Church of Christ is to do in a
better manner what the ancient Israel did imperfectly. When we ask what the special function of the
ancient Israel was, we find it given in a great variety of ways, all of which
include one central thought, best expressed perhaps by the phrase, “To approach
God.” This central idea was connected with the thoughts of special times of
approach, or Holy Seasons; with a special place of approach, which was the
Temple of God’s Presence; and with a special set of men who made the approach
on behalf of their fellows, and who were called Priests. When we turn to the
Church of Christ we find the same central thought and the same dependent ideas.
The main function of the New Testament Church is also to approach God. Just
as in the Old Testament economy the priests when approaching God presented sacrifices
to Him, so in the New Testament Church gifts are to be presented to God, and
these gifts or offerings bear the Old Testament name of sacrifices. We are enjoined
to present our bodies;Rom. xii. 1: “I beseech you therefore, brethren,
by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, well-pleasing
to God, which is your reasonable service (τὴν λογικὴν
λατρείαν ὑμῶν).” The thought expressed is that the Christian should consecrate
the whole personality, body, soul and spirit to God; and thus all service whether
of work or worship became a sacrifice. Compare Ps. li. 15-17.
our praise, “that is the fruit of our lips which make confession to His name”;Heb. xiii. 15.
our faith;Phil. ii. 17.
our alms-giving;Paul’s great collection for the poor saints in Jerusalem is an offering: Acts xxiv.
17; so is the contributions which the members of the Church at Philippi sent
to the apostle: Phil. iv. 18.
our “doing good and communicating.”Heb. xiii. 16. These are
all called “sacrifices,” or “sacrifices well-pleasing to God,”
and, to distinguish them from the offerings of the Old Testament economy, “spiritual or living
sacrifices.”Θυσίαι πνευματικαί: 1 Pet. ii. 5;
θυσία ζῶσα: Rom. xii. 1; cf. Phil. ii. 17. The exertions made by St. Paul
to bring the heathen to a knowledge of the Saviour is also called a sacrifice
or offering.Rom. xv. 16. The New Testament Church is the ideal Israel, and does the work which the ancient
Israel was appointed to do. The limitations only have disappeared. There is no trace in the New
Testament Church of any specially holy places or times or persons. The Christian
ideal is, to quote the late Dr. Lightfoot, a Holy Season extending all the year
round, a Temple confined only by the limits of the habitable globe, and a Priesthood
including every believer in the Lord Jesus Christ.Commentary on the Epistle to the Philippians (1881), 6th ed. p. 183.
This does not mean that the New Testament Church may not select special days for
the public worship of God; that it may not dedicate buildings where the faithful
can meet together to unite in offering the sacrifices of prayer and praise;
that it may not set apart men from among its membership and appoint them to
lead its devotions. But it does mean that God can be approached at all times,
and in every place, and by every one among His people. His fellow believers
may select one from among themselves to be their minister. There may be a
ministering
priesthood, but there cannot be a mediating priesthood within the Christian society. There is one Mediator only,
and all, men, women and children, have the promise of immediate entrance into
the presence of God, and are priests.
Luther has expressed the thought of the sacerdotal character of the Church of Christ
when he says, in a description of the Eucharistic service: “There our priest
or minister stands before the altar, having been publicly called to his priestly
function; he repeats publicly and distinctly Christ’s words of the Institution; he takes the Bread and the Wine, and distributes it according to Christ’s
words; and we all kneel beside him and around him, men and women, young and
old, master and servant, mistress and maid, all holy priests together, sanctified
by the blood of Christ. We are there in our priestly dignity. . . . We do not
let the priest proclaim for himself the ordinance of Christ; but he is the
mouthpiece of us all, and we all say it with him in our hearts with true faith
in the Lamb of God Who feeds us with His Body and Blood.”
This sacerdotal character of the whole Church of Christ was maintained in the primitive Christian Church down
to at least the middle of the third century. Whatever evinced a whole-hearted dedication
of one’s self to God was a sacrifice which
required no mediating priesthood in the offering.
For the Christian sacrifice always means
a sacrifice of self. When Polycarp gave his body to be burnt for the faith of Jesus,
he gave it in sacrifice, and every martyr’s death or suffering was a sacrifice well-pleasing
to God.Compare Letter of the Smyrnaeans on the Martyrdom of Polycarp, 14:
“Then he, placing his arms behind him and being hound to the stake, like a goodly ram out of
a great flock for an offering, a burnt sacrifice made ready and acceptable to God, looking up to heaven, said: O Lord God
Almighty. . . .” When poor and humble believers fasted that they might have food to give
to the hungry, they were sacrificing a
spiritual sacrifice.Aristides, Apology, 15: “And if any among the Christians is poor and in want, and they have not
overmuch of the means of life, they fast two or three days, in order that they may provide those
in need with the food they require.”
A favourite phrase to describe widows and orphans was “the altar of God” on which the
sacrifices of almsgiving were offered up. It is used by Polycarp, To the Philippians, 4;
also in the Apostolic Constitutions, ii. 26 and iv. 3, of the orphans, the old and all
who were supported by the benevolence of the faithful. Tertullian says of the widow: “aram enim
Dei mundam proponi oportet,” Ad Uxor. i. 7.
When Christians, either at home and in private or in the assembly
for public worship, poured forth prayers and thanksgivings, they were offering sacrifice
to God.Clement of Alexandria spiritualizes the Old Testament sacrifices to make them the forerunners
of Christian prayers. “And that compounded incense which is mentioned in the Law, is that which consists
of many tongues and voices in prayer . . . brought
together in praises with a pure mind, and just and right conduct, from holy works
and righteous prayer,” Strom. vii. 6. In the same chapter he says: “For the sacrifice of the Church is the word breathing as incense from holy souls,
the sacrifice and the whole mind being at the same time unveiled to God.” Justin Martyr does not hesitate to call such devotions “the only perfect
and well-pleasing sacrifices to God.”Dialogue, 117.
And the Holy Supper, the very apex and crown of all Christian
public worship, where Christ gives Himself to His people, and where His people dedicate
themselves to Him in body, soul and spirit, was always a sacrifice as prayers, praises and almagi ring were.
The Church of Christ was a sacerdotal society, its members were all priests, and its services were all sacrifices.The conception of a mutilated sacerdotalism, where one part of the Christian worship is alone thought
of as the true sacrifice, and a small portion of the fellowship—the ministry—is declared to be the priesthood,
did not appear until the time of Cyprian, and was his invention.
Such is the New Testament thought of the Church of Christ—a Fellowship,
a United Fellowship, a Visible Fellowship, a Fellowship with an Authority bestowed upon it by
its Lord, and a sacerdotal Fellowship whose every member has the right
of direct access to the throne of God, bringing with him the sacrifices of himself,
of his praise and of his confession.
CHAPTER II
A CHRISTIAN CHURCH IN APOSTOLIC TIMES
Can we, piercing the
mists of two thousand years, see a Christian Church as it was in Apostolic times—a
tiny island in a sea of surrounding heathenism? Our vision gets most assistance
from the Epistles of St. Paul, which not only are the oldest records of the
literature of the New Testament, but give us much clearer pictures of the earliest
Christian assemblies for edification and thanksgiving than are to be found in
the Acts of the Apostles. The more we study these epistles the more clearly
we discern that we must not project into these primitive times a picture taken
from any of the long organized churches of our days. On the other hand, we can
see many an analogy in the usages of the growing churches of the mission field.
This is not to be wondered at. The primitive church and churches growing among
heathen surroundings have both to do with the origins of organization.
For one thing, we must
remember that the meetings of the congregation were held in private houses;It is true that we read in Acts xix. 9, 10 that St. Paul held meetings in the
Schola of Tyrannus: but this is a unique instance.
and as the number of believers grew, more than one house must have been placed
at the service of the brethren for their meetings for public worship and for
the transaction of the necessary business of the congregation. We are told
that in the primitive church at Jerusalem the Lord’s Supper was dispensed in
the houses,Acts ii. 46: κλῶντές τε κατ᾽
οἶκον ἄρτον. and that the brethren met in the house of Mary the mother of John
Mark,Acts xii. 12: “The house of Mary, the mother of John whose surname was Mark; where
many were gathered together and were praying.”
in the house of James
the brother of our Lord,Acts xxi. 18; xii. 17. and probably elsewhere. At the close of the Epistle
to the Romans, St. Paul sends greetings to
three, perhaps five, groups of brethren gathered round clusters of distinguished
Christians whom he names. One of these groups he calls a “church,” and the
others were presumably so also.Rom. xvi. 3-5: “Salute Prisca and Aquila . . . and the church that is in their house”;
xvi. 14: “Salute Asynsritus, Phlegon, Hermes, Patrobas, Hermas, and the
brethren that are with them”; 15: “Salute Philologus and Julia, Nereus and
his sister, and O1ympas, and all the saints that are with them”; 10: “Salute them
which are of the household of Aristobulus”; 11: “Salute them
of the household of Narcissus.” The groups saluted in verses 10 and 11 may have
been a number of freedmen or slaves belonging to the households of the two
wealthy men mentioned; but the other three groups are evidently house-churches.
St. Paul sends salutations to other house-churches; to that meeting in the house of
Philemon at Colossae (Philem. 2), to that meeting in the house of Nymphas in
Laodicea (Col. iv. 15), and to that meeting in the house of Stephanas (1 Cor.
xvi. 15).
The account of Saul, the persecutor, making
havoc of the Church, entering every house and haling men and women to prison,
reads like a record of the persecution of the Huguenots among the house-churches
of Reformation times in France, or like raids on house-conventicles in the Covenanting
times in Scotland. It becomes evident too as we study these early records that
when it was possible, that is, when any member had a sufficiently large abode
and was willing to open his house to the brethren, comparatively large assemblies,
including all the Christians of the town or neighbourhood, met together at stated
times and especially on the Lord’s Day, for the service of thanksgiving. Gaius
was able to accommodate all his fellow Christians, and was the “host of the
whole Church.”Rom. xvi. 23.
Traces of these earliest
house-churches survived in happier days. The ground plan of the earliest Roman
church, discovered in 1900 in the Forum at Rome, is modelled not on the basilica
or public hall, but on the audience hall of the wealthy Roman burgher, and the
recollections of the familiar surroundings at the meetings in the house-churches
probably guided
the pencil
of the architect who first planned the earliest public buildings dedicated to
Christian worship.Compare C. Dehio, Die Genesis der christlichen Basilika in the
Sitzensber. d. München. Akad. d. Wiss. 1882, ii. 301 ff. Old liturgies which enjoin the deacon, at the period of
the service when the Lord’s Supper is about to be celebrated, to command the
mothers to take their babies on their knees, bringIn the so-called Liturgy of St. Clement there is the following rubric:—
“The order of James, the brother of John, the son of Zebedee.
“And I James, the brother of John, the son of Zebedee, command that forthwith the deacon say,
Let none of the hearers, none of the unbelievers, none of the heterodox stay. Ye who
have prayed the former prayer, depart. Mothers, take up your children. Let
us stand upright to present unto the Lord our offerings with fear and trembling.” Neale and Littledale, Translations
of Primitive Liturgies, p. 75.
The writer had the privilege of worshipping in a house-church in the Lebanon under the
shoulder of Sunim in the autumn of 1888. The long low vaulted kitchen had been
swept and garnished for the occasion, though some of the pots still stood in
a corner. The congregation sat on the floor—the men together in rows on the right and
the women in rows on the left. During the services which preceded the Holy Communion,
babies crawled about the floor making excursions from mother to father and back
again. When the non-communicants had left, and the “elements,” as we say in
Scotland, were being uncovered, the mothers secured the straggling babies and
kept them on their laps during the whole of the communion service, as was enjoined
in the ancient rubric quoted above.
with them memories of these homely gatherings in private houses, which lasted down to the close
of the second century and probably much later, except in the larger towns.The earliest trace we find of buildings set apart exclusively for Christian worship dates
from the beginning of the third century (202-210): Clement of Alexandria, Stromata, vii. 5.
Clement speaks of a building erected in honour of God, while he insists that it is the
assembly of the people and not the place where they assemble that ought to be called the church.
It is St. Paul, in his First Epistle to the Corinthians, who
gives us the most distinct picture of the meetings of the earliest Christian
communities. The brethren appear to have had three distinct meetings—one for
the purposes of edification by prayer and exhortation, another for thanksgiving
which began with a
common meal and ended with the
Holy Supper,The best account of the Agape is in Keating’s The Agape and the Eucharist (1901). and a third for the business of the little society.
1. In his description of the first
the apostle introduces us to an earnest company of men and women full of restrained
enthusiasm, which might soon become unrestrained. We hear of no officials appointed
to conduct the services. The brethren fill the body of the hall, the women sitting
together, in all probability on the one side, and the men on the other; behind
them are the inquirers; and behind them, clustering round the door, unbelievers,
whom curiosity or some other motive has attracted, and who are welcomed to this
meeting “for the Word.”
The service, and probably each
part of the service, began with the benediction: “Grace be to you and peace
from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ,” which was followed by an invocation
of Jesus and the confession that He is Lord.St. Paul does not mention the benediction as forming part of the Christian worship, but
the way in which it occurs regularly at the beginning of his epistles, preserving
always the same form, warrants us in supposing its liturgical use in the manner
above indicated. The invocation of Jesus as the Lord is made the test of all
Christian public utterance for edification, and must have preceded the prophetic
addresses if not the whole service: 1 Cor. xii. 3. One of the brethren began to pray; then another and another; one began the
Lord’s Prayer,The use of the Lord’s prayer is not mentioned but it may be inferred. “Paul nowhere
mentions the Lord’s prayer. But we may assume that we have a trace of it in
Rom. viii. 15, and in Gal. iv. 6. In speaking of the right to call God Father,
he gives the Aramaic form for father, in each instance adding a translation; and this is only to be explained by supposing that he had in mind a formula
which was known wherever the Gospel had penetrate, and which, by preserving
the original language, invested the name with peculiar solemnity, in order to
maintain its significance unimpaired in the believer’s consciousness.” Weizsäcker,
The Apostolic Age, ii. p. 258 (Eng. Trans.). According to the Didache the Lord’s Prayer was to
be said three times every day (Did. viii.). and all joined; each prayer was followed by a hearty and fervent
“Amen.”1 Cor. xiv. 16. Then a hymn was sung; then
another and another, for several of the brethren
have composed or selected
hymns at home which they wish to be sung by the congregation.1 Cor. xiv. 26. Several of these
hymns are preserved in the New Testament, and one is embodied in one of our
Scotch paraphrases:If it be
permitted, as I think it is, to believe that the author of the Apocalypse used
the outline of the Christian worship of the earliest age as the canvas on which
he painted his glorious prophetic visions, then we can disentangle many a short
hymn used in the services of the apostolic Church and also get many a detail
about that service. The paraphrase quoted above combines two of the songs given
in Revelation (v. 9-13). We have another in xv. 3 f.:—
Great and marvellous are Thy works,
O Lord God the Almighty;
Righteous and true are Thy ways,
Thou King of the Ages.
Who shall not fear Thee, Lord, and glorify Thy Name?
For Thou only art Holy;
All the Nations shall come and worship before Thee;
For Thy righteous acts have been made manifest;
and yet another in xi. 17:—
We give Thee thanks, O Lord God, the Almighty,
Which art and which wast;
Because Thou hast taken Thy great power and didst reign,
And the Nations were wroth,
And Thy wrath came,
And the time of the dead to be judged,
And the time to give their reward to Thy servants,
To the prophets and to the saints,
And to them that fear Thy Name,
The small and the great;
And to them who destroy the earth.
It is likely that the singing was antiphonal; there are alternate strophes in the hymns
in the heavenly worship, and Pliny says that the Christians “carmen Christo
quasi Deo dicere secum invicem” (Ep. 96 [97]).
—
To Him be power divine ascribed,
And endless blessings paid;
Salvation, glory, joy, remain
For ever on His Head:
Thou hast redeemed us with Thy Blood,
And set the prisoners free;
Thou mad’st us kings and priests to God,
And we shall reign with Thee,
* * * * *
To Him that sits upon the throne
The God whom we adore,
And to the Lamb that once was slain;
Be glory evermore.Scotch Paraphrases, lxv. 7-11.
After the hymns came reading from the Old Testament Scriptures, and readings or recitations concerning
the life and death, the sayings and deeds of Jesus.St. Paul does not mention the reading of Scripture in his order of worship; but it must have been there. In his epistles to the Corinthians,
to confine ourselves to them, he implies such a knowledge of the Old Testament and of deeds and sayings of Jesus as could only be got from the
continuous public reading of the Scriptures, and the reciting sentences about Jesus. He takes it for granted that the Old Testament Scriptures
are known and known to be the law for life and conduct, in 1 Cor. vi. 16;
ix. 8-13; xiv. 21;
2 Cor. vi. 16, 18; viii. 15;
ix. 9. In the beginning of 1 Cor. xv. he clearly refers to
formal statements, not yet perhaps committed to writing, which he himself had handed over as he had received them, and which recited the facts about the
sayings and deeds of Jesus. The opening and reading from the book comes after the singing in the heavenly worship (Rev. v.
vi.). Then came the “instruction”—sober words for edification,
based on what had been read, and coming either from the gift of “wisdom,” or from that intuitive power of seeing into the heart
of spiritual things which the apostle calls “knowledge.”Instruction (διδαχή), teaching or doctrine includes the “wisdom” and “knowledge” of
1 Cor. xii. 8; “wisdom,” (λόγος σοφίας) is
described in 1 Cor. ii. 7; vi. 5;
and “knowledge” (λόγος γνώσεως) in
2 Cor. x. 5; xi. 6; and perhaps the
πίστις of 1 Cor. xii. 9, which may mean depth of loyal spiritual experience. Then came the moment of greatest expectancy.
It was the time for the prophets, men who believed themselves and were believed by their brethren to be specially taught by the Holy Spirit,
to take part. They started forward, the gifted men, so eager to impart what had been given them, that sometimes two or more rose at once and
spoke together;1 Cor. xiv. 31. and sometimes when one was speaking the message came to another, and he leapt to his
feet,1 Cor. xiv. 30. increasing the emotion
and taking from the edification. When the prophets were silent, first one, then another, and sometimes two at once, began strange
ejaculatory prayers,I have followed Weizsäcker’s conception of what was meant by speaking “in a tongue.” These things have to be noted about the
phenomenon. It occurred in prayer only (1 Cor. xiv. 2, 14); it appeared like a soliloquy
(1 Cor. xiv. 2); the speaker edified himself (xiv. 4), but seems to have
lost conscious control over himself (xiv. 14); what was said was not intelligible to others
(xiv: 2); it could be compared to the sound of a trumpet which gave no clear call
(xiv. 7, 8); or to the use of a foreign and barbarous language (xiv. 10, 11);
the speaker in a tongue ought to interpret what he has said, and that he may be able to do this he ought to pray for divine assistance
(xiv. 13); that such speaking was not all of one sort—there were “kinds of tongues”
(xii. 10). Upon the whole then we may conceive it to have been rapt ejaculatory prayer uttered during unrestrained
emotion, where words often took the place of sentences. This enables us to see how brethren, who were sympathetio enough, could follow the obscure windings of thought
and expression, and interpret. Our knowledge is exclusively derived from 1 Cor. xiv.; the two passages in
Acts x. 46; xix; 8, and the references in the post-apostolic period do not enlighten us. Compare Heinrici,
Das Erste Sendschreiben an die Korinther, pp. 376-393; Bleek, Studien u. Kritiken (1829), pp. 3-79; Hilgenfeld, Die Glossolalie in der alien Kirche,
Leipzig, 1850. This “gift” of tongues is referred to by Irenaeus, v. 6, and Tertullian, Adv. Marcion, v. 8. in sentences so rugged and disjointed that the audience for the most part could not understand, and had to wait
till some of their number, who could follow the strange utterances, were ready to translate them into intelligible language.1 Cor. xiv. 27, 28.
Then followed the benediction: “The Grace of the Lord Jesus be with you all”; the “kiss of peace”; and the congregation dispersed.
Sometimes during the meeting, at some part of the services, but oftenest when the prophets were speaking, there was a stir at the back of the room,
and a heathen, who had been listening in careless curiosity or in barely concealed scorn, suddenly felt the sinful secrets of his own heart revealed to him,
and pushing forward fell down at the feet of the speaker and made his confession,1 Cor. xiv. 25.
while the assembly raised the doxology: “Blessed be God, the Father of the Lord Jesus, for evermore.The other form of doxology common to St. Paul’s epistles is “Unto God our
Father, be glory for ever, Amen.” These doxologies are found running through
St. Paul’s and other epistles in the New Testament. They are used to end a prophetic
utterance, or an exposition of divine wisdom, and they occur in the description
of the heavenly worship in the Apocalypse. Amen.”
Such was
a Christian meeting for public worship in Corinth in apostolic times; and foreign
as it may seem to us, the like can be still seen in mission fields among the
hot-blooded people of the East. I have witnessed everything but the speaking
“with tongues” in meetings of native Christians in the Deccan in India, when
European influence was not present to restrain Eastern enthusiasm and condense
it in Western moulds.
The meeting described by the apostle is not to be taken as something which might be seen
in Corinth but was peculiar to that city; it may be taken as a type of the
Christian meeting throughout the Gentile Christian Churches; for the Apostle,
in his suggestions and criticisms, continually speaks of what took place throughout
all the churches.1 Cor. xiv. 33; xi. 16.
It is to be observed that if the apostle finds fault with some things, he gives the order of
the service and expressly approves of every part of it, even of the strange
ejaculatory prayers.1 Cor. xiv. 39. The order of service is given by St. Paul in 1 Cor. xiv. 26; where
the “psalm” includes the supplication and thanksgiving of xiv. 16. He gives his Corinthian converts one broad principle,
which he expects them to
apply for themselves in order to better their service.
Everything is to be done for the edification of the brethren, and the first
qualification for edification is that all things be done “decently and in order,”
for God is not a God of confusion but of peace.1 Cor. xiv. 33, 40. He gives examples of his principle.
The prophets were to restrain themselves; they were to speak one at a time,
and not more than two or three at one meeting;1 Cor. xiv. 29-33. and
those who prayed “in tongues” were to keep silence altogether unless some
one who could interpret was present, for it is better to speak five words with
understanding than ten thousand in a tongue. The women too who had the gift of prophecy were to
use it in
private, and not start forward at the public meeting and deliver their message
there. So far from finding fault with the kind of meeting described, St. Paul
seems to look on the manifestation of these gifts of praise, prayer, teaching,
and prophecy, within the congregation at Corinth, as an evidence that the Christian
community there was completely furnished within its own membership with all
the gifts needed for the building up in faith and works.1 Cor. xii. 4 ff.: cf. Eph. iv. 16.
What cannot fail to strike us in this picture is the untrammelled liberty of the worship,
the possibility of every male member of the congregation taking part in the
prayers and the exhortations, and the consequent responsibility laid on the
whole community to see that the service was for the edification of all. When
we consider the rebukes that the apostle considered it necessary to administer,
it is also somewhat surprising to find so few injunctions which take the form
of definite rules for public worship, and to observe the confidence which the
apostle had that if certain broad principles were laid down and observed, the
community was of itself able to conduct all things with that attention to decency
and order which ensured edification.
Our wonder is apt to be increased
when we remember the social surroundings and
conditions of these Corinthian Christians. They were a number of burghers, freedmen
and slaves, who, as their names show, were mostly of Roman origin, gathered
from the wealthiest and most profligate city on the Mediterranean. The population
of Corinth was as mixed as that of Alexandria. At Cenchrea, on the eastern shore
of the isthmus, the wealth of Asia and Egypt poured in, and was sent off to
Rome and Italy from Lechaeum, the western harbour. The flow of commerce
brought with it the peoples, religions and habits
of all lands. The religion of the city was a strange medley of cults Eastern
and Western. Aphrodite and Astarte, Isis and Cybele, were among her deities; Romans, Jews, Egyptians and Phoenicians among her people.
The familiar illustrations
which the apostle uses in his epistles indicate the habits of the population.
He speaks of the arena and the wild-beast fights,1 Cor. xv. 32. of the
theatre,1 Cor. iv. 9; vii. 31. of the boxing
match and the stadium race,1 Cor. ix. 24-27. of the great idol-feasts and processions.1 Cor. viii. 10. The
city, we know, was honeycombed with “gilds”—religious corporations for the
practices of the Eastern religions, and trades unions for the artizans and the
seamen. The Christian society was gathered from all classes; from the poor
and the slaves,1 Cor. i. 26. from the well-to-do like the city treasurer,Erastus, Rom. xvi. 23. and an elder from the
Jewish Synagogue;Crispus, Acts xviii. 8; 1 Cor. i. 14. it
included ladies of rank like Chloe,1 Cor. i. 11. and men of abounding
wealth like Gains.Rom. xvi. 23; 1 Cor. i. 14. It was this hcterogenous society, including so many jarring
elements, that the apostle expected to develop into an orderly Church of Christ
in virtue of the “ gifts “ of the Spirit implanted within it.
2. It is by no means so easy to get a clear picture of the second meeting of
the Christian community—the meeting for thanksgiving—as it is to see what the
meeting for edification was like.It is strange that, apart from the descriptions of the Last Supper in the Synoptic
Gospels (and for obvious reasons they cannot be taken as descriptions of the
way in which the Eucharistic service was celebrated in the Apostolic and post-Apostolic
Church), we have no very clear account of how the Service of Thanksgiving was
observed among the primitive Christians till the middle of the second century,
when we have the statement of Justin Martyr in his Apology, i. 67. The
earliest account, so far as I know, which gives as full a description of the
Holy Communion as we have of the meeting for exhortation in the First Epistle
to the Corinthians, is to be found in the Canons of Hippolytus (Gebhardt
and Harnack, Texte u. Untersuchungen, VI. iv. pp. 118-22). Yet the whole line
of the history of worship, of the organization of the local churches, and of
the administration of ecclesiastical property follows the development of this
part of the public worship of the Church. We can learn many details, but we
have no complete account. In the account of the Last Supper,
here in the Epistle to the Corinthians, in the Didache (x. 1), in the description
of Pliny, in Clement of Alex. (Paidagogos, ii. 1), in Ignatius
(Ad Smyrnæos, viii.), the
celebration follows a common meal; in Justin it takes place during the meeting
for exhortation; in the Canons of Hippolytus, the meeting for
exhortation, the Holy Communion, and the Lord's day common meal are all separate
from each other. With the latter we have only to remove the blemishes which
the apostle found, and the vision of the meeting as he approved of it stands
clearly before us. But the abuses which had corrupted
the meeting for thanksgiving had so changed it, from what it ought to have been,
that it could not serve what it was meant to do. The framework of the degenerate
meeting and of the same gathering re-organized according to the apostle’s directions
can easily be traced. The members of the Christian community in Corinth assembled
together in one place, where they ate together a meal which they themselves
provided; and this meeting ended with the celebration of the Lord’s Supper.
The Holy Supper was the essential part. The common meal and what belonged to
it were accessories, the casket to contain the one precious jewel, the body
to be vivified by this soul. It was the Holy Supper that really brought them
together; but their conduct had made it impossible for them to be the Lord’s
guests at His Table.1 Cor. xi. 20. The apostle tells the Corinthians that their meeting could
not be a Lord’s Supper nor even a love-feast if each ate his own meal and one
was hungry, while another drank his fill.1 Cor. xi. 21. The common meal showed that all the
brethren belonged to one living organism which was the Church in Corinth, of
which the Lord was the Head. Nothing could so wound this thought
as making the distinctions between rich and poor, which had been done. It banished
the whole idea of fellow-ship, and sensuality was introduced where, above all
places, it ought to have been absent.1 Cor. xi. 22. God had manifested His displeasure by
sending sickness and death into the congregation.1 Cor. xi. 30-32. The apostle lays down a general
principle, and gives instances of its application, which if followed out will
make the common meal a fitting introduction to the Holy Supper, and then shows
how the Lord’s Supper itself is to be solemnly and fitly celebrated
according to the commands of Jesus. If we take the principles which the apostle lays down and suggestions from other
portions of the New Testament, with those which come from the earliest post-apostolic descriptions of similar
meetings, we may perhaps venture to reconstruct the scene.
The apostle shows that this meeting for thanksgiving is to be a social
meal representing the fellowship
which subsists between all the members of the brotherhood, because they have
each a personal fellowship with their Lord. They are therefore to eat all together,
and if anyone is too hungry to wait for his neighbours he ought to eat at home.
It is also to be a fitting introduction for the Lord’s Supper, which both symbolises
and imparts that personal fellowship with Christ which is the permanent basis
of their fellowship with each other. This thought that the Holy Supper is to
come at the end of it must dominate the meeting during its entire duration.
From beginning to end the brethren are at the Lord’s Table and are His guests.
The whole membership of the Church
at Corinth met together at one place on a fixed day, the Lord’s day,The Lord’s day: Acts xx. 7; Didache, xiv. 1;
Canons of Hippolytus (Texte u. Untersuchungen, VI. iv. p. 105, cf. p. 183 n.). for their
Thanks-giving Meeting. The meeting was confined to the member-ship; even catechumens,
as well as inquirers and unbelievers, were excluded. The partakers brought provisions,
according to their ability. Some of the brethren, who belonged to
that honoured number who were recognized
to have the prophetic gift, presided.Didache, x. The food brought was handed over
to them, and they distributed so that the superfluity of the rich made up for
the lack of the poor. They also conducted the devotional services at the feast
and at the Holy Supper which followed. The presidents began with prayers of
thanksgiving for the food prepared for them and before them;The beautiful prayer given in the Didache is (x.): “We thank Thee,
Holy Father, for Thy holy name, which Thou hast caused to dwell in our
hearts, and for the knowledge and faith and immortality which Thou hast made known to
us through Jesus Thy Servant; to Thee be the glory for ever. Thou, Lord Almighty,
didst create all things for Thy Name’s sake, both food and drink Thou didst
give to men for enjoyment, in order that they might give thanks to Thee; but
to us Thou hast graciously given spiritual food and drink and eternal life through
Thy Servant. Before all things we thank Thee that Thou art Mighty; to Thee
be the glory for ever. Remember Thy Church, Lord, to deliver it from every evil
and to make it perfect in Thy Love, and gather it from the four winds, the sanctified,
into Thy Kingdom. Let Grace come and let this world pass away. Hosanna to the Son of David. Whoever
is holy, let him come; whoever is not let him depart. Maranatha. Amen.” This
prayer was to be said at the close of the feast. “Now after ye are filled thus do ye give thanks” is the introductory sentence.
It is also to be remembered that when prophets conducted the love-feast they
were not confined to prescribed prayers. “Permit the prophets to give thanks
as much as they will.” it was an
evidence of the bounty of God the Creator; a pledge of His
fellowship with them His creatures; a warrant for their continuous trust in His Fatherly care
and providence; and a suggestion of the bounties of His redemption which were
more fully symbolised in the Holy Supper which followed.The common meals which our Lord shared with His disciples were always looked upon as showing
His intimate fellowship with them, and spiritual associations clustering round
the thought were enhanced by His frequent comparison of the Kingdom of God to
a common meal (Matt. xxii. 4; Luke xiv. 15 f.; Luke xxii. 30;
cf. Rev. iii. 20). Those who had sat at meat with Him supposed that they had a claim upon
Him (Luke xiii. 26); while the miraculous feeding was a picture of the providence
of God which ought to awaken our continuous trust in Him. There are evidences of all these thoughts. During the feast the
brethren were taught to regard themselves as in God’s presence and His guests; but this did not hinder a prevailing sense of gladness, nor prevent them
satisfying their hunger and their thirst; God the creator had placed the food
and drink before them for that purpose.The note of gladness is always marked. The brethren in the primitive Church at Jerusalem
“breaking bread at home, did eat with gladness and singleness of heart.” Acts
ii. 46; cf. Acts xxvii. 33-35. “Both food and drink Thou didst give to man
for enjoyment, in order that they might give thanks to Thee,”
Didache, x. “Edant bibantque ad satietatem, neque vero
ad ebrietatem; sed in divina praesentia cum laude Dei,” Canons of Hippolytus (Texte u.
Untersuchungen, VI, iv. p. 107). It did prevent all
unseemly behaviour, all unbrotherly conduct in speech or action, and it insisted on the
absence of all who were at variance with their neighbours until the quarrel
had been put an end to.” But every one that hath controversy with his friend let him not come together with
you until they be reconciled,” Didache, xiv. In the special
“Lord’s day” love-feast which may be given to the poor, as set forth in the
Canons of Hippolytus, it is said: “Ne quis multum loquatur neve clamet, ne forte vos irrideant, neve
sint scandalo hominibus, ita ut in contumeliam vertatur qui vos invitavit, cum appareat, vos a bono
ordine aberrare” (Texte, etc. VI. iv. p. 108). These love-feasts naturally became the means of helping the poor
attached to the Christian congregations, as we can see in the primitive Church
at Jerusalem (Acts vi. 1, 2), and from such ancient ecclesiastical manuals as
the Canons of Hippolytus. Gentile Christians had been accustomed to pagan banquets and the more modest common
meals of the “gilds,” and could the more readily accommodate themselves to the Christian observance,
but this familiarity with the heathen usages would the more readily lead to
such corruptions as St. Paul censures in the Corinthian Church. Cf. W. Liebenam,
Zur Geschichte u. Organisation des Römischen Vereinswesens, pp. 260-261.
Liebenam thinks that the evidence goes to prove that the eating at these common
meals of the confraternities was for the most part frugal and that the excess
arose from over-drinking. He and Foucart
(Des associations religieuses chez les Grecs, p. 153 ff.) have collected
the evidence. The excesses at Corinth arose from the pagan associations connected
either with these common meals of the confraternities or more probably with
the temple banquets (1 Cor. x. 14-22). During the feast hymns were sung at intervals, and
probably short exhortations were given by the prophets.“Psalmos recitent, antequam recedant,” Can. Hipp. (Texte, VI. iv. 106) Then when all was decently
finished the Holy Communion was solemnly celebrated as commanded by the apostle.
3. It is
to be remembered that the apostle regarded the community of Christians at Corinth
as something more than a society for performing together acts of public worship,
whether eucharistic or for prayer, praise and exhortation. It was a little self-governing
republic. This made the third kind of meeting necessary. The common worship
of the society, especially the eucharistic service, united it with the whole
brotherhood of believers throughout the world, and showed it to be in the
succession from the ancient people of God;1 Cor. x. 1-4. but it had a corporate unity of its
own which manifested itself in actions for which the whole body of the Corinthian
believers were responsible. This local unity took shape in the meeting of the
congregation which is expressly called the “Church”1 Cor. xiv. 19, 34, 35; xi. 18. by
the apostle, at which all the members apparently had the right of appearing
and taking part in the discussion and voting—women at first as well as men.
This meeting had charge of the discipline of the congregation and of the fraternal relations
between the community and other Christian communities. Letters seeking apostolic
advice were prepared and dispatched in its name;1 Cor. vii. 1. The epistle known as the
First Epistle of Clement begins: “The Church of Rome to the Church of Corinth, elect and consecrate, greeting.” it appointed delegates to
represent the church and gave them letters of commendation,2 Cor. iii. 1, 2; viii. 19.
and in all probability it took charge of the money gathered in the great collection
for the poor saints at Jerusalem.1 Cor. xvi. 1-2. The whole administration of the external
affairs of the congregation was under its control; and this was a work of very
great importance, because it was this fraternal intercourse that made visible
the essential unity of the whole Church of Christ.
It exercised the same complete control over the internal administration of the affairs of
the congregation. It expelled unworthy members;1 Cor: v. 1-8. it
deliberated upon and came to conclusions about the restoration of brethren
who had fallen away and showed signs of repentance.2 Cor. ii. 6-9. It arrived at its decisions
when necessary by voting, and the vote of the majority decided the case.2 Cor. ii. 6 We
hear nothing in the epistles of a common congregational fund for purposes common
to the brethren; if such existed it was probably under the care of this meeting
also.
All these things implied independent self-government; and the apostle asks the brethren
to undertake another task which shows even more clearly how independent and autonomous he
expected the congregation to be. He censured Christians for bringing their fellow-believers
before the ordinary law-courts should disputes arise between brethren; he urged
that such matters should be settled within the congregation. He used stronger
language about this than about any other side of the practical expression of
their religious life. “Dare any of you,” he says, “having a matter against
his neighbour, go to law before the unrighteous, and not before the saints?”1 Cor. vi. 1. This advice of St. Paul passed into the ecclesiastical legislation of
the primitive Church. We read in the Apostolic Constitutions (II. xlvi. xlvii. xlviii. xlix.):
“Let not therefore the heathen know of your differences among one another, nor do you receive unbelievers as witnesses against yourselves,
nor be judged by them . . . but render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s
. . . as tribute, taxes or poll-money. . . . Let your judicatures be held on the
second day of the week, that if any controversy arise about your sentence, having
an interval till the Sabbath, you may be able to set the controversy right and
to reduce those to peace who have the contests one with another before the Lord’s
day. Let the deacons and the elders be present at your judicatures, to judge
without acceptance of persons, as men of God with clear conscience. . . . Do not pass the same sentence for every sin, but one suitable to each crime,
distinguishing all the several sorts of offences with much prudence, the great
from the little. Treat a wicked action after one manner, and a wicked word after
another; a bare intention still otherwise . . . Some thou shalt curb with threatenings only; some thou shalt punish with
fines to the poor; some thou shalt mortify with fastings; others shalt thou
separate according to the greatness of their several crimes. . . . When the parties are both present (for
we will not call them brethren until they receive each other in peace) examine
diligently concerning those who appear before you. . . .”
To grasp the full significance of his meaning we must remember that the
apostle is speaking to men living in the busiest commercial city of the age,
and to a little community within it which included city officials, merchants,
and artizans, as well as slaves. He is not addressing men belonging to a small
rural village where life is simple and the occasions of dispute few and mainly
personal. The Christians of Corinth lived in the grasp of a highly artificial
and complicated commercial life, where the complexity of affairs offered any
number of points at which differences of opinion might honestly arise between brethren
related as masters and servants, buyers and sellers, traders and carriers. It was men living
in these surroundings whom the apostle ordered to abstain from going before
the ordinary law courts for the purpose of settling disputes which might arise
between them, and whom he commanded to create tribunals within the community
before which they were to bring all differences. Have they not one single “wise man,” he asks, among them who could act
as judge?1 Cor. vi. 5. We are apt to forget
that Christianity came to establish a new social living as well as a religion,
and that from the first it demanded that all the relations between man and man
ought to be regulated on Christian principles. That means now that our national
laws ought to conform to the principles of the Gospel; it meant then that all
disputes were to be settled within the Christian community, and that nothing
was to be taken before the heathen tribunals.
Such is the picture of a Christian church in the Apostolic age, as it appears in the pages
of the Epistles of St. Paul to the Corinthians, and, although no such clear
outline is given us of any other Christian community, still we are warranted,
as we shall see, in assuming that the Church in Corinth did not differ much
from the other churches which came into being through the mission work of the
great apostle to the Gentiles.Compare Weizsäcker’s The Apostolic Age, ii. 246-290. Heinrici, Das Erste Sendschreiben des
Apostels Paulus an die Korinther, passim. We see a little self-governing republic—a tiny
island in a sea of surrounding paganism—with an active, eager, enthusiastic
life of its own. It has its meetings for edification, open to all who care to
attend, where the conversions are made which multiply the little community;
its quieter meetings for thanksgiving, where none but the believing brethren
assemble, and where the common meal enshrines the Holy Supper as the common
fellowship among the brethren embodies the personal but not solitary fellowship
which each believer has with the Redeemer; its business meetings where it rules its members
in the true democratic fashion of a little village republic, and attaches itself to other
brotherhoods who share the same faith and hope, trust in and live for the same
Saviour, and have things in common in this world as well as beyond it. The meeting
for thanksgiving represents the centre of spiritual repose, the quiet source
of active life and service; the meeting for edification, the enthusiastic,
eager, aggressive side of the life and work; and the business meeting, the
deliberative and practical action of men who recognize that they are in the
world though not of it.
We can see our brethren in the faith living, loving, working together, quarrelling and
making it up again, across these long centuries, and all very human as we are.
The evidence for the independence and self-government of the churches to which St. Paul addressed
his epistles is so overwhelming that it is impossible even to imagine the presence
within them of any ecclesiastical authority with an origin and power independent
of the assembly of the congregation, and the apostle does not make the slightest
allusion to any such governing or controlling authority, whether vested in
one man or in a group of men. The apostle was so filled with the sense of high
rank to which all Christians are raised in being called to be “sons of God” through Jesus Christ, that in his view this sublime position makes all believers
of equal standing no matter with what spiritual gifts and natural abilities
particular individuals may be endowed.Gal. iii. 26-28; cf. 1 Cor. xii.
xiii. It was a natural and practical consequence
of this thought that all believers should share the responsibilities of control
in the community to which they belonged. So we find it as a matter of fact in
the churches to which St. Paul addressed his epistles. He did not write to ecclesiastical
persons to whom the brethren owed obedience as to an authority different from,
and superior to, the assembly of the congregation. He addressed his letters
to the whole community, who, in his eyes, are responsible for the progress
and good behaviour as for the misdeeds and decline of the society and of individual Christians
within it. His letters are quite consistent with the existence of ministering
officials who owe their position to the assembly and are responsible in the
last resort to it; but they are not consistent with the existence within the
community of any authority whose power comes directly from a source outside
the brotherhood.
In his letters to the Church at Corinth, the apostle makes scant allusion to office-bearers
of any kind. The meeting of the congregation is the one thing which gathers
up the unity of administration within the community. The apostle appears to
acquiesce in this state of matters, unless we consider the query as to whether
there are no wise men within the society who can settle disputes within the
brotherhood to be a suggestion that some kind of recognized officials are needed
for the furtherance of the orderly life of the local church. In verses 3-15
of the last chapter of the Epistle to the Romans, whether these be a short letter
addressed to the Church at Ephesus, as some think, or whether they be an integral
part of the letter to “all that be in Rome, beloved of God, called to be saints,”
the apostle ad-dresses Christians who appear to be living in an even less organized
condition of Christian fellowship. They form a unity because of their common
faith and love; but that unity does not appear to find expression even in one
common congregational meeting. Little companies, to whom the apostle unhesitatingly
gives the name of “churches,” have gathered round prominent persons who appear
to have been the first converts, or those who had placed their houses at the
disposal of the brethren for holding meetings for worship, or those who had
voluntarily done special services to their fellow believers. The same condition
of things is to be found at Colossae and at Laodicea. The apostle sends greetings
to persons of different sexes and positions in life, but never to office-bearers
as such. Nor among his many exhortations does he allude to the need of organization
under hierarchical authority, still less does he prescribe a form of
organization which was to be uniform throughout the whole Church of Christ.
We do, however,
find traces of an organization within the Christian communities, if we use the
word in the most general way, in the Epistles of St. Paul. The meeting of the
congregation is almost as prominent in the Church of the Thessalonians as
it is at Corinth; it exercises discipline;1 Thess. v. 14. it selects faithful men to accompany
the apostle to Jerusalem with the money brought together in the great collection;2 Cor. viii. 19.
it evidently has all administrative powers in its hands. But besides this, we hear of men
who are called “those who are over you in the Lord,” and the brethren of Thessalonica
are told to value them highly for their works’ sake.1 Thess. v. 13. In the Corinthian Church
we hear of “gifts,” of “helps” (ἀντιλήψεις),
anything that could be done for the poor or outcast brethren, either by rich and influential
brethren, or by the devotion of those who stood on no such eminence; and guidances
or “governments” (κυβερνήσεις), men
who by wise councils did for the community what the steersman or pilot does
for the ship.Hort, The Christian Ecclesia, p. 159.
These “gifts” were bestowed on members of the community for the service of
all; and men who were recognized to be able to guide wisely as well as others
from whom all kinds of subordinate service could be expected, were present within
the Christian community at Corinth.1 Cor. xii. 28. Again the Corinthian Christians are told
“to be in subjection” to Stephanas, the first convert, and others like him
who have ministered to the saints and who have laboured among them, putting
heart into their work.1 Cor. xvi. 15, 16. The phrase “to minister unto the saints”
(εἰς διακονίαν τοῖς ἁγίοις) corresponds with the
διακονεῖν τραπέζαις of
Acts vi. 2. This ministry to the saints, which is connected with
leadership of some kind, is expanded in the Epistle to the Romans to include
liberality, showing mercy and leadership (Rom. xii. 6-8); and these three heads
read like a brief summary of the qualifications of the elder or episcopus enumerated
in the First Epistle to Timothy (1 Tim. iii. 1-9). In the First Epistle to the
Thessalonians the thought of ministry to the saints includes
the three heads of caring for the spiritual and bodily wants of the brethren,
having oversight of moral behaviour, and leadership or
presidency—κοπιῶντες, νουθετοῦντες, and προϊστάμενοι.
(1 Thess. v. 12). In the Epistle
to the Romans there is express mention of men who are over their brethren,
and they are told to do their work diligently.Rom. xii. 8. These references and others
show us that there were men in these Christian societies who were recognized
as leaders and who rendered continuous and valued services to their brethren
by so doing. They may not have been office-bearers by election and appointment,
but they were engaged in doing the work that office-bearers do in a Christian
church.
Altogether apart, however, from the organization of the local churches, whether developed
or undeveloped, we find a ministry which existed in all the churches of the
Epistles of St. Paul, and indeed in all the churches of the New Testament. We
meet everywhere with men who are called prophets, and who occupy a distinguished
place in the primitive churches. St. Paul esteemed them highly. He placed them
second to apostles in his enumeration of the “gifts” bestowed by God on the
churches.1 Cor. xii. 28. He exhorts the Corinthian Christians to cultivate the “gift” of
prophecy, and the Thessalonian Christians are told to cherish “prophesyings.”
It becomes evident the more these epistles of St. Paul are studied, that teaching
and exhortation, associated afterwards in a very special manner with the
functions of rule and leadership,
were in the hands of the prophets to a very
large extent in the apostolic Church, and that no inquiry into the “ministry” of the primitive Church can omit the functions and position of prophets and
prophecy.
This brings us to consider the “ministry” and organization of the churches in the apostolic
age, a thing necessary to complete our conception of what a Christian society
was like in these early times. The subject is interesting, but confessedly difficult.
Yet we have light enough, from the writings of the New Testament and the earliest
extra-canonic literature, to
show us that it was entirely unlike anything which has existed in any part of the Christian Church
from the beginning of the third century downwards.
Before we begin to inquire what this ministry and organization were, it may be useful to note
two things: first, it must be remembered that our Lord has clearly intimated
that leadership within His Church was to have a distinctive character of its
own; and secondly, there is from the very first beginnings of organization a clearly marked separation between two different
kinds of ministry.If we examine the various uses
of the words “minister” or “servant” or “deacon” (διάκονος), “he who ministers
or serves” (ὁ διακονῶν) “ministry or service”
(δι9ακονία), and “to minister or to serve”
(διακονεῖν) we have the following extensive application:—
1. The ordinary service which a
hired servant renders to his master, such as waiting at table, etc., as in Luke xii. 37 and elsewhere.
2. Kindly personal attentions rendered to our Lord, as by St. Peter’s mother-in law
(Matt. viii. 15; Mk. i. 31; Luke iv. 39), by Martha (Lu. x. 40;
John xii. 2), or by the women from Galilee (Matt. xxvii. 55; Mk. xv. 41;
Luke viii. 3); or rendered to our Lord’s followers and looked on as done to Himself (Matt.
xxv. 44; Heb. vi. 10); or rendered to St. Paul by Timothy, Erastus and Onesimus
(Acts xix. 22; Philem. 13; 2 Tim. i. 18).
3. The service of angels rendered to our Lord and to men (Matt. iv. 11; Mark i. 13;
Heb. i. 14).
4. The service
rendered by the O. T. economy (1 Peter i. 12; 2 Cor. iii. 7).
5. The work of our Lord Himself (Matt. xx. 28; Mark x. 45; Luke xxii. 26, 27;
2 Cor. iii. 8; v. 18; Rom. xv. 8).
6. WITHIN THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH we find the following widely extended application:—
a. Discipleship in general (John xii. 26).
b. Service rendered to the Church because of “gifts” bestowed and specially connected with the bestowal
and posesssion of these “gifts” (Rom. xii. 7; 1 Cor. xii. 5;
1 Peter iv. 10. 11).
c. Hence all kinds of
service, whether the “ministry of the Word” or ministry not distinctly of
the Word (Acts vi. 2; Matt. xx. 26; xxiii. 11;
Mark ix. 35; x. 43).
d. Specifically the “ministry of the Word” (Acts vi. 4; Eph. iv. 12;
2 Tim. iv. 5); and most
frequently the “Apostleship” (Acts i. 17; xx. 24;
xxi. 19; Rom. xi. 13; 2 Cor. iii. 3, 6;
iv. 1; vi. 3 f.;
1 Tim. i. 12; 1 Cor. iii. 5; Eph.
iii. 7; Col. i. 23, 25).
e. Service which was not a “ministry of the Word”:—Feeding the poor (Acts vi. 1); providing,
bringing and dispensing resources in the time of famine (Acts xi. 29; xii. 25);
organizing, gathering and conveying the great collection for the poor
saints at Jerusalem (Rom. xv. 25, 31; 2 Cor. viii. 4, 19, 20;
ix. 1, 12, 13); to which we may probably add the service of the whole Church of Thyatira
(Rev. ii. 19).
f. Services rendered by specially named men, and which probably included both the “ministry of the Word” and
other kinds of service:—The ministry of Stephanas (1 Cor. xvi. 15), of Archippus
(Col. iv. 17), of Tychicus (Eph. vi. 21; Col. iv. 7), of Epaphras (Col. i. 7),
and of Timothy (1 Thess. iii. 2; 1 Tim. iv. 6).
g. Men who are office-bearers in a
local church and are called “deacons” as a title of office (1 Tim. iii. 8-13); men who
may be office-bearers but who may get the name applied to
them not because of office but because of the work they do—a work which has not yet ripened
into a permanent office as in Phil. i. 1, and as in Rom. xvi. 1 (“Phoebe, our
sister, who is a deacon of the Church which is at Cenchrea,” and
who is also called “patroness”).
7. The idea of “rule” is conveyed in Rom. xiii. 4, where kings are called the “deacons”
of God; and in John xii. 26; Matt. xxv. 44; Heb. vi. 10, where it is said
that those who serve are honoured of the Father, and where all service done
to the Church or its members is said to be done to our Lord Himself.
The distinctive character of leadership in the Christian Church is given in the saying of our Lord contained
in Luke xxii. 26: “He that is greater among you let him become as the younger,
and he that is chief as he that doth serve”; and this junction of service
and leadership is maintained throughout the Epistles of St. Paul. The Corinthian
Christians were to place themselves under the guidance of Stephanas and those
like him who had served them and laboured among them. Those that are “over
the Thessalonian brethren in the Lord” are the men who spend most labour upon
them. Everywhere service and leadership go together. These two thoughts are
continually associated with a third, that of “gifts”; for the qualifications
which fit a man for service and therefore for rule within the Church of Christ
are always looked upon as special “gifts” of the Spirit of God, or charismata.The “gifts” (χαρίσματα) are
individual capacities or excellencies laid hold on, strengthened, vivified and applied by the Spirit to service
within the community. They are the natural capacities which men possess apart from their
own power of acquiring them and which come from the free bounty of God the Creator.
Men are not all alike; their capacities and natural powers differ; and thus
when the Spirit works through these powers there is nothing mechanical in the
activities set in motion. These natural endowments are laid hold on by the Spirit,
strengthened by His agency, and used, each of them, for a special service
(διακονία) within
the Christian society. They may be the natural capacities for teaching, for
evangelization, for the vision, and utterances of spiritual truths, for ecstatic
praise, for leadership of men, for organization, for duties to the poor and
sick, for the performance of all the practical and social duties needed for
the welfare of the community. These natural endowments are seized by the Spirit
and so influenced that they become the specialized “gifts” of the Spirit,
and fit the possessors for all kinds of service, so that as Chrysostom says,
“ἐνεργήματα καὶ χαρίσματα
καὶ διακονίαι ὀνομάτων διαφοραὶ
μόναι, ἐπεὶ πράγματα τὰ αὐτά”
(Cat. 233). Lists
of these “gifts” are given, none of them being meant to be exhaustive. In 1 Cor. xii. 4-11
appear: the word of wisdom (λόγος σοφίας),
the word of knowledge (λόγος γνώσεως), faith (πίστις)
gifts of healing (χαρίσματα ἰαμάτων),
prophecy (προφητεία),
workings of powers (ἐνεργήματα δυνάμεων),
testing of spirits (διακρίσεις πνευμάτων),
kinds of tongues (γένη γλωσσῶν),
and interpretation of tongues (ἑρμηνεία γλωσσῶν).
In 1 Cor. xii. 28-31 appear: apostles (ἀπόστολοι),
prophets (προφῆται), teachers (διδάσκαλοι),
powers (δυνάμεις),
gifts of healing (χαρίσματα ἰαμα̜των),
helps (ἀντιλήψεις),
governments (κυβερνήσεις),
kinds of tongues (γένη γλωσσῶν). In Rom. xii. 6-8 appear:—prophecy
(προφητεία),
service (διακονία), teaching (διδασκαλία),
the liberal man (ὁ μεταδιδοὺς), the ruler (ὁ προϊστάμενος),
and the merciful man (ὁ ἐλεῶν). And in Eph. iv. 11 we have: Apostles
(ἀπόστολοι), prophets (προφῆται),
evangelists (εὐαγγελισταὶ), pastors and teachers (ποιμένας καὶ διδάσκαλοι).
To these we may add “a man’s capacity for the married or celibate life” (1 Cor. vii. 7). The conception of
“gifts” in their relation to the Christian society is given in its widest extent in
1 Peter iv. 9-11: “Using hospitality one to another without murmuring: each,
as he bath received a ‘gift,’ ministering it to one another, as good stewards
of the manifold bounty of God.” Thus we have three thoughts:
of qualification, which is the “gift” of God; the service to the Church of Christ which these “gifts” enable
those who possess them to perform; and lastly the promise that such service
is honoured by the Father,John iii. 26. and is the basis of leadership or rule within the Church of Christ.
The earliest evidence we have for the beginnings of the organization of a local church is
given in Acts vi., where we are
told about “seven” men being
set apart for what is called the “ministry of tables,” and which is contrasted
with the “ministry of the Word.”Acts vi. 2. We have thus at the very beginnings of organization
a division of ministry, or rather two different
kinds of ministry, within the Church of Christ
in the apostolic age. Harnack calls this division the “earliest datum
in the history of organization.”Expositor, Jan.–June, 1887, p. 324. The distinction which comes into
sight at the very beginning runs all through the apostolic Church, and goes
far down into the sub-apostolic period. It can be traced through the Pauline
epistles and other New Testament writings, and down through such sub-apostolic
writings as the Didache, the Pastor of Hermas, the Epistle of Barnabas, the
Apology of Justin Martyr, and the writings of Irenaeus. It is also found in the Christian literature which does
not belong to the main stream of the Church’s history, among the Gnostics, the
Marcionites and the Montanists.The evidence has been collected by Harnack in Texte u. Untersuchungen, II. ii. pp. 111 f. The distinction ceases to be an essential
one or one inherent in the very idea of the ministry when we get down as far
as Tertullian, but it does not cease entirely. Prophets are found long after
Tertullian’s time, but they no longer occupy the position which once was theirs.
The common name
for those who belong to the first kind of ministry is “ those speaking the Word
of God,” and this name is given to them not only in the New Testament, but also
in the Didache, by Hermas, and by Clement
of Rome. To the second class belonged the ministry of a local church by whatever
names they came to be called, pastors, elders, bishops, deacons. We may call
the first kind the prophetic, and the second kind the local ministry. The great
practical distinction between the two was that the prophetic ministry did not
mean office-bearers in a local church; while the local ministry consisted of these office-bearers.
The one was a ministry to the whole Church of God, and by its activity bound
all the scattered parts of the Church
visible together; the other was a ministry within a local church, and, with
the assembly of the congregate in, manifested and preserved the unity and the independence
of the local community. In the apostolic and early sub-apostolic church the prophetic
ministry was manifestly the higher and the local ministry the lower; the latter
had to give place to the former even within the congregation over which they were
office-bearers.
But while this higher
ministry can be clearly separated from the lower ministry of the local churches,
it does not follow that these office-bearers did not from the first count among
their number men who possessed the prophetic gift. Prophecy or the gift of magnetic
utterance might come to any Christian, and St. Paul desired that it might belong
to all.1 Cor. xiv. 5. The two ministries can be clearly distinguished, but no hard and fast line
can be drawn between the men who compose the ministries. The “prophetic” gift of
magnetic speech was so highly esteemed that it is only natural to suppose that when
congregations chose their office-bearers they selected men so gifted, if any such
were within their membership. This, we can see, was the case in later times. Polycarp
was an office-bearer in the Church at Smyrna, but he was also a “prophet.”“The glorious martyr Polycarp, who was found an apostolic and prophetic teacher in our own time.” Epistle of the Smyrnaeans, 16.
Ignatius of Antioch was a prophet.Epistle to the Philadelphians, 7. Cyprian and other pastors in North
Africa had the same gift, which was a personal
and not an official source of enlightenment.Epistles, lvii. 5 (liii.): lxvi. 10 (lxviii.). We have by no means
obscure indications that what took place later happened in the earliest period.
The “Seven,” who were selected for the lower ministry in Jerusalem,
did not confine themselves to the “service of tables,” but were found among those
who “spoke the Word of God” with power.Acts viii. 5, 40.
CHAPTER III
THE PROPHETIC MINISTRY
St. Paul’s conception of a Christian
communityThis is equally true of the whole Church
of Christ throughout the whole world: for each local church is the Church in
miniature. The relation of the prophetic ministry to the whole Church on the
one hand and to the local church on the other is an instructive illustration
of the visibility of the Church Universal in every Christian community. is a body of which the Spirit of Christ is the soul. The individual
members are all full of the Spirit, and their individual powers and capacities
are laid hold of, vivified, and strengthened by the indwelling Spirit in such
a way that each is “gifted” and enabled to do some special service for Christ
and for His Church in the society in which he is placed. Every true Christian
is “gifted” in this way. In this
respect all are equal and of the same spiritual rank. The equality, however,
is neither monotonous nor mechanical. Men have different natural endowments,
and these lead to a diversity of “gifts,” all of which are serviceable in their
places, and enable the separate members to perform different services, useful
and necessary, for the spiritual life of the whole community and for the growth
in sanctification of every member. Some have special “gifts” bestowed on them
which enable them to do corresponding services, and some are “gifted” in a
pre-eminent degree. Thus, although every Christian is the dwelling place of
the Spirit, and is therefore to be called “spiritual”1 Cor. iii. 1; cf. Gal. vi. 1,
and 1 Cor. ii. 15.
(πνευματικὸς), some are more fitted to
take leading parts than others, and are called the “spiritual” in a narrower
and stricter sense of the word.
These specialized gifts of the Spirit included all kinds of service, and were
all, in their own place, valuable and equally the “gifts” of the one Spirit.
Some of them, however, were sure to be more appreciated than others. To men
and women, quivering with a new fresh spiritual life, nothing could be more
thirsted after than to hear again and again renewed utterances of that “word
of the Spirit,” which had first awakened in them the new life they were living.
Hence among the specially “gifted” persons, those who had the “gift” to
speak the “Word of God,” for edification and in exhortation, took a foremost
place, and were specially honoured.Compare the τετιμημένοι of the Didache (iv. 1; xv. 2)
and 1 Tim. v. 17: “oἱ καλῶς προεστῶτες
πρεσβύτεροι διπλῆς τιμῆς
ἀξιούσθωσαν, μάλιστα οἱ
κοπιῶντες ἐν λόγῳ καὶ
διδασκαλίᾳ.” It would be a mistake, however, to call
this ministry of the “Word” the “Charismatic Ministry,” as if it alone depended on
and came from the “gifts” of the Spirit; for every kind of service comesRom. xii. 7: “εἴ́τε διακονίαν, ἐν τῇ
διακονίᾳ,” is any kind of service in the Christian community.
from a “gift,” and the ministry of attending to the poor and the
sick, or advising and leading the community with wise counsels, are equally
charismatic.“Helps” (ἀντιλήψεις) and “wise counsels”
(κυβερνήσεις) are placed in the same list of “gifts” with apostles, prophets, teachers
and those who have powers of healing. The ministry of the local church, which is
the foundation whence has come the present ministry in the Church in all its branches, was as
much founded on the “gifts” of the Spirit as was the ministry of the Word. Sohm appears to ignore this in
his otherwise admirable discussion of the “Lehrgabe” (Kirchenrecht, i. 28 ff.);
and Harnack does not have it always before him, as it ought to be, in the dissertations appended to his epoch-making edition
of the Didache (Texte u. Untersuchungen, II. ii.).
St. Paul always assumes that this “gift” of speaking the
“Word of God” required a “gift” in the hearers which corresponded to the
“gift” in the speakers, and that it would have small effect apart from the
general “gift” of discernment of spirits. The spiritual voice needs the spiritual
ear. The ministry of the Word depends for its effectiveness upon the ministry
of discernment: for the “natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit
of God; for they are foolishness unto him; and he cannot know them because
they are spiritually examined.”1 Cor. ii. 14. There was therefore in this ministry
of the “Word” the exercise of a two-fold “gift” or charisma; on the one hand the
charisma which enabled the speaker to declare what was the message of God, and on the
other hand the charisma in the hearers which enabled them to recognize whether the
message was really what it professed to be, a declaration of the Spirit, to
receive it if it was and to reject it if it was not. The duty laid upon the
speakers was to speak forth the Word of God in the proportion of the faith that
was in them, or to the full measure of the Christ that was in them; and the
duty laid upon the hearers was to test whether what was said to them was really
an utterance of the Spirit.The prophets who speak the “Word of God” are told to prophesy
according to the measure of the faith that is in them:
κατὰ τὴν ἀναλογίαν
τῆς πίστεως (Rom. xii. 6);
and the hearers are told to test the speakers (1 Cor.
xii. 10, compare vv. 1, 4; 1 Thess.
v. 21; cf. 1 Cor. x. 15; xi. 13); and in
1 John iv. 1-3 it is said, “Beloved,
believe not every spirit, but test the spirits whether they be of God,” etc. This charisma of discernment
lay at the basis of the “call” given by the congregation to men to be their
office-bearers: compare Canons of Hippolytus, ii. 7-9 (Texte und Untersuchungen, VI. iv. pp. 39, 40);
and its use showed that the spiritual “gift” which belonged to the whole community
was higher than the gift “ possessed by an individual prophet inasmuch as it was
the judge of that gift.” Compare Sohm, Kirchenrecht (1892), i. 56 ff., whose remarks, however valuable, seem too doctrinaire.
This “ministry of the Word” was the creative agency in the
primitive Church, and it may almost be said to have had the same function throughout
the centuries since. It was overthrown or thrust aside and placed under subjection
to an official ministry springing out of the congregation, and it has never
regained the recognized position it had in the first century and a half. But whenever the Church of
Christ has to be awakened out of a state of lethargy, this unofficial ministry
of the Word regains its old power though official sanction be withheld. From
point of view, and that not the least important, the history of the Church
flows on from one time of revival to another, and whether we take the awakenings
in the old Catholic, the mediaeval, or the modern Church, these have always
been the work of men specially gifted with the power of seeing and declaring
the secrets of the deepest Christian life, and the effect of their work has
always been proportionate to the spiritual receptivity of the generation they
have spoken to. The Reformation movement, which may be simply described as the
translation
into articulate thought of the heart religion of the mediaeval
Church, and which revived in so many ways the ideas and usages of the primitive
times, has expressed the two cardinal ideas of this primitive ministry of the
Word, in its declaration that the essential duty of the ministry of the Church
is the proclamation of the Gospel, and in its statement that the principle of
authority in the last resort is always the witness of the Spirit in the hearts
of believers.“Ut hanc fidem consequamur, institutum est ministerium docendi
Evangelii et porrigendi Sacramenta” (Augsburg Confession, Pt. I. art. v.);
“Nam sicuti Deus solus de se idoneus est testis in suo sermone; ita etiam
non ante fidem reperiet sermo in hominum cordibus, quam interiore Spiritus testimonio obsignetur” (Calvin,
Instit. I. vii. 4). “Our full persuasion and assurance of the infallible truth and divine authority
thereof is from the inward work of the Holy Spirit bearing witness by and with
the Word in our hearts” (West. Conf. i. 5).
The divine “gift,” whose possession placed men among the class of those who
spoke the Word of God (λαλοῦντες τὸν λόγον τοῦ
Θεοῦ)Heb. xiii. 7: Didache iv. 1: “My child, him that
speaketh to thee the Word of God thou shalt have in remembrance day and night, and honour him as the
Lord: for, where that which pertaineth to the Lord is spoken, there the Lord
is.”
gave the primitive Church its preaching ministry.This statement ought to be qualified: the local presidents or προϊστάμενοι
of 1 Thess. v. 12 seem to have had other duties besides merely to exercise oversight;
they had also to warn and instruct. Those so endowed
were in no sense office-bearers in any one Christian community; they were not
elected to an office: they were not set apart by any ecclesiastical ceremony; the
Word of God came to them, and they spoke the message that had been sent them.
They all had the divine call manifested in the “gift” they possessed and could
use. They were sent for the extension and edification of the whole Church of
God, and although they used their gifts in the meetings of the local communities
yet they were always to be conceived as the ministers of the Church universal.
Some of them were wanderers by the very nature of the work they were called
to; many of them, perhaps most, did not confine themselves to one community.
They came and went as they pleased. They were not responsible to any society
of Christians. The local church could only test them when they appeared, and
could receive or reject their ministrations. The picture of these wandering
preachers, men burdened by no cares of office, with no pastoral duties, coming
suddenly into a Christian community, doing their work there and as suddenly
departing, is a very vivid one in sub-apostolic literature. Their presence—men
who were the servants of all the churches and of no one church—was a great bond
which linked together all the scattered independent local churches and made
them one corporate whole.
We find in this “prophetic ministry” a threefold division.
They are apostles, prophets and teachers.
It does not seem possible to make a very strict or mechanical
division between the kinds of “Word of God” spoken by each class of men, but
it may be said that what was needed for zealous missionary endeavour was the
distinguishing characteristic of the first class, exhortation and admonition
of the second, and instruction of the third. In virtue of their personal “gifts” they were the venerated
but not official leadersHeb. xiii. 7: “Μνημονεύετε
τῶν ἡγουμένων ὑμῶν, οἵτινες
ἐλάλησαν ὑμῖν τὸν λόγον τοῦ Θεοῦ.”
(ἡγούμενοι) of every community where they were for the time being to be
found, and were worthy, not only of honour, but of honorarium.1 Cor. ix. 13, 14; Gal. vi. 6; cf.
2 Cor. xi. 8, 9, and Phil. iv. 10 ff.
“But every true prophet who will settle among you is worthy of his support. Likewise a true
teacher, he also is worthy, like the workman, of his support.
Every first-fruit then, of the products of the wine-press and threshing-floor,
of oxen and of sheep, thou shalt take and give to the prophets.”
Didache. xiii, 1-3. Τιμὴ
has the two meanings of “honour” and “honorarium,” and it is difficult to
know sometimes how to translate it; a case in point is 1 Tim. v. 17. We can
trace this threefold ministry of
the Word from the most primitive times down till the end of the second century,
if not later. It existed in the oldest Gentile Christian community, that of
Antioch, where a number of prophets and teachers sent forth two apostles from
among their own number.Acts xiii. 1-3. Apostles, prophets and teachers are mentioned in the
First Epistle to the Corinthians and in the Epistle to the Ephesians.1 Cor. xii. 28; Eph. iv. 11. The
same threefold ministry is given in the Pastor of Hermas, which dates aboutHermas, Simil. ix. 15: “The thirty-five are the prophets of God and His ministers; and the forty are the
apostles and teachers of the preaching of the Son of God.”
140 A.D., and in the Pseudo-Clementine Homilies, which can scarcely be earlier
than 200 A.D.Homilies, xi. 35: “Wherefore, above all, remember to shun apostle or prophet or teacher who does
not first accurately compare his preaching with that of James, who was called the brother of my Lord.” In all these authorities
we have the three classes mentioned together,
and in all save one we have them in the same order. The three classes
are also placed in pairs: apostles and prophets in the Epistle to the Ephesians
and in the Apocalypse;Rev. xviii. 20: “Rejoice over her, thou heaven, and ye saints and ye apostles and ye
prophets.” Eph. ii. 20: “Being built on the foundation of the apostles and the
prophets.” Didache, xi. prophets and teachers in the Didache and
in the Pseudo-Clementine Letters;Didache, xiii. 1, 2; xvi. 2. Pseudo-Clementines, De Virginitate, i. 11, “Ne
multi inter vos sint doctores, fratres, neque omnes sitis prophetae”; but this
is a quotation, said to be from Scripture. For fuller list of authorities compare
Harnack, Texte u. Untersuchungen, II. ii. 93-110, and tabular summary in note pp. 110-112. apostles and teachers in Hermas and in the
Epistles to Timothy.Hermas, Pastor, Vis. iii. 5; 1 Tim. ii. 7;
2 Tim. i. 11.
1. Apostles. The distinguishing characteristic of an apostleFor the meaning and work of an apostle: compare Lightfoot, St. Paul’s Epistle to the Galatians, 7th ed.
pp. 92-101; note on The name and office of an apostle; Harnack, Texte u. Untersuchungen, II.
ii. 111-118; Weizsäcker, The Apostolic Age (Eng. Transl.), ii. 291-299; Sohm, Kirchenrecht,
i. 42-45; Loening, Die Gemeindeverfassung des Urchristenthums, pp. 33-37; Armitage Robinson, Encyc. Bibl., art.
Apostle, pp. 264-6; Schmiedel, Encyc. Biblic., art. Ministry, pp. 3114-3117; Hort, The Christian Ecclesia,
pp. 22-41; Seufert, Ursprung and Bedeutung des Apostolats; Gwatkin, art. Apostle, Hastings’ Bible Dictionary, i. 126.
was that he had given himself, and that for life,1 Cor. xv. 10; Gal. ii. 7, 8. to be a missionary,
preaching the gospel of the Kingdom of Christ to those who did not know it.
He had received the “gift” of speaking the “Word of God,” and he was distinguished
from others who had the same “gift” in this, that he had been called either
inwardly or outwardly to make this special use of it. The prophet and the teacher
had the same “gift” in the same or in less measure than the apostle, but they
found their sphere of its use within the Christian community, while the apostle’s
sphere was for the most part outside, among those who were not yet within the
Church of Christ. They built on the foundation laid by the apostle; he laid
the foundation for others to build upon.Rom. xv. 20. The apostles were men who in virtue
of the implanted “gift” of “speaking the Word of God” and of the “call” impelling them, were
sent forth to be the heralds of the kingdom of Christ.
This was their life-work. They were not appointed to an office, in the ecclesiastical
sense of the word, but to a work in the prosecution of which they had to do
all that is the inevitable accompaniment of missionary activity in all ages
of the Church’s history.
Our Lord has Himself shown us where
to look for the origin and meaning of the term “apostle.” He declared Himself
to be the Apostle or Sent One of the Father; as the Father had sent Him, so
He sent others in His name to be His apostles or sent ones, to deliver His message
of salvation.This appears to be the line of thought in our Lord’s address in the synagogue at Nazareth.
He quoted from Isaiah lxi. 1, about the one sent from God,
and declared that He was the “Sent One” (Luke iv. 18, 21); He had come to
deliver a message from the Father which was to be proclaimed in the cities
of Palestine (Luke iv. 41; cf. Matt. xv. 24). He made His
followers His representatives in Matt. x. 40-42 (cf. the parallel passages in
Mark ix. 37, and Luke ix. 48). The two thoughts are combined in John xx. 21:
“Jesus therefore said unto them again, Peace be unto you; as the Father hath sent Me, even so I send you”; cf. Clement,
Ep. I. xlii. 1, 2; Tertullian, De Praescriptione, 37.
In earlier classical Greek “apostolos “ meant a messenger who is also a representative
of the man who sent him; in later Greek, the Attic use of the word to mean
“a naval expedition, a fleet dispatched on foreign service,” seems to have
superseded every other. The word however was used in later Judaism to mean the
messengers sent from Jerusalem to collect the Temple tribute from the Jews of
the Dispersion and who were at the same time charged with the business of carrying
letters and advice from the Jewish leaders in the capital of Judaism, and of
promoting religious fellowship throughout all the Jews scattered over the civilized
world. Hence Dr. Lightfoot says, “In designating His immediate and most favoured
disciples ‘Apostles’ our Lord was not introducing a new term, but adopting
one which from its current usage would suggest to His hearers the idea of a
highly responsible mission.” Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians
(7th ed.); The name and office of
an Apostle, pp. 93, 94; cf. also Seufert, Ursprung and Bedeutung des Apostolats, pp. 8-14.
But is is very doubtful if the word was in use in Judaism until after the time
of our Lord, and it seems in every way simpler to believe that the Christian
origin and use of the word were what are given above.
The apostles
were the representatives and “envoys” of Christ, the pioneers of
Christianity. The word, therefore, lends itself to a very wide application, for
in a sense every Christian ought to be an “ envoy “ or herald of the Master. Our
Lord sanctioned the widest use of the word when He declared that whoever
received a little child in His name received Himself;Matt. xviii. 5. the little ones can be and are His “envoys.”
But there were concentric rings in this wide circle of application; and the men belonging to each were distinguished from the others by the kind
of preparation they had received, and by the nature of the call which had come
to them.
Our Lord, personally and by living human voice, selected twelve
men and called them “apostles,”In Mark iii. 13-16 we are told that Jesus appointed Twelve, “whom He also called Apostles”
(that is the reading adopted by Westcott and Hort) for a double purpose (the
two parts of the purpose being made emphatic by the repetition of ἵνα), of
being in close companionship with Him, and of sending them forth to preach and
to cast out demons, This, that they had to do, was what Jesus Himself had been doing (Mark i. 39; cf.
Mark i. 14-34). Thus their training was both intimate companionship and close imitation in
service. The account is confirmed by Luke vi. 13, where He called the Twelve; by Luke ix. 2, where He sent them forth to
do and to teach; and by Luke ix. 10, where we are told that they did what they had been commanded. Hort,
The Christian Ecclesia, pp. 22-41. that by personal companionship
with Him in the inner circle of His disciples, and
by experience gained in a limited mission of apprenticeship among the villages
of Galilee, where following their Master’s example closely they preached and
cast out demons, they might have the training to be witnesses for Him in the
universal mission which was to be theirs after His death. Their preparation
was their intimate personal companionship with their Lord and their apprentice
work under His eyes. Their call was the living voice of the Master while He
was with them in the flesh. These two things separated the “Eleven” from all
others; they were both of them incommunicable and rested on a unique experience.
One, Matthias, who had enjoyed the personal companionship with Jesus, though
in a lesser degree, and who had been an eyewitness during the Lord’s ministry
on earth and could testify to the Resurrection, was called by the voice of his
fellow-believers and by the decision of the lot to the same “service and sending
forth” (διακονία καὶ ἀποστολή).Acts i. 25. His preparation was the same as
that of the “Eleven,” though less complete; but his call was quite different.
Another, Paul, was “called” and prepared by Jesus Himself, but in visions
and inward inspirations. We have no evidence that St. Paul ever saw Jesus in
the flesh, still less that he had any opportunity of converse with Him. His
“call” came to him on the road to Damascus in the vision of the Risen Christ
Whom he had been persecuting; it was repeated from the lips of Ananias, also
instructed in vision;Acts ix. 10 ff. it came to him over and over again in his lonely musings, where he was obliged
to think out for himself the principles which were to guide him in
his new life. His preparation
was altogether different both from that of the “Eleven” and of Matthias. They
had been gradually prepared; they had been led step by step, and had been weaned
from their old life in half-conscious ways. He had been torn out of his by a
sudden wrench; and his preparation had been given him in inward moral struggle
and spiritual experience, in musings and visions and raptures, “whether in
the body or out of the body” he could not tell.2 Cor. xii. 1-4; Gal. i. 15-17. It was this difference in “call”
and preparation—the difference between personal intercourse with Jesus in the
flesh and intercourse with Him in visions—that separated St. Paul from the “Eleven.” And it was this difference that St. Paul’s opponents of the “sect
of the Pharisees who believed” seized upon when they refused to acknowledge
his claims to apostolic authority. If we take the Pseudo-Clementine literature
to represent the opinions of these men and their successors, and discern in
the attacks made on Simon Magus an example of their arguments against the apostle
to the Gentiles, there is abundant proof of this. The whole argument in the
last chapter of the 17th Homily turns on the impossibility of trusting to information
received in visions, or of verifying and authenticating them. The argument comes
to a climax in the question: “Can any one be rendered fit for instruction
through visions? And if you say, ‘It is possible,’ then I ask, Why did our
teacher abide and discourse a whole year to those who were awake? And how are
we to believe your word, when you tell us that He appeared to you?”Clementine Homilies, xvii. 13-20; the quotation is from sect. 19.
In others who were called “apostles” the Spirit had implanted
the inward “call” to consecrate themselves to a life of missionary endeavour,
and had given them that gift of speaking the Word of God which made the “call” fruitful. Yet another class had been selected by Christian communities and
sent forth to be their apostles, the “apostles of the churches,” who were
also the apostles of the Master, and who were called by St. Paul “the glory
of Christ.”2 Cor. viii. 23: “Our brethren, the apostles
of the churches, the glory of Christ.”
Men belonging to all these classes,
and to others besides, are called “apostles” in the writings of the New Testament,
where the name is by no means confined to the “Eleven,” Matthias, and St. Paul.
BarnabasActs xiii. 2, 3: “The Holy Ghost said, Separate me Barnabas and Saul for the work whereunto
I have called them. Then when they had fasted and prayed and laid their hands
on them, they sent them away”; xiv. 4: “But the multitude of the city was
divided; and part held with the Jews and part with the apostles (Barnabas and
Paul)”; xiv. 14: “But when the
apostles, Barnabas and Saul heard it . . .”; Gal. ii. 9: “They who were reputed to be pillars
gave to me and to Barnabas the right hands of fellowship that we should go unto
the Gentiles and they to the circumcision.” Compare 1 Cor. ix. 5, 6. was an “apostle.” He had been selected at the bidding
of the Spirit by the circle of prophets and teachers at Antioch, and had been
sent, with prayer and laying on of hands, to be the companion missionary of
St. Paul; he is called an apostle to the Gentiles in the Epistle to the Galatians,
and St. Paul associates him with himself when he claims the privileges everywhere
accorded to acknowledged apostles. Andronicus and Junias were “apostles,”
who had been in Christ before St. Paul.Rom. xvi. 7: “Salute Andronicus and Junias, my kinsmen and my fellow prisoners, who
are of note among the apostles, who also have been in Christ before me.” The
phrase “of note among the apostles” has often been translated “highly esteemed
among the apostles.” Upon this Dr. Lightfoot remarks: “ Except to escape the
difficulty involved in such an extension of the apostolate, I do not think the
words οἵτινές εἰσιν ἐπίσημοι ἐν τοῖς ἀποστόλοις
would have been generally rendered “who are highly esteemed by the apostles”; and he goes on to say that the Greek fathers took the more natural interpretation
and included Andronicus and Junias among the apostles. He quotes Origen and
Chrysostom. The latter thought that Junias or Junia was a woman’s name, and
yet he numbered her among the apostles; Lightfoot, Commentary on the Epistle
to the Galatians (7th ed.), p. 96 ff. Silas or Silvanus and Timothy are,
on the most natural interpretation, classed as apostles in the First Epistle to the Thessalonians. St. Paul and
his companions in his
missionary work among the Thessalonians had received no material support for
their labours, “though we might have
been burdensome to you, being apostles
of Christ”; and the we most
probably includes Silas and Timothy, whose names appear with that of St. Paul
in the superscription of the letter.1 Thess. i. 1, 6. Dr. Lightfoot includes Silas among those who are called apostles by
St. Paul, but refuses to include Timothy: (1) because Timothy had not seen the
Lord, and (2) because when the apostle mentions
Timothy elsewhere he carefully excludes him from the apostolate.
He writes in Col. i. 1 and in 2 Cor. i. 1, “Paul an
apostle and Timothy the brother”; and in Phil. i. 1: “Paul and Timothy
servants of Jesus Christ.” In the Pastoral Epistles Timothy is described as an
evangelist: “Do the work of an evangelist; fulfil thy ministry” (2 Tim. iv. 5). It is held by many,
among others by Lightfoot and Sohm, that the
evangelists of 2 Tim. iv. 5, of Eph. iv. 11, and of
Acts xxi. 8 (Philip the evangelist), were men
who did the work of wandering missionaries but lacked the indispensable characteristic
(as they think) of an apostle, viz. having seen
the Lord and received a commission from Him (Luke xxiv. 48; Acts i. 22; 1
Cor. ix. 1). This distinction may prove good for the apostolic period, though it seems doubtful that it does, but it entirely
falls to the ground in the immediately succeeding times. I am inclined to conclude
that there is really no distinction between a wider use of the term apostle and the evangelist. The word
“evangelist” occurs very seldom. The three references exhaust the New Testament
uses; it disappears entirely in the immediately post-apostolic literature, it is not to be found in the Apostolic fathers nor in the
Didache. When it reappears, as in Tertullian, De Praescriptione 4 (Qui pseudapostoli
nisi adulteri evangelizatores) and in Eusebius (Hist. Eccl. III. xxxvii. 2, 4) it is used to describe such men as were called “apostles” in
the Didache. On the other hand the apostles are described as “entrusted with the evangel” (Gal. i. 7, 8);
as those who “preach the evangel” (1 Clement, 42); as the twelve evangelizers (Barnabas, viii. 3). Light.,
Com. on the Epistle to the Galatians (7th ed.), p. 96 n., 97. Sohm, Kirchenrecht, i. 42 n.;
Harnack, Texte und Unters. II. ii. 113 n., 114; Sources of the Apostolic Canons (Eng. Trans.), p. 16, n. 8. In 1 Cor. iv. 9, when St. Paul says:
“I think that God hath set forth us the apostles last of all as men doomed
to death; for we are a spectacle unto the world, both to angels and to men,”
Apollos, on the most natural interpretation of the passage, is classed with
St. Paul among the apostles who are thus set forth.Lightfoot excludes Apollos on the double ground that it is extremely unlikely
that he had seen the Lord, and because Clement of Rome, speaking of Peter,
Paul and Apollos, calls the two former ἀπόστολοι μεμαρτυρημένοι
and the latter ἀνὴρ δεδοκιμασμένος (1 Clem. 48). Epaphroditus is mentioned as one of the
“apostles of the churches,” (the church of Philippi), and is called by St. Paul
“my brother, and fellow-worker and fellow-soldier.”Phil. ii. 25.
Many scholars include James the brother of our Lord among those called
apostles by St. Paul; but the evidence
is very doubtful, and James had not the missionary work which belongs to an apostle.The evidence for including James, the brother of our Lord among those called
apostles by St. Paul is contained in 1 Cor. xv. 7: “Then He appeared to James; then to all the
apostles; and, last of all, as unto one born out of due time, He appeared to
me also”; in 1 Cor. ix. 5: “Even as the rest of the apostles, and the brethren
of our Lord, and Cephas”; and Gal. i. 19, which may read: “But other of
the apostles saw I none, save James the Lord’s brother,” and would then include
James among the apostles, or: “But I saw no other apostle, but only James
the Lord’s brother.” which would exclude James. James is included by Lightfoot, Sohm, Weizsäcker
(Apostolic Age (Eng. Trans.), ii. 294) and many others. Besides these St. Paul speaks of men whom he calls ironically “pre-eminent
apostles,”The phrase, τῶν ὑπερλίαν ἀποστόλων
is translated in the R. V. “the chiefest apostles,” which would imply that
the “Twelve” were meant. But this is impossible. St. Paul would never have
called the “Twelve” “false apostles, deceitful workers, fashioning themselves
into apostles of Christ” (2 Cor. xi. 13), as he does the men mentioned in
xi. 5 and xii. 11. The marginal reading,
“those pre-eminent apostles,” is in every
way to be preferred. Cf. Heinrici’s masterly exposition, Das Zweite Sendschreiben des Apostel Paulus an die Korinther, pp. 401-412;
also Schmiedel, Encyc. Bibl. art. Ministry, p. 3114. and more gravely “false apostles,” who had come among the Corinthian
believers to seduce them from their allegiance to the apostle, probably from
Jerusalem, furnished with letters of commendationCor. iii. 1. from St. Paul’s
enemies there, and who had insinuated that St. Paul was no true apostle. There
is no reason to believe that St. Paul denied that these men were apostles so
far as outward marks went. They were missionaries and had given themselves to
the work; they had come furnished with credentials. In all outward respects
they were apostles like many
others; but their message was false; they preached another Christ; they were
among the false prophets who the Master had said would come.Matt. xxiv. 11; Mark xiii. 22.
As the earlier decades passed the number of men who were called
apostles increased
rather than diminished. They were wandering missionaries whose special duties
were to the heathen and to the unconverted. In writings like the Didache they
are brought vividly before us. They were highly honoured,Didache, xi. 4: “Every apostle who cometh to you let him he received as the Lord.” but had to be severely
tested. They were not expected to remain long within a Christian community nor
to fare softly when they were there. They were the special envoys of One Whose
kingdom is not of this world, and Who had sent forth His earliest apostles with
the words: “Go, provide neither gold nor silver nor brass in your girdle nor
wallet for your journey, neither two coats, neither shoes nor staff.”Matt. x. 10; cf. Luke ix. 3; Mark vi. 8. Primitive
Christians insisted on as rigorous an imitation as did St. Francis, and accordingly
formulated the saying into the rule that if the apostle spent more than three
days among his fellow Christians, if he asked for money, if he were not content
with bread and water, he was no true apostle, and was not to be received.Didache, xi. 5, 6: “He shall not remain except for one day; if however, there be need, then the next
day; but if he remain three days, he is a false prophet. But when the apostle departeth,
let him take nothing except bread enough till he lodge again; but
if he ask for money, he is a false prophet.”
All these men, called apostles, have one distinguishing characteristic: they
have given themselves for life to be missionary preachers of the Gospel of the
Kingdom of Christ. Hence it seems superfluous to accumulate from the epistles
of St. Paul a great variety of marks of the apostolic character and work.Dr. Lightfoot has made a list of what he conceives St. Paul thought were the indispensable
qualifications for the apostolic office:—the apostle must have been a witness of the Resurrection (Acts i. 21-23);
and this was supplied to St. Paul by a miraculous revelation; a commission received either directly
from our Lord or through the medium of the Church as was the case with Matthias
(Acts i. 23-26), and with St. Paul himself, who was not actually invested with
the rank of apostle till he received it along with Barnabas at Antioch (Acts xiii. 2); the conversions which resulted
from his work (1 Cor. ix. 2); possessing the signs of
an apostle, which were partly moral and spiritual gifts such as patience, self-denial, effective preaching, and
partly supernatural “signs, wonders and mighty deeds.” Com. on the Epistle to the Galatians (7th ed), pp. 98, 99.
Weizsäcker has also made a collection of the qualifications of an apostle,
but he, rightly enough, considers that they were the qualifications demanded from St.
Paul by his enemies, and are therefore what they declared
a true apostle ought to possess. “According to them the candidate for the apostolate
required above all to be a Jew by birth (2 Cor. xi. 22). He must have seen Jesus
(1 Cor. ix. 1; cf. 2 Cor. v. 16) and been an acknowledged promoter of His
cause (2 Cor. xi. 23; cf. Acts i. 21). Personal qualities,
like courage (2 Cor. x. 1 ff.) and eloquence seem also to have been required.
On the other hand the apostle was then expected to attest himself by certain
signs (2 Cor. xii. 12), above all by miraculous powers and achievements; again
by visions and revelations (2 Cor. xii. 1), and further, by attacks which could
not fail to be made upon him, and by his bearing under them (2 Cor. xi. 13 ff.).”
He adds, “All this would have been meaningless, if only a given number of definite individuals had been
recognized as apostles.” The Apostolic Age, ii. 295 (Eng. Trans.).
The one distinctive feature about all of them was not so much what they were, but what they did.
They were all engaged in a life work of a peculiar kind, aggressive pioneering missionary labour.
The crowning vindication of their career was what they put into it and what
they were able to accomplish; their courage,2 Cor. iii. 12; x. 1 rf.;
xi. 21.
their self-sacrificing endurance,2 Cor. vii. 5; xii. 10.
the “signs, wonders and mighty deeds” which accompanied their labours,2 Cor. xii. 12. and, above all,
the results of their work. It was to this last that St. Paul appealed over and
over again. His Corinthian converts were the seal of his apostleship; he did
not need written certificates from coterie or council, from Jerusalem or Antioch,
for the Corinthians were his living “letter” of commendation known and read
of all men.1 Cor. ix. 2; 2 Cor. iii. 1-3. He appealed to what every great missionary would point to if he were asked to
justify his work, to what our Lord Himself appealed to when He was put to the question.Matt. xi. 2-5.
There could not but be gradations
in this wide company of apostles, and these depended on things personal and incommunicable.
Nothing could take from the “Eleven” the fact that they had been personally
selected and trained for their missionary work by Jesus while He was still
with them in the flesh. This gave them a unique position not only within the
Jewish Christian Church, but also throughout all Christendom. This also was
the basis of the apostolate in the narrower sense of the term. Others might
be, and were, “separated unto the Gospel of God,” might devote themselves,
in obedience to the “call” that came, to a life of active missionary work,
and have their “call” vindicated in the abundant fruit of their labours. The
Risen Christ had appeared to many others besides themselves. What separated
the “Eleven” from other apostles was that the Lord, while in
the flesh, had selected
them and had spent long months in training them for their work. They were missionaries
like the others, and made missionary tours like them, but this special and unique
preparation which no others possessed gave them a position apart. St. Paul claimed
that he too belonged to this inner circle; his claims were admitted when Peter,
James and John “saw that he had been entrusted with the Gospel of the uncircumcision,
even as Peter with the Gospel of the circumcision,” in that memorable
interview, when the older apostles gave Barnabas and Paul the right hand of
fellowship. St. Paul proved to them that his call and preparation had been as intimate as theirs. Christ, Who “had wrought
for Peter unto the apostleship of the circumcision,” had “wrought
for Paul unto the Gentiles,”Gal. ii. 7-9. and they had seen that it was so. And as his preparation had been
the same, so the “call” had come to him directly, as distinctively, and as
immediately from God, as it had come to the Twelve,1 Cor. i. 1: “Paul called to be an apostle of Jesus Christ, by the will of God.”
2 Cor. i. 1. Gal. i. 1: “Paul, an apostle not from men nor through man, but
through Jesus Christ, and God the Father.” and his vision of the
Risen Saviour had been as evident.1 Cor. ix. 1; xv. 8.
These two uses of the term apostle, the wider and the narrower,
continued beyond the apostolic age. We can see this in the Didache,
which carries the reference to the narrower circle in its title,The full title is Διδαχὴ τῶν δώδεκα Ἀποστόλων,
“The Teaching of the Twelve Apostles.” while in its description of the wandering
“apostles” it paints the itinerant missionaries to whom the term belonged
in its widest extent. We can also see it in the difficulties which the early
fathers had to determine what was the number of the apostles, and who were to
be included within it.Compare Lightfoot, Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians, 99, 100.
The unique position occupied by the “Eleven” and by St. Paul was personal to themselves; it was based on
a unique and immediate experience; no succession could come from it. But apostles,
in the wider sense of the term, have always existed in the Church of Christ,
and are with us still in the missioners and missionaries of the various branches of the Christian Church.
In lands where the language of the New Testament
is still spoken. the name as well as the thing survives; the missionaries
and missioners of the modern Greek Church are still called “holy apostles.”Missionaries and missioners in the Greek Church are called ἱεραπόστολοι.
“The delegates of the Archbishop of Canterbury’s mission to the Nestorians are regularly called
apostles by the Syrians of Urmi” (Armitage Robinson, Encyc. Bibl., art.
Apostle, p. 265). So are the priests who itinerate in the Peloponnesus preaching to great open air gatherings on the
market-days at such towns as Tripolitza.
It was the apostolate in its widest
extent that was a part of the “prophetic ministry” of the primitive Church.
When we think of apostles as part of the triad of “apostles, prophets and teachers,”
we must have in mind, not twelve or thirteen, but
large numbers who were missionaries in the
Church, and took the first rank in the prophetic ministry because their
duty was to extend the boundaries of the Church of Christ. They all belonged
to the class of those “gifted” to “speak the Word of God,” men who were to
be tested by the discriminating “gift,”
but who, when received, were to be honoured and their word obeyed. The spiritual “gift” which they possessed was a personal and not an official thing; and in one
sense they were all on the same level, for they had all the same “ gift.” But
they differed in natural endowments, and the spiritual gift had been bestowed
in larger measure on some than on others. Some could, and did, fill a large
sphere and wield an enormous influence; others had to content themselves with
a much inferior position; but whether their sphere was large or small they
had the same work to do. They were the pioneers of primitive Christianity. They
cannot be compared with the officials of a long established church. The only
safe comparison is with the missionary of modern times, and their work has the
curious double action which must characterize pioneer Christian work in all
places and at all times.
They had
to teach Christian morality to converts ignorant of its first principles, and
this could only be done when stern command mingled with sweet persuasiveness.
They had to deal with people who could but awkwardly apply the moral principles
they had been taught, and had to select typical cases, and to point out how
they must be decided. On the one side their action must appear to be highly
autocratic; on the other their influence was entirely personal, and their only
means of enforcing their decisions was by persuasion.
They had
to show their converts not merely how to live lives worthy of their new profession; they required to train them in the art of living together in Christian society,
and they had to do it in such a way as to foster social as well as individual
responsibility. So on the one hand they can be represented as shaping constitutions,
selecting and appointing office-bearers, and generally controlling in autocratic
fashion the communities their teaching had gathered together; and on the other
hand this very work can be truly described as the almost independent effort
of the communities themselves.Many of the differences, which make the Pastoral Epistles so different from the
earlier epistles of St. Paul, disappear when the character
of the apostle’s work is kept steadily in view. For it is the missionary’s
business, and often the hardest part of it, to create the feelings of corporate responsibility
and independent action. His work is that of a parent training his children,
and dependent on natural relationship and personal character for the obedience
he demanded, not that of an ecclesiastical superior with official rights to
support his injunctions.
If this double
characteristic inherent in all missionary work be forgotten, it is possible
to take the most opposite views of apostolic methods and of the rights which
an apostle claimed to have and to exercise.Sohm (Kirchenrecht, i. pp. 42-5) declares that with the “gift” of “speaking the Word of God”
there went as its accompaniment the “gift”
of spiritual rule, and that all “apostles, prophets and teachers “ who had
the one were also entrusted with the other. He shows how the apostles in the
primitive church of Jerusalem led in all things: in the ministry of the “Word,”
in prayer, in the appointment of office-bearers (the community elected but the
apostles appointed—καταστήσομεν,
Acts vi. 3—and presided in the laying on of hands); and when they were absent at
their missionary work James took their place. St. Paul decided for his communities
questions of arrangement, sometimes by quoting a “word of the Lord,” sometimes
by giving his own opinion (1 Cor. xiv. 37); decided upon questions of marriage
(1 Cor. vii. 10, 12), of virgin daughters (1 Cor. vii. 25, 40), and generally
declared “how ye ought to walk” (1 Thess. iv. 1). Timothy and Titus, not because
they were the apostle’s delegates, but because they had the “gift” of the “Word,” appointed to office
(Titus i. 5; 1 Tim. iii. 1 ff. 8 ff.),
and directed ecclesiastical discipline (1 Tim. v. 19, 20; Titus iii. 10).
Loening (Die Gemeindeverfassung des Urchristenthums, pp.34, 35), on the other hand, thinks that the duties of an apostle were purely ethical: to teach believers how they should behave as Christians, and in particular
what changes they had to make in their conduct (1 Cor. iv. 16, 17); when the
apostle has a “word of the Lord” then he commands, but otherwise the apostle
is not master of the faith of his converts (2 Cor. i. 24), and his directions
are only counsels founded on his own experience; and it is with entreaties
and persuasion that he asks the exclusion of a grievous sinner and the reception
again of a repentant one (1 Cor. v. 3 ff.; 2 Cor. ii. 5 ff.;
viii. 11 ff.).
Men, like Sohm, who dwells upon
the power to command inherent in the possession of the “gift” of speaking
the Word of God, search for, find and point to St. Paul’s interference in the
details of the life of his communities.
While others, like Loening, who
see the plain evidences of the independence and self-government in these same
communities, insist that the apostle’s whole relation to his converts was purely
ethical, and had nothing to do with organization and its working. Six months
spent in watching a missionary at work would have taught them how to combine
their views.
No apostle stands forth so clearly
before later generations as does St. Paul. His letters reveal the man, his modes
of work, the authority he possessed and the way in which he used it. We may
take him as the highest type of the first, order of the prophetic ministry.
His duties and the authority which lay behind them were what belonged to the
planting of Christianity.
His claims to authority rested upon a double basis. He had received words,
sayings and commandments of Jesus which he could hand on to his converts and
which were the “traditions” which he asked them to hold fast;1 Cor. xi. 2; “Hold fast the traditions, even as I delivered them
to you.” and being filled with “the Spirit of God,”
i.e., one of those who were “gifted,”
to “speak the Word of God,” he could give the authoritative interpretation
of these commands, and could show the true application of the principles of
Christian morality.The direct command of Jesus St. Paul calls ἐπιταγὴ,
while his own suggestions receive the name of συγγνώμη or
γνώμη; cf. l Cor. vii. 6, 10, 25; these suggestions have a measured authority for the
giver has the Spirit of God: 1 Cor. vii. 40; xiv. 37. He might have demanded to be honoured for these possessions
and “gifts,”1 Thess. ii. 6: “When we might have claimed honour from you, as apostles of Christ.” but he preferred to rest his claims to the obedience, reverence,
and affection of his converts on the personal relation which had grown up between
them and himself.1 Cor. ix. 2; 2 Cor. iii. 1-3.
He was the first who had made the Gospel known to them,
and their faith in the Lord was of itself witness to his power
over them and to his claims upon them; and this intimate
personal relation between teacher and pupil, between preacher
and convert, between guide and follower on the pathway heavenward, ought to beget
on their part gratitude, affection, trust and imitation.Gal. iv. 13 ff.; 1 Cor. iv. 16;
xi. 1; Phil. iii. 17. He was their spiritual
father, and he could claim the affectionate obedience due to a parent, while
as a father he had the right both to praise and to blame, and that with severity.Gal. iv. 19. 1 Cor. iv. 14; 18-21;
2 Cor. ii. 9; xiii. 2, 3.
St. Paul never forgot that he was
doing the work of a pioneer, and that his work was but half done if his communities
of converts remained in a state of pupilage. He was therefore careful to cultivate
their sense of personal and corporate responsibility. While he was ready to
answer any questions about difficultiesCor. vii.-x. which had arisen in the communities,
he was very careful to make suggestions only, and to leave the full responsibility
for the decisions to come on the shoulders of the society. Even in the case
of the gross sin of incest “the condemnation he pronounces is not from a distance
or in his own name only; he twice represents himself as present, present in
spirit, in an assembly where the Corinthians and his spirit are gathered together
with the power of our Lord Jesus. That is, while he is peremptory that the incestuous
person shall be excluded from the community, he is equally determined that
the act shall be their own act, and not a mere compliance with a command of
his.”Hort, The Christian Ecclesia, p. 130; cf. pp. 84-5. For the case
mentioned above, cf. 1 Cor. v. 1-13, with
the conclusion: “Do ye not judge them that are within, whereas them that are
without God judgeth? Put away the wicked man from among yourselves.” For the
authority exercised by the apostles, besides Hort as above, compare Weizsäcker,
The Apostolic Age, ii. 297-299; (Eng, Trans.); Schmiedel, Encyc. Bibl.,
art. Ministry, pp. 3116, 3117. Gore, The Church and the Ministry (3rd ed.),
pp. 233-238, an account in which history suffers from being looked
at through the coloured glass of apostolic succession. Gwatkin, art.
Apostle in Hastings’ Bible Dictionary, i. 126.
It is not to be supposed that all
the numerous apostles of the primitive Church were men like St. Paul; his natural
endowments and the large “gift” of the Spirit he possessed give him a place by himself.
Yet, the due deductions made, we can see in him the type of these unknown men
who were the pioneers of Christianity in the first century; men who carried
the Gospel to Antioch, who sowed its seeds in imperial Rome, who made hundreds
of little barren spots the gardens of the Lord. They went first; the prophets
and the teachers followed in their steps.
2. While the apostle was the missionary of the primitive Church, the prophetFor the Prophetic Ministry compare: Mosheim, Dissertationes ad historiam ecclesiasticam pertinentes
(1743), ii. pp. 132-308: De prophetis ecclesiae apostolicae dissertatio; Harnack,
Encyclopædia Britan. art. Prophet (New Testament); Texte und Untersuchungen,
II. ii. 119 ff.; Heinrici, Das erste Sendschreiben des Apostel Paulus an die Korinther,
pp. 347-462; Loening,
Die Gemeindeverfassung des Urchristenthums, pp. 33 ff.; Robinson, Encyc. Biblica, 3883 ff.;
Gayford, Hastings’ Bible Dictionary; art. Church, i. 434 ff.; Selwyn, Christian Prophets (1899);
Weinel, Die Wirkungen des Geistes and der Geister im nachapostolischen Zeitalter bis Irenaeus (1899)—an extravagant book. found
his work within the Christian communities which had been created by the energy
of the apostles. Prophecy was the universal and inseparable accompaniment of
primitive Christianity and one of its most distinctive features. Wherever the
Spirit of Jesus had laid hold on men, and believers were gathered
into societies, there appeared among them some who believed themselves to be specially filled with the Spirit of the Master,
and able to speak His Word as He wished it to be spoken. When such an one addressed
them, his fellow Christians seemed to hear the Lord Himself speaking: “for,”
they said, “where that which pertaineth to the Lord is spoken, there the Lord
is.”Didache, iv. 1.
Prophecy had its home in Palestine; the ancient prophets, with the “Word of Jehovah” on their lips, were the spiritual guides in Israel of old. It had been silent
for generations, but its reappearance was expected and longed for by pious Israelites
as a sign of the nearness of the Messianic time. They looked
for the return of Elijah or Jeremiah or another of the prophets;Matt. xvi. 14; Mark vi. 15; viii. 28; Luke ix. 8. and the apostles
could appeal to the prophecies of Joel to explain the outpouring of the Spirit
and its universal diffusion en the day of Pentecost.Acts ii. 16; cf. Joel ii. 28, 29. Our Lord too had led His
followers to expect a revival of prophecy. He had said that He would send prophets; had foretold that unbelievers would maltreat them when they
appeared;Matt. x. 41; Matt. xxiii. 34; Luke xi. 49. and had promised a prophet’s reward to those who received His prophets.
We need not wonder then that Christian prophets arose in the Jewish Christian Church, and
were to be found there from the very beginning; but what is to be remarked
is that prophecy was not confined to the Jewish Church. It appeared spontaneously
wherever the Christian faith spread. We find prophets in the churches of Jerusalem
and Caesarea among purely Christian Jewish communities;Acts xi. 27; xv. 32; xxi. 9, 10. at
Antioch where Jews and Gentiles mingled in Christian fellowship;Acts xi. 27; xiii. 1.
and everywhere throughout the Gentile churches—in Rome, in Corinth, in
Thessalonica, and in the Galatian Church.Rom xii. 6, 7; 1 Cor. xiv. 32, 36, 37 ff.;
1 Thess. v. 20; Gal. iii. 3-5. Prophets are mentioned by name in
the New Testament writings—Agabus,Acts xi. 28; xxi. 10. Barnabas, Saul, Symeon Niger,
Lucius of Cyrene, Manaen,Acts xiii. 1.
Judas and Silas.Acts xv. 32. Women prophesied, among them the four daughters of Philip.Acts xxi. 9.
Prophecy, with prophets and prophetesses, appears in almost uninterrupted succession
from the very earliest times down to the close of the second century, and indeed
much longer, although it did not retain its old position.
From the beginning too we find the true prophet confronted
by the false, who preached a strange Christ, and attempted to turn believers
away from the faith.
The primitive Church had its birth at a time when the old
religions, whether Jewish
or Pagan, had lost their power; when the old religious formulae no longer appealed
to the hearts and consciences of men; when an immediate revelation of the mind
of the Master was the one pressing religious need for which all craved. Prophecy
gave this to the young Christian communities. The effect of the presence of
these inspired men, who spoke soberly enough at times, and often burst forth
into raptures and recited the visions they had received, can scarcely be overrated.
They confirmed the weak, they admonished the lax, they edified the whole society.
The
word “prophet,” like the term “apostle,” was used in a wider and in a narrower
sense. In its widest meaning it could be, and it was, applied to all the three
classes who were “gifted” to “speak the Word of God.” St. Paul himself was
called a prophet long after he had begun his apostolic mission.Acts xiii. 1. Dr. Lightfoot seems
to think that Saul was only a prophet until he had received the “call” from
the prophets and teachers at Antioch. “The actual investiture, the completion
of his call, as may be gathered from St. Luke’s narrative, took place some years
later at Antioch. It was then that he, together with Baranbas, was set apart
by the Spirit acting through the Church, for the work to which God had destined
him, and for which he had been qualified by the appearance on the road to Damascus.”
Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians (7th ed.), p. 98. But this surely
contradicts St. Paul’s own statements. He claimed to have been an apostle from
his conversion, in Acts xxii. 21, and in Acts xxvi. 17. Ramsay, St.
Paul the Traveller, pp. 66, 67, answers this curious theory very thoroughly. He had the
peculiar prophetic gift of speaking in visions and “revelations.”2 Cor. xii. 1-5.
The “teachers” also had something in common with the “prophets.”The “prophet” is continually called a teacher and said to teach, Didache, xi. 10;
and the woman Jezebel, who called herself a prophet, is said to have
taught and seduced many in the church at Thyatira, Rev. ii. 20. In this wider use
the whole Church was said to be composed of “saints and prophets,”Rev. xi. 18; xvi. 6. and the
prophets when present, assumed the lead in the local churches
(ἡγούμενοι).Silas and Judas, who were prophets in the church at
Jerusalem are called ἡγούμενοι there: Acts xv. 22; cf. Heb. xiii. 7
and above p. 73.
In the narrower sense of the term prophecy had its distinct sphere between apostleship and teaching. St.
Paul, following his Master, places it second in his list of the “gifts” which
God has bestowed on His Church.1 Cor. xii. 28. It had its place within the congregation, and
was part of the preaching ministry of the apostolic Church. In the picture St.
Paul gives us of the meeting for edification, prophecy in the order of serviceSee above, p. 46.
comes between the part devoted to instruction and “speaking in a tongue.” St. Paul’s statements lead
us to believe that the prophetic “gift” was not confined to a favoured few.
He expected that it should manifest itself in every community of Christians.
He desired that every member of the Corinthian Church should possess it, and
that all should strive to cultivate it.1 Cor. xiv. 1, 5, 39. The Christians in Thessalonica were
exhorted to cherish “prophesyings,”1 Thess. v. 20.
and the brethren in Rome to make full use of the “gift.”Rom. xii. 6. If he criticised the action of prophets
at Corinth it was for the purpose of teaching them how to make the best of the
“gift” which had been entrusted to them for the edification of their brethren.1 Cur. xiv. 29-33.
What then was prophecy? The new revelation of God in Jesus Christ, the new way of approach to the Infinite
Father manifested in the appearance of the Son, had created for the primitive
Christians a new life and had illumined them with a new light. It gave them
a new insight into the relations between God and man, and a fresh manifestation
of the bonds uniting our Father in Heaven with His children on earth. It made
them see with new vividness the way of God’s salvation and the duties which
God required of man. There arose in the midst of the primitive Christian societies
men specially filled with all this wealth of insight, and inspired or “gifted” to disclose to their fellows the divine counsels and the hidden mysteries
of the faith. These were the prophets.
They were teachers. A large part of what they uttered was
instruction, but their peculiar
“gift” was distinct from that of the teacher. He had to make known the new
facts and events which the Gospel had disclosed; he had to trace the connexion
between these divine events, and to explain the rationale of the divine forces
at work for man’s salvation. He had to show the bearings of these divine facts
and forces upon beliefs and ways of living. The distinctively prophetic task
was different. The prophet was a producer, not an expounder simply, not a
man whose task was finished when he had taught
others to assimilate the divine knowledge which lay at their disposal.
The prophet added something more. He was a revealer bringing forth something
new. For prophecy presupposed revelation; it rested upon it; and apart from
revelation it did not exist.1 Cor xii. 3; xiv. 6, 26, 30,
32; Matt. xvi. 17. The prophet
was a man of spiritual insight and magnetic speech. What he uttered came
to him as an intuition of the Spirit, as if he had heard a voice or seen a sight.
This does not mean that the prophet spoke in a state of ecstasy
or amentia. St. Paul’s suggestions in 1 Cor. xiv. 29-33
imply that the prophet retained his consciousness throughout and had the
power to control himself. The apostle counselled that whatever number of revelations
had been received, not more than two or three should be uttered during one meeting,
and that if a brother received a revelation while another was speaking the
speaker should give way. Prophecy might be ecstatic, and we have evidence that
it frequently was, but it was not so necessarily. Non-ecstatic prophecy lasted
in the Church for two centuries, and can be shown to have existed among the
Montanists, notwithstanding the accusations of their opponents.Cf. Ritschl, Die Enstehung der altkatholischen Kirche, p, 475.
Prophecy might be based on “visions.” St. Paul appeals to his own visions as well as to
his “revelations.”2 Cor. xii. 1-5. The Apocalypse, which is the great prophetic book of the New Testament
and the most conspicuous relic we have of the prophecy of the primitive Christian Church, is a series of visions
seen by a prophet and related by him.Rev. xxii. 9. Sub-apostolic prophecy had its “visions” also. The
Pastor of Hermas, a Roman presbyter
or elder who was a prophet, is largely composed of “visions.”Compare the very full account of Hermas in the Dict. of Chr. Biog. ii. 912-927.
It is interesting to notice how many of the “visions” of the sub-apostolic
prophets were concerned with some question of Christian life and practice. Hermas
had a vision about the restoration of repentant sinners to Church privileges
(Vis. iii. 7); Cyprian had one about the subject which interested him most—the
obedience which ought to be given to bishops; and Eusebius (Hist. Eccl. V. iii. 2-3) relates
how while the confessors of Lyons were in prison, it was revealed to one of
them, Attalus, after his first conflict in the arena, that his companion did
not act wisely in prison in keeping to his ascetic living, that he told his
vision to his companion Alcibiades, who gave heed to him and left off his ascetic
usages, for, it is added “they were not deprived of the grace of God, but the
Holy Spirit was their director.” But “visions” were not essential to prophecy, nor do they seem to have been its common accompaniment.
All inspired witness-bearing was prophecy, and we may almost say that free,
spontaneous discourse about spiritual things was its essential characteristic.
We learn, for example, from the Didache that, while a definite form
of words was prescribed for the celebration of the Eucharist, the prophets were
not bound to use it. They were to be allowed to “give thanks as much as they
will.”Didache, x. 7. At the same time it must
be remembered that the prophets were always believed to speak in a very special
fashion in the name of God and with His authority. When the prophet spoke God
was present, and the prophet was to be listened to as the messenger of God.1 Cor. xiv. 25; Gal. iv. 14;
Didache, iv. 1: “My child, remember night and day him that speaketh to thee the word of God and honour
him as the Lord; for where that which pertaineth to the Lord is spoken, there
the Lord is.” Acts xiii. 1, 2: “Now there were at Antioch, in the church
that was there, prophets . . . and as they ministered to the Lord and fasted,
the Holy Ghost said, Separate Me Barnabas and Saul . . .”
There is nothing in the whole series of descriptions of prophecy
which have come down to us from apostolic and from sub-apostolic times to suggest that
the prophets held any office, or that they were the recognized heads of local
churches. Office-bearers, indeed, might be prophets; for the “gift” might
come to anyone, and St. Paul desired that it should be the possession of every
member of the Corinthian Church. Office neither brought it nor excluded it;
a prophet was a gift of God to the whole Church, and no community could make
exclusive claim to him.
Nevertheless
prophets had an important influence within the local churches of primitive times.
We can see this from the Epistles of St. Paul and, from sub-apostolic literature,
we can discern that their influence grew rather than diminished during the first
decades of the second century. This power seems to have been exercised more
particularly in the two matters of discipline and absolution or restoration
to membership after gross cases of sin. St. Paul does not lend his sanction
to any such special powers of interference. When he speaks of excommunication
or of restoration he addresses himself to the whole Christian community, in
whose hands he takes for granted that these duties rest.1 Thess. v. 14; 1 Cor. v. 1-8;
2 Cor. ii. 5-8. But in writing to
the Galatian church about dealing with sinners he uses the words, “Ye that are
spiritual” (πνευματικοί).Gal. vi. 1: ὑμεῖς οἱ πνευματικοὶ
καταρτίζετε τὸν τοιοῦτον.
This term “spiritual man” or πνευματικὸς
came to be used, in a fashion quite different from St. Paul’s
use, almost exclusively of the prophets;Pseudo-Clem., De Virginit. i. 11: “With
the gift therefore that thou hast received from the Lord, serve the
spiritual brethren, the prophets.” Irenaeus,
Adv. Haer. V. vi. 1: “In like manner we do hear of many brethren in the Church, who possess the
prophetic gifts . . . whom also the apostle terms ‘spiritual.’” and the phrase of the apostle must
have had some effect in leading primitive Christians to believe that the prophets were
the persons to deal with these matters. The primitive Church early adopted the
idea that certain sins, of which varying lists are given, were
of such a grievous kind that the sinner could not be received back again into the
Christian society. They did not hold that these sins were beyond the mercy of
God; but they did think that, without the direct voice of God commanding them,
it was not permitted to them to restore such sinners to the communion of the
Christian society. The voice of God they believed that they could hear in the
judgment of the prophet; and the prophets could declare the forgiveness which
the community felt to be beyond its power. Tertullian, who represents the older
view, expresses this very strongly.Tertullian, De Pudicitia, xxi.: “The Church it is true will forgive sins; but it will be the Church of the Spirit, by means
of a spiritual man; not the
Church which consists of a number of bishops. For the right and judgment is
the Lord’s, not His servant’s; God’s
Himself, not the priest’s.” Hermas, Pastor, Mandata, IV. iii It was also believed that God dwelt in
the martyrs as He did in the prophets, and that confessors and martyrs had
the right to declare whether sinners ought to be absolved and restored.Sohm has collected the evidence for the right assigned to martyrs to pronounce absolution
on the belief that God was specially present in His martyr, in his
Kirchenrecht, i. 32, n. 9.
The office-bearers deprived the prophets of the right of absolution and took
it upon themselves in the end of
the second and in the beginning of the third centuries; and Cyprian’s long
struggle with the confessors in North Africa ended in the overthrow of all such
rights in the hands of any but the regular office-bearers in the Church. There
are evidences also that the prophets had a large share in declaring who were
to be chosen to fill the posts of office-bearers in the local churches. All
these things go to show, that if the statement that the prophets exercised a
“despotism”Harnack, Theol. Lit. Zeitung, 1889, pp. 420, 421. over
the primitive Christian churches is too strong, they did possess very great
authority—the authority which belongs to one who is believed to utter the Word of God.
The prophets
who are referred to in St. Paul’s epistles seem to have been members of the
communities which they edified with their “gift” of exhortation and admonition,
and this was no doubt the case with the largest number of these gifted men.
But many who had the “gift” in
a pre-eminent way took to wandering from one local church to another, in order
to awaken Christian life and service in newly planted congregations; and the
wandering habit easily grew when the services of the travelling prophets proved
welcome to the infant communities. This custom was foreshadowed by our Lord
Himself when He promised a prophet’s reward to those who received His prophets,Matt. x. 41.
and it evidently existed from the earliest times. Agabus wandered from church
to church; we hear of his being at Jerusalem, Antioch and Caesarea.Acts xi. 28; xxi. 10. Such wandering
prophets might easily become apostles, and
we can see an example of this change
of work when Barnabas, who did a prophet’s
work in Antioch, was, at the call of the Spirit, sent, along with Saul,
to undertake the work of an apostle or missionary in Cyprus, Pamphylia, Pisidia
and Lycaonia. When these wandering prophets settled down for a time with their
families,1 Cor. ix. 5. in any Christian community, far from home and employment, it was
but right that the community they benefited by their labours should support
them. St. Paul had laid down the principle that it was a commandment of the
Lord’s that “they which proclaim the gospel should live of the gospel,”1 Cor. ix. 14; Matt. x. 10.
and had said to the Galatian Christians, “let him that is taught
in the word communicate to him that teacheth in all good things.”Gal. vi. 6.
Primitive Christians had also the Lord’s promise made to those who received
His prophets.Matt. x. 41. Hence the Christian communities made regulations for the support
of the wandering prophets who gave them that exhortation and admonition which
were the things chiefly sought in the meeting for edification. The prophets
were to have the first-fruits of wine and oil, of corn and bread, of oxen and
sheep, of clothing and of money.Didache, xiii.: “But every true prophet who will settle among you is worthy of his support. Likewise a
true teacher, he also is worthy, like the workman of his support. Every first-fruit
then of the products of the wine-press
and threshing-floor, of oxen and of sheep, thou shalt take and give to the prophets; for they are your high-priests. But if ye have no prophet, give it to the
poor. If thou makest a baking of bread, take the first of it and give according
to the commandment. In like manner also when thou openest a jar of wine or oil,
take the first of it and give to the prophets; and of money and clothing and
every possession take the first, as may seem right to thee, and give according
to the commandment.” The local churches supported the
wandering prophets while they settled among them. In return the prophets exhorted in the
meetings for edification and presided at the meetings for thanksgiving.Didache, x. 7. The mode
of conducting the Eucharistic meeting is quite unknown except the one fact that
when prophets were present they led. It is easy to conceive a collegiate superintendence
of the meeting for edification; but it is hardly possible to think of a collegiate
presidency at the dispensation of the Lord’s Supper. Did the prophets select
one of their number to preside, or did they preside in turn? We do not know.
Nor can we get out of this difficulty by supposing that the Lord’s Supper was
dispensed in the family, when the father would naturally preside; for St. Paul's
description clearly implies a common dispensation.
The conception that a prophet was
inspired to speak the Word of God invested him with such a sacred authority
that his position would have been completely autocratic had it not been under
some controlling power. This power of control lay in the fact that every prophet
required the permission or authorisation of the congregation in order to exercise
his “gift” among them. This authorisation followed the testing or the recognition
whether the supposed prophet had or had not the true spirit of Jesus. The power
of testing lay in the witness of the Spirit, which was living in every Christian
and in every Christian community. For, as has been before remarked, the prophetic
ministry rested on a double “gift,” or
charisma; one, the “gift” of speaking
the Word, in the prophet, and the other, in the members of the Christian community,
the “gift” of discernment.Compare pp. 70-72. The possession and use of this “gift” of testing
preserved the freedom and autonomy of the local Christian churches in presence
of men who were persuaded that they spoke in the name of God. Every prophet
had to submit to
be tested
before he was received as one worthy to exhort the brotherhood; and his decisions
or admonitions on points of discipline or absolution had to be approved by the
congregation ere they were enforced. The right and the duty of Christian communities
to test every one who came with a prophetic message was urged repeatedly by
St. Paul and in other New Testament writings. The apostle insisted that all
prophets, apostles, and even himself, ought to be tested by all Christians to
whom they presented themselves. He appealed to their power of judging his own
message.1 Cor. x. 15; xi. 13;
2 Cor. xiii. 5, 6; cf. Rev. ii. 2; compare H. Weinel,
Paulus als Kirchlicher Organisator (1899), pp. 18, 19. The power to discriminate between the true and the false spiritual
gifts was a special charisma which
ought to be used.1 Cor. xii. 10; cf. vv. 1, 4. The Lord had warned His followers against “ false “ prophets,
and had predicted that they would bring evil upon His Church;Matt. vii. 15; xxiv. 11.
and St. Paul, after telling the Thessalonians to cherish prophesyings, insists on their using
their power of discrimination. The same command is given in 1 John iv. 1.1 Thess. v. 21; 1 John iv. 1-3; cf. Didache,
x. 1, 2, 11; xiii. 1. The
Church of Ephesus was praised for trying and rejecting men who called themselves
apostles and were not.Rev. ii. 2.
The Churches of Smyrna and Thyatira were blamed for the untested and unrejected
teaching which they had permitted.Rev. ii. 14, 15, 20.
There was need for testing, for if the genuine Old Testament prophecy was confronted with
“gilds” of diviners and soothsayers belonging to the old Semitic naturalist
religions, as well as with colleges of Jewish prophets who had retained the
external prophetic characteristics, but had lost the true spirit of Jehovah,Deut. xiii. 3; Jer. xxiii. 21-32.
the prophets of Jesus also had their rivals and their innocent or designing
imitators. In that age of crumbling faiths in the Graeco-Roman world, Eastern
religions were entering
to possess the land. The great imperial system of roads and
sea-routes served other purposes besides the traffic of trade, the convoy of
troops, or the ordinary coming and going of the population. Bands of itinerant
devotees, the professional prophets and priests of Syrian. Persian, and perhaps
of Indian cults, passed along the high-roads. Solitary preachers of oriental
faiths, with all the fire of missionary zeal, tramped from town to town, drawn
by an irresistible impulse towards Rome, the centre of civilization. the protectress
of the religions of her myriads of subject peoples, the tribune from which,
if a speaker could only once ascend it, he might address the world. It was the
age of wandering preachers and teachers, of religious excitements, of curiosity
about new faiths,Compare Wissowa, Religion and Kultus der Römer (1902), pp. 78-83;
Boissier, La Religion Romaine d’Auguste aux Antonins (1878), i. 354-403. when all who had something new to teach hawked
their theories as traders dragged about and exposed their merchandise. We need
not suppose that these men were all charlatans or self-conscious impostors.
We must not thrust aside carelessly and without question the claims made by
the prophets and preachers of many of these Eastern faiths to the possession
of a knowledge of hidden powers and processes of nature, and of a command over
them. Above all, we must not forget the strange assimilative character of so
many Oriental faiths, which was as strong in Syria and Asia Minor in the early
centuries as it is in India now. Christianity attracted men then as now; they
were curious about it; they seized on sides of the new religion which they
could best appreciate, and could so present their beliefs as to be able to
plead that they themselves were Christians of a more sympathetic character and
with a wider outlook than others. The great cities which were the centres of
trade and commerce—the ganglia of the great empire, as the roads were its nerve-system—Ephesus,
Corinth, Thessalonica, Rome, where we find the Christian prophets most active
within the Gentile Christian Church, were the very places where this pagan Oriental
prophecy most
abounded. Nothing hindered the presence of such men at the
meetings for edification; nothing prevented them from claiming
to speak in the Spirit; only the διάκρισις lying in the Christian
society, only the power of discernment and testing through
that “gift” of spiritual insight which was in every true Christian, and therefore
in the Christian community, prevented the claims of such men to be inspired
guides being admitted.
The testing
was for the purpose of finding whether the prophetic “gift” was genuine or
not. It had little or nothing to do with the external appearance of the prophet
or with the kind of utterance which he selected to convey his message. The question
was: Were the contents of the prophetic message such as would come from the
spirit of Jesus? had it the self-evidencing ring about it? had it the true
ethical meaning which must be in a message from the Master?—something which
distinguished it from everything heathenish or Jewish, something which showed
that the prophet had drunk deeply at the well of Christ?
The test
that St. Paul gives: “no man speaking in the Spirit of God saith, Jesus is
anathema; and no man can say that Jesus is Lord, but in the Holy Spirit”1 Cor. xii. 3.
may seem inadequate and easily eluded; but St. Paul is not delivering a short
verbal creed; he is setting forth a principle. Prophecy must be filled with
the sense of the Lordship of Jesus over the believer’s heart, soul and life,
if it is true prophecy.The test given in 1 John iv. 1: “Beloved, believe not every spirit, but test the
spirits, whether they be of God; because many false prophets are gone out into
the world. Hereby know ye the Spirit of God: every spirit which confesseth
that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God; and every spirit which confesseth
not Jesus (annulleth Jesus) is not of God,” also looks like a creed; but what
follows makes us see that it is to be taken as a principle which can be felt
and which means much more than the form of words in which it is expressed. In
both cases the statement of the test is immediately followed by an exposition
of the necessity of Christian love permeating the whole Christian life. In the later days of the Didache
the need for testing was felt as strongly, if not more so;
the tests, however, took a much more mechanical aspect. The
fine spiritual sense which the apostle trusted to has gone into the background and
some wooden maxims have taken its place. “Not every one that speaketh in the
spirit,” says the Didache warningly, “is a prophet, but only if he have the
ways of the Lord.”Didache, xi. 8. The subordinate
tests are: A prophet who orders a meal in the spirit and eateth it; a prophet
who does not himself practise what he teaches; a prophet who asks for money—are
all false prophets. But a prophet who has the “ways of the Lord,” and who practises
more than he preaches is a true prophet. (Did. xi. 9-12.) The phrase “ways of the Lord” does not, taken by itself,
suggest anything mechanical, and has a flavour of the old spirituality. But
the subordinate tests appear to indicate a degeneracy both in the prophetic
office and in the spiritual discernment of the people. For the prophetic office
and its discrimination demanded a somewhat high tone of spiritual life, and
might very easily deteriorate. In this, as in other things, there is a close
parallel to be drawn between the prophets of the New and of the Old Testament.
3. The third
class of persons who belonged to this prophetic ministry were the teachers
(διδάσκαλοι).
We can trace
their presence along with that of the apostles and the prophets in the promise
of Jesus, in the most conspicuous of the “gifts” of His Spirit to the apostolic
church, in the records of the sub-apostolic period. Our Lord promised to send
“wise men and scribes”—a
“gift” to be recognized and appreciated by His followers, and rejected with
hatred by those who refused His salvation.Matt. xxiii. 34: “prophets, wise men and scribes.” Luke xi. 49: “prophets and apostles.”
Cf. Matt. x. 41. St. Paul emphasized their presence,
when he said that God had set in the Church “thirdly teachers.”1 Cor. xii. 28.
We find them mentioned throughout the apostolic and sub-apostolic periods, holding
an honoured place in the infant Christian communities.
They were
not office-bearers necessarily, though there was nothing to prevent their being
chosen to office. What made
them “teachers” was
neither selection by their brethren nor any ceremony of setting apart to perform
work which the Church required to be done. They were “teachers” because they
had in a personal way received from the Spirit the “gift” of
knowledge, which fitted them to instruct
their fellow believers. Their more public sphere of work was in the meeting
for edification, where, according to St. Paul, they had a definite place assigned
to them after the praise and before the prophesyings;1 Cor. xiv. 26. but it may
be inferred that their work was not limited to public exhortation, and that
they devoted time and pains to the instruction of catechumens and others who
wished to be more thoroughly grounded in the principles of Christian faith and
life.Gal. vi. 6. St. Paul gives us some indications of the work of the “teacher.” The
apostle always brought to the communities he had founded what may be called
the “oral Gospel” of the Lord Jesus or the saving deeds of the Evangelical
history, and certain institutions and commandments of the Master.We can see from 1 Cor. xv. 1-3, how St. Paul had made his converts acquainted
with the sufferings, death, and rising again of our Lord; how he had enlarged
on His character and ethical qualities (2 Cor. viii. 9; x. 1); etc., etc.
He had taught them the institutions of Jesus (1 Cor. xi. 23 ff.). We have references
to “commandments” of the Lord in 1 Cor. vii. 6, 25. These were
the things which he “had received,” and which he “handed over” to his converts
to be stored up in the retentive Oriental memory uncorrupted by reading and
writing. He had added others—hidden things revealed to him because he was a
prophet—which he called “mysteries,” about the Resurrection or the universality
of the Gospel.1 Cor. xv. 51: “Behold I tell you a mystery:
We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling
of an eye, at the last trump.” 1 Cor. ii. 6 ff. Cf.
xiii. 2; xiv. 2. These things he had handed over to them either “by word or
by epistle.”2 Thess. ii. 15. To these he had added suggestions and opinions of
his own.1 Cor. vii. 6, 10, 25. All these things formed the stock of material on which the “gift” of the teacher enabled him to work for the edification
of the community. St. Paul’s own discourses furnished the teachers in his communities
with examples of the way in which all these stores of communicated knowledge
could be brought to bear upon the faith, life and morals of the members of the
local churches. He had given them a “pattern of teaching”Rom. vi. 17: τύπος διδαχῆς. which they could
strive to imitate, and which they without doubt did copy in their public exhortations
or private instructions and admonitions.
From
St. Paul’s epistles it would appear that the apostle expected that every Christian
community would furnish from its own membership, the teachers required to instruct
the members;Eph. iv. 15, 16. but it is evident, at least when we get beyond the apostolic
period, that many gifted men, whose services were appreciated, went from church
to church teaching and preaching, and that without having any pretension to
the prophetic gift. Justin Martyr and Tatian, well-known apologists of the second
century, were wandering teachers of this kind.
Such a wandering master,
we learn from the Didache, belonged to the class of “honoured” persons
(τετιμημένοι), and at once attained a
leading position in the community he entered or to which he belonged. He had
to submit to the same tests as the prophet, but like him, when once received,
he was honoured as one who spoke the “Word of God.”Didache, xiii. 2; xv. 2.
A position such as this, carrying with it both privilege and support, would be
sought after by those who thought more of the honourable position in which the
teacher stood than of the serious responsibilities which his office involved,
and there are warnings both in apostolic and sub-apostolic literature that the
work of a teacher is not to be lightly undertaken.James iii. 1; Barnabas, Epistle iv. 9: “Being desirous
to write many things to you, not as your teacher, but as becometh one who loves you.” It is perhaps worthy of
remark that the “teachers” seem to have maintained their position as a distinct
class of men, apart from the office-bearers
of a local church, much longer than the prophets did. In the general overthrow
of the prophetic “ministry” during the second century the office of “teacher” was absorbed by the local ministry; but “teachers” apart from office-bearers
seem to have maintained themselves in the Church for some centuries,Compare the curious sentence in the Apostolic Constitutions (VIII. xxxii.)
which can scarcely be earlier than the beginning of the fifth century: “Let him that teaches,
although he be one of the laity, yet, if
he be skilful in the word and grave in his manners, teach;” where the reference
is evidently to the instruction of catechumens. The teachers of the famous catechetical
school of Alexandria were laymen during some part of their time as teachers.
The Christian communities, especially in large towns, must have needed teachers for Christian
schools; for all teaching within pagan lands is closely associated with idolatry.
Tertullian (De Idolatria, x.) has discussed the difficulties of schoolmasters amidst a pagan populace; the same difficulties
attend native Christians in India now. When a Marathi boy first goes to school
he is placed upon a small carpet and a board covered with red tile dust is placed
before him. The image of Saravasti, the goddess of learning, is painted on the
board. Then the master sitting beside him first worships Ganesa and Saravasti,
and teaches the boy to make the letters which form the name Ganesa. The difficulties
are exactly those which Tertullian describes.
and some
churches, notably that of Alexandria, seem to have possessed large numbers of
teachers.Eusebius, Hist. Eccl. VII. xxiv. 6: “The presbyters
and the teachers of the brethren in the villages.”
This prophetic
ministry and the peculiar place it occupied was the distinctive feature of the
organization of the Church of Christ during the apostolic and sub-apostolic
periods. It gives this age a place by itself, and separates it from all other
periods of the Church’s history; for it must be remembered that while this
ministry lasted it dominated and controlled. Whatever administrative organization
the local churches possessed had to bend before the authority of the members
of this prophetic circle. To them belonged the right to lead the devotions of
their brethren—to speak the “Word of God” in the meeting for edification,
and to preside at the Eucharistic service—and to influence in a large but indefinite
manner the whole
action of the infant Christian communities. Yet they were not office-bearers in any
sense of the word. They were not elected, nor were they set apart by any ecclesiastical
action to a place of rule. Their vocation was immediate and personal. They could
be tested, and their ministry might be accepted or rejected, but there
the power of the Church with regard to them and to their ministry came to an end.
They appear on the pages of the apostolic and sub-apostolic literature in the three classes
which have been described; but the divisions, we can see, represented functions,
not offices, nor can it be said that these functions were separated by any hard
and fast line.
The apostle or wandering missionary was also a prophet and a teacher; his vocation required
him to be all three. The prophet might become an apostle, if he gave himself
permanently to the aggressive creative work which was the characteristic of
the apostolic activity; and he was also a teacher, for his
prophetic utterances must often
have been teaching of the highest and most stimulating kind. But a teacher could fulfil the special work of
his vocation without having the “gift” of revelation added to that of knowledge.
In all three classes we can discern the effects of a real outpouring of the Spirit, imparting
special spiritual gifts, and creating for the service of the infant Christian
communities a ministry which “spoke the Word of God” in the same sense as
did the prophets of the Old Testament Dispensation. St. Paul was a prophet in
the same sense that Isaiah was, and the author of the Apocalypse had visions
as vivid as those of Ezekiel.Compare Plumptre, Theology and Life, p. 90: “Strange as the thought may seem to us, there were in that age (the apostolic)
some hundreds it may be, of men as truly inspired as Isaiah or Ezekiel had been,
as St. Paul or St. Peter then were, speaking words which were, as truly as any
that were ever spoken, inspired words of God, and yet all record of them has
vanished.” The one great difference between the prophesying of the two
dispensations was that the gift was
much more widely bestowed in the New than it had been in the Old Dispensation.
It seems to be impossible to draw any
line of demarcation between the prophecy of the Old and that of the New Testament,
except that the latter partook of the universalist character of the new revelation
of the Kingdom which our Lord proclaimed, and the “gift” was imparted to Gentiles
as well as to Jews. The same outstanding features characterized the prophets and
prophecy in the two dispensations. In both cases the prophetic “call” came to
the prophet personally and immediately in a unique experience; and when the “call” came everything else had to be set aside, and the “word” from God had to
be spoken. It is possible to compare narrowly St. Paul and Isaiah, St. John and
Ezekiel, Polycarp and Jeremiah. In neither case was the prophetic “call” a call
to office in the Church. The New Testament prophets were no more presbyters or bishops
in virtue of their “call” than were the Old Testament prophets elevated to the
priesthood in Israel; and in both cases the regular office-bearers had to give
way to and bow before the men through whom the Spirit of God spoke.
In Old Testament prophecy, as in the
prophecy of the New Testament, the Spirit of God was given in a larger measure to
some men and in a smaller degree to others, and in each case the natural faculties
of the prophet had full play to exert themselves according to the capacities of
the man. There were gradations in the prophetic order from men like St. Paul and
Isaiah, who stood in the foremost rank, to the nameless prophet whom the lion slew,
or the impetuous prophet who interrupted his brother in the meeting of the Corinthian
congregation.
In both cases true prophecy was surrounded
with a fringe of prophet life which was hostile, and which was inspired by a spirit
at variance with the purposes of Jehovah and with the principles of Jesus. In the
Old Testament, as in the New, there was a marked tendency towards deterioration
within the prophetic order.
In both cases the power to
discriminate between the true and the false prophecy, between the man who spoke
full of the Spirit of God and the member of the prophetic “gild,” was left to the
spiritual discernment of the people spoken to. The discerning faculty was often
at fault; pretenders were received by and misled the faithful. Jeremiah had to
protest against the way in which the people received men who claimed to be prophets,
and Origen had to repudiate the prophets, or their caricatures, whom Celsus described
with graphic irony.Origen, Contra Celsum, vii. 9: “Again inasmuch
as Celsus announces that he will describe from personal observation and an intimate
knowledge of the facts, the manners peculiar to the prophets of Phenicia and Palestine,
let us consider these statements. Firstly, he declares that there are several kinds
of prophesyings, although he gives no list of them . . . . ‘The prophets,’
he says, ‘are many and unknown persons. They are apparently and very readily moved
to speak as if in a divine ecstasy without any special occasion both at the time
of service and at other times. Some go about as beggars and visit encampments and
towns. Every one of them says readily and simply: ‘I am God,’
or ‘I am the Son of God,’ or ‘I am the Holy Spirit. I have come; for the world
is about to be destroyed; you, O men, will be lost through your wickedness. I am
willing to save you; and you shall see me again coming with heavenly power. Blessed
is he who now worships me. On all others I shall cast eternal fire, on cities and
lands and on men. Men who do not recognize their impending judgment will repent
and groan in vain; but those who have hearkened unto me, I will protect for ever.’
With these threats they mingle words, half-frantic, meaningless and altogether mysterious,
whose significance no sensible man could discover. For words that are vague and
without meaning give every fool and wizard an opportunity
of giving any particular meaning they wish on any matter, to what has been said.” One must
remember that Celsus was what would now be called a cultured agnostic. His statements
are not unlike some criticisms of the Salvation Army preachers. Yet this power of spiritual insight was the only
touchstone, and, indeed, there could have been no other in the last resort. For
men can never get rid of their personal responsibility in spiritual things.
CHAPTER IV
THE CHURCHES CREATING THEIR MINISTRY
In approaching the subject of the ministry of the local Christian communities
it may be well to note these things at the outset. We have abundant evidence
of the thorough independence of the local churches during the apostolic age,
whether we seek for it in the epistles of St. Paul or in the Acts of the Apostles.Compare what has been said on pp. 32, 33; 54-57.
We must remember the uniquely Christian correlation of the three thoughts of
leadership, service and “gifts”; leadership depends on service, and service
is rendered possible by the bestowal of “gifts” of the Spirit which enable
the recipients to serve their brethren.Compare what has been said
on pp. 62 ff. The possession of these “gifts” of
the Spirit was the evidence of the presence of Jesus within the community, and
gave the brotherhood a divine authority to exercise rule and oversight in the
absence of any authoritative formal prescriptions about a definite form of government.Compare p. 33 and pp. 69 ff.
We have also to bear in mind the general evidence which exists to show that
there was a gradual growth of the associative principle from looser to more
compact forms of organization.This growth of the associative principle is seen in the names given to believers
as a united company. The earliest title was disciples (μαθηταὶ); which implied
that Jesus, their Lord, was also their teacher, and their only teacher-for Jesus
expressly forbade His followers calling any one but Himself Master, Teacher,
Father or Lord (Matt. xxiii. 8-10); and the command was repeated by St. Paul
when he forbade the Christians of Corinth to call themselves the followers of
any of the apostles (1 Cor; iii. 3-9):
The name Teacher, with the corresponding term disciples, lingered long in
a sporadic way in Christian literature (for example in Justin Martyr, Apol. i. 13), and
in Sources of the Apostolic Canons, vi. p. 23), and the word disciples occurs
frequently in the Acts of the Apostles. It is a name which suggests
a purely personal relationship to Jesus, and it was soon displaced
in favour of other designations which implied association among the followers
of Jesus. Among them we may select the terms saints, brethren, the people of
the Way. The last mentioned—οἱ τῆς ὁδοῦ
ὄντες—is
specially interesting. It suggests a common worship and therefore an organization
for worship. It implies groups of men and women, who, though far apart from
each other, are united in spite of intervening space by the ties of a common
worship. The Christians in Damascus and by implication those in Jerusalem, are
so called (Acts ix. 2; xxii. 4). It was the name given to the Christians at
Ephesus (Acts xxiv. 14); it was applied by St. Paul to himself when justifying
the special services of the Christian worship as distinguished from the Jewish
(Acts xxiv. 14). St. Paul himself usually employs the terms
saints or brethren
when he speaks of his fellow Christians. The brethren or the saints who form
an independent community, whether in a house or in a town or in a province,
are called by St. Paul a Church; and he, in his epistles to the Galatians and to the
Corinthians, uses the same word to denote all the brethren, wherever they may
be. These two terms saints and brethren are, like the phrase those of the Way;
collective, and imply organization of some kind or other. When the brethren
or the saints met together for worship the meeting or the building in which
they met was frequently called a synagogue
(James ii. 2), and this word was used not only by the judaising Christians (Epiphanius,
xxx. 18); but also by the Marcionites, though they were the Christians furthest
removed from the Jewish believers in Jesus. The oldest inscription stating
that the building on which it is carved was used as a Christian place of worship
comes from Syria, and states that the erection was a Marcionist church:
Συναγωγὴ Μαρκιωνιστῶν κώμης Λεβάηων τοῦ Κυρίου
καὶ Σωτῆρος Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ. It dates from 318 A.D.
(Compare Le Bas and Waddington, Inscriptions No. 2558, iii. 583). Compare Weizsäcker;
The Apostolic Age, i. 45-8 (Eng. Trans.). Harnack Texte und Untersuchungen, II. v. p. 25,
or English Translation, Sources of the Apostolic Canons, p. 22, n. 10, for the
use of Teacher. For the general question of designations, cf. Harnack, Expositor, 1887, Jan.-June, pp. 322-4. Nor should it be forgotten that the
members
of these earliest congregations
of believers were well acquainted with social organization of various kinds
which entered into their daily life in the world. When we remember these facts
it need not surprise us that though in the end the organization of all the churches
was, so far as we can see, pretty much the same, this common form of government
may have arisen independently
and from a variety of roots which may at least be guessed
if they cannot be proved. There are traces of several primitive types of
organization within the churches of the apostolic age.
The first notice we have of organization within a local church is given us in the sixth chapter of the Acts
of the Apostles when, at the suggestion of the apostles, seven men were chosen
for what is called the service
of tables. This took place
probably in the year 34 A.D. These
men were selected and set apart to take care of the poor and to administer the
charity of the congregation.
It is too often forgotten that
this service had not the second-rate importance which now belongs to it in ecclesiastical
organization. It is plain that in apostolic times the primary duty overshadowing
all others, was that those who had this world’s goods should help their poorer
brethren who had need. The sayings of our Lord were ringing in their ears:
“If thou wouldest be perfect, go, sell all that thou hast and give to the poor,
and thou shalt have treasure in heaven”; “Every one that hath left houses
and lands for My name’s sake shall receive an hundredfold and shall inherit
eternal life”;Matt. xix. 21, 23; 29. “Seek ye His kingdom, and these things shall be added
unto you . . . sell that ye have and give alms; make for yourselves
purses which wax not old.”Luke xii. 31-33.
Their devotion to the invisible God was to manifest itself in practical
love to the visible brethren.1 John iv. 20. The first duty of presbyters, according to Polycarp,
was to be compassionate and merciful, “visiting all the infirm, not neglecting
a widow or an orphan or a poor man”;Polycarp, Philippians, 6.
and he calls widows “God’s
altar”—a phrase repeated by Tertullian.Polycarp, Philippians, 4. θυσιαστήριον Θεοῦ.
Tertullian, Ad Uxor. i. 7: aram Dei. The phrase θυσιαστήριον Θεοῦ is used in the
Apostolic Constitutions to denote widows, orphans and the poor aided by the congregation. ii. 26:
“Let the widows and orphans be esteemed as representing the altar of burnt-offering”; iv. 3: “But an orphan who, by reason of his youth, or he that by feebleness
of old age, or the incidence of disease, or the bringing up of many children,
receives alms . . . shall be esteemed an altar to God.” The phrase is almost always accompanied
with the thought that those who receive alms are to pray for their benefactors.
These men were chosen to fill the highest administrative position
which the Church could give, and
were to take charge in the name of the community
of the most sacred of all ecclesiastical duties. The office instituted was required
by the ordinary and permanent needs of the Christian society, for the Lord had
said that the poor were always to be with them.Dr. Hatch in his Organization of the Early Christian Churches, pp. 32-36 (1st
ed.), has, I think, exaggerated somewhat the pauperism of the early centuries
throughout the Roman Empire; but the case of Jerusalem must have been peculiar.
The population of the city was largely supported by the profits the citizens
made from the crowds of pilgrims who came from all parts of the Jewish Dispersion
to the great festivals. Conversion to the Christian faith must have deprived
the converts of this means of support and brought them into a chronic state
of poverty.
A few years later we read of money collected outside Palestine and brought for distribution
among the poor of the Church in Jerusalem by Barnabas and Saul, who placed it
in the hands of men who are called elders
or presbyters. Unless we are to believe that the appointment of the seven
was a merely temporary expedient, it is only natural to suppose that the duty of distributing
money among the poor was performed by the men who were appointed by the Church
to do it, or by others appointed in the same way and for the same purpose; and the natural inference is that the
Seven of Acts vi. were the elders of Acts xi.,
and that we have in the narrative the account of the beginnings of the organization
as a whole in the Church at Jerusalem, and not merely the institution of a special
order of the Christian ministry.Dr. Lightfoot calls the attempt to identify the Seven
with the elders afterwards mentioned in the church at Jerusalem a “strange perversity,” although it has
the support of Boehmer (Diss. Jur. Eccl. p. 373 ff.), of Ritschl (Entstehung der Altkatholisch. Kirche,
2nd ed., p. 355 ff.), and of Lange (Apostol. Zeitalt. ii. 75), and Gwatkin regards the idea as a possible one
(Hastings’ Bible Dictionary, i. 440, 574); it appears to me that it must be made
unless we suppose that the appointment of the Seven was a merely temporary expedient
to provide for an immediate necessity, or discredit the narrative altogether,
which is what not even such a destructive critic
as Schmiedel is inclined to do (Encyc. Biblica, art. Community of Goods, i. 879, 880).
The Church in Jerusalem appointed seven men.
The apostles suggested the number. “Look ye out therefore, brethren, from among
you seven men.”Acts vi. 3. They are never called deacons; the Seven is the technical
name they were known by. Philip, one of them, is not called “Philip the Deacon,”
but “Philip one of the Seven.”Acts xxi. 8. Why this name? To say with Dr. Lightfoot
that the number is mystical is scarcely an explanation, and it is not likely
that it was merely haphazard. The Hebrew village community was ruled by a small
corporation of seven men,Josephus, Antiq. IV. viii. 14, 38; Bell. Jud. II. xx. 5. Compare
Schürer, Gesch. d. Jüdischen Volkes im Zeitalt. Jesu Christi (1898), ii.
178 (3rd ed.). Schürer quotes from the Talmud, Megilla, 26a, where
the “Seven” of the town also appear. as the Hindu village is managed by the council of the
Five or the Punchayat. The Seven was a title as well known in Palestine as the Five is
now in India. The Church in Jerusalem, in founding their official council of administration,
created an entirely new organization required by the needs of the young community,
but one which brought with it associations which had deep roots in the past
social life of the people. Modern missionary enterprise, which has the same
problems of organization before it as confronted primitive Christianity, frequently
sheds light on the procedure of the latter. The Church of Scotland (Established)
missionaries at Darjeeling, who have based the organization of their native
church on the Hindu Punchayat; the missionaries of the Presbyterian Church
of England, who have laid hold on the village representative system in China; Bishop Patteson, who made a similar use of the native organizations in the
South Seas—have all unconsciously followed in the footsteps of the apostles
when they suggested the Jewish village government as a basis for the organization
of the primitive Church in Jerusalem.
This earliest example of Christian ecclesiastical organization
contains in it three
interesting elements—apostolic guidance and sanction; the self-government and
independence of the community evinced in the responsibility for good government
laid upon the whole membership; and, as a result, a representative system
of administration suggested by the every-day surroundings of the people.
When we trace the expansion of Christianity and the creation of Christian communities outside
Jerusalem, we have no such distinct picture of the beginnings of their organization
as is given in Acts vi., but there are indications of what took place. The preaching
of the Gospel gave rise to Christian communities in various parts of Palestine
which regarded the Church at Jerusalem as their common mother church, and all
these communities together made the Church of God which St. Paul persecuted.Gal. i. 13; 1Cor. xv. 9.
It is probable also that when this Judeo-Christianity spread beyond the bounds
of Palestine throughout Syria and Cilicia,Gal. i. 22. the community in the capital of
Judaism, presided over by its college of office-bearers with St. James at their
head, was regarded as the mother church and the centre of the whole movement.
They had before them the example of Judaism which appeared one visible whole
centred in the great council. of the elders in Jerusalem.
Further, the Acts of the Apostles relates that Paul and Barnabas
left behind them at Derbe, Lystra and Iconium, communities of Christians with elders at their head. We are
told that the apostles “appointed for them elders in every church.”Acts xiv. 23: χειροτονήσαντες δὲ αὐτοῖς
πρεσβυτέρους κατ᾽ ἐκκλησίαν.
The word, χειροτονήσαντες, means strictly to
elect by popular vote. It suggests that Paul and Barnabas followed the example
of their brethren at Jerusalem. and suggested and superintended
an election of office-bearers, and the title “elders” (πρεσβύτεροι)
was probably derived from the Church of Jerusalem. It need not have been
so, however, for the word was common enough among the Greeks, and the more mature men in the congregations
would be naturally selected.Deissmann, Bib. Studies (Eng. Trans.), pp. 154-157: The names which afterwards came to
denote fixed offices in the Church have all general as well as technical uses,
and this adds greatly to the difficulty of investigation. A second and very different type of organization, though
capable of being joined with the first, also comes to us from the primitive
Church in Jerusalem. The accounts of the earliest condition of the Church, whether
taken from the Acts of the Apostles or from the Epistles of St. Paul, reveal
an independent self-governing community under the guidance of the apostles St.
Peter and St. John. The leadership of these two apostles is conspicuous throughout
the first eleven chapters of the Book of Acts. Then there is a sudden change
which is quite unexplained, and in the twelfth chapter (ver. 17) and onwards St. James,
the brother of our Lord, is seen to be in a position of pre-eminence.Acts xii. 17; xv. 13; xxi. 18;
GaL i. 19; ii. 9, 12. This is confirmed by later tradition,
Eusebius, Hist. Eccl. II. i. 2, 3.
The letters of St. Paul also reveal the change, but equally give no hint of
when it took place or of the causes which led to it. But if canonical Scripture
tells us nothing about the reasons for the change, tradition and early
Church history have a good deal to say about it. It is quite impossible to explain
the continuous and marked influence of St. James, on any theory of the organization
of the Church at Jerusalem which makes it borrow its constitution from the Jewish
Synagogue system. When we read the story of the election of his successors we
have suggestions of another and very different organization. The James, who
was the recognized and honoured head of the community in Jerusalem, was the
eldest male surviving relative of our Lord.Matt. xiii. 55; Mark vi. 3; Eusebius,
Hist. Eccles. I. xii. 4; II. i. 2, 3; III. xi. 1. We are told by Eusebius,
quoting, it can hardly be doubted, from Hegesippus, that after the martyrdom
of St. James and the fall of Jerusalem, the remaining apostles and personal
disciples of our Lord, with those that were
related to our Lord according to the flesh, the greater part of them
being yet living, met together
and unanimously selected Symeon to fill the vacant place.Eusebius, Hist. Eccl. III. xi. 1, 2. In another passage he says that Symeon
was the son of Clopas our Lord’s paternal uncle, and adds that “he was put
forward by all as the second in succession, being the cousin of the Lord”;
in a third he speaks of “the child of the Lord’s paternal uncle, the aforesaid
Symeon, son of Clopas,” and in a fourth he tells us that Hegesippus relates
that Clopas was “the brother of Joseph.”Ibid. xi. 1, 2; xxxii. 4; IV. xxii. 4.
In short he dwells pertinaciously on the natural kinship between the head of the
primitive Christianity in Jerusalem and our Lord. The last glimpse we have
of our Lord’s kinsfolk has been recorded by the same gossipy writer, who made
it his business to preserve such details, and it reveals them at the head of
the Jewish Christian community. He tells us that in the fifteenth year of the
Emperor Domitian “there still survived kinsmen of the Lord, grandsons of Judas,
who was called the Lord’s brother according to the flesh.” They were dragged
to Rome and brought before the Emperor. He questioned them. They showed him
their hands horny with holding the plough, and said that their whole wealth
amounted to about 9,000 denarii, the value of thirty-nine acres
(πλέθρα) of land, which they cultivated themselves and on which they paid taxes. The Emperor
contemptuously sent them back to Palestine, and there they were made the rulers
of the Church because they had been martyrs and were of the lineage of the Lord.
They lived till the reign of Trajan, and their names were James and Zoker.Ibid. III. xx. 1-8: τοὺς δὲ ἀπολυθέντας
ἡγήσασθαι τῶν ἐκκλησιῶν, ὡσὰν δὴ μάρτυρας ὁμοῦ καὶ ἀπὸ γένους
ὄντας τοῦ Κυρίου. For the names of the two young men, see the ecclesiastical historian Philippus
of Side, in the fragment printed in Cramer, Anecdota Graeca, ii. 88.
A succession in the male line of the kindred of Jesus, where the eldest male relative of
the founder succeeds, where the election to office is largely regulated by a
family council, and where two can rule together, has no analogy with any form of
organization known in the Christian Church. But the type of organization is easily recognizable.
It was, and is to this day, a common Oriental usage that the headship of a religious
society is continued in the line of the founder’s kindred according to Eastern
line of succession, from eldest male surviving relative to eldest male surviving
relative, whether brother, uncle, son or cousin. Here again we have a Christian
community organizing itself,
and that under apostolic sanction,
on a plan borrowed from familiar social custom.Dr. Harnack thinks that the position assigned to the “relatives of our Lord” in the choice
of the head of the community shows that the thought of Jesus as the “Teacher”
had given place to the conception of “king”; but according to Oriental
usage it is precisely the position of a religious “teacher” which is transmitted
in the line of the founder’s kinsfolk. Compare Expositor, 1887, Jan.-June, p. 326.
When we turn to the churches which owed their being to the apostolic work of St. Paul, we
find the independence and self-government evidently taken for granted and formulated
in principles laid down by the apostle in his epistles. The churches at Rome
and at Corinth were churches because the presence and power of Christ were manifested
within the Christian fellow-ship in a series of “gifts,” which provided everything
necessary for their corporate life as churches, organized according to any form
of self-government which recommended itself to them. There is not a trace of
the idea that the churches had to be organized from above in virtue of powers
conferred by our Lord officially and specially upon certain of their members.
On the contrary the power from above, which was truly there,
was in the community, a direct gift from the Master Himself.
We find in the earlier Epistles1 and 2 Thessalonians written about 48-52 A.D.; 1 Corinthians and Galatians written about
53-55 A.D; 2 Corinthians written about 53-56 A.D.; Romans written about 54-67 A.D. of
St. Paul traces of men who exercised rule or at least leadership of some kind
within the churches.Compare above pp. 60 ff. They may have been elected office-bearers or they may
have been men who, without being office-bearers in the
strict sense of the words, performed
services necessary for the well being of the community such as office-bearers
are accustomed to do.
Even in the case of the simplest
and smallest Christian communities certain services must always be rendered
to the whole fellowship. Some one must provide a room for the meetings, take
care of the Scriptures and other books required for the acts of public worship,
keep the records of the society. The meetings need a president, if only for
the time being. There is also need for services which may be called spiritual.
Some one must see that brotherly intercourse is maintained, that quarrels are
avoided, and that persons at variance are reconciled. The sick have to be visited,
inquirers and the young have to be instructed and encouraged in the faith. Some
persons have to see to all these things. They will naturally season their work
with advice, admonition, warning, and encouragement. The men who begin to do
these things from their love to the cause and the work naturally go on doing
them; and their activity which was at first purely personal and voluntary,
tends to become recognized and official. This is what may be seen on any mission
field in the present day, especially in such lands as China and India, where
Christianity is doing aggressive work among a civilized people habituated to
work together in a society. The epistles of St. Paul reveal the same state of
things. The men who are to be honoured as leaders are those who work for their
brethren and put some heart into their labour
(οἱ κοπιῶντες ἐν ὑμῖν).
Their work might include exhortation and admonition, for the term applied to them by St. Paul is the
word he used to describe his own labours,1 Cor. xv. 10: “I laboured (ἐκοπίασα) more abundantly than they
all.” Gal. iv. 11: “Lest by any means I have bestowed labour (κεκοπίακα)
upon you in vain.” or it might be work of some other
kind.Rom. xvi. 6, 12; where providing for material wants seems to be the meaning. Whatever it was, it was necessary for the foundation, growth and stability
of the infant churches. The men
who laboured in these ways were the natural leaders of the community, for leadership
was to be based on service, and the apostle declared that they were to be “esteemed highly for their work’s sake.”1 Thess. v. 13.
These workers, as is the case in modern missions, were the first converts,
like Stephanas,1 Cor. xvi. 15, 19, cf.
Acts xviii. 2, 26; Clement, 1 Epistle, xlii. 4. or the men who had given their houses for the meetings of the
brethren.Rom. xvi. 5, 10, 11, 14, 15; 1 Cor. xvi. 19;
Col. iv. 15; Philem. 2. These brethren were to have the pre-eminence, and were to be obeyed
for their work’s sake.1 Cor. xvi. 16.
These natural leaders receive a
special name in the epistles to the Romans and to the Thessalonians. They are called
“those who are over you in the Lord.” The word is προϊστάμενοι;
and the term has a history, and would at all events suggest a
special kind of relationship between leaders and led. It suggested
the relation of patron and client, of προστάτης and
μέτοικος,
familiar enough in Rome and in Thessalonica, which no longer bore the old strictly legal meaning, but
which in a less definite sense permeated the whole social life of the times.
The word or a cognate one (προεστὼς)
lingered long in the Roman Church. It is found in the writings of Hermas, the
Roman presbyter, and was used by Justin Martyr when he wished to explain the
organization of a Christian congregation to a Roman Emperor.We find the series of related words:—προϊστάμενος,
προϊστάμενοι (used as a noun),
προστάτις, προστάτης and
προεστὼς, Rom. xii. 8;
xvi. 2; 1 Thess. v. 12; Hermas,
Pastor, Vis. ii. 4; Justin, i. Apol. lxv; lxvii. The term
προστάτης was used technically in Greek city life (and Thessalonica in Paul’s time was
a Greek city which had been permitted by the Romans to retain its ancient Greek
constitution) to denote those citizens who undertook to care for and rule over the
μέτοικοι,
or persons who had no civic rights. It denoted technically the Roman relation
of patron and client and what corresponded thereto in Greek social life. The
word was used by Plutarch to translate the Latin patronus
(Plutarch, Rom. 13; Mar. 5). Clement, in his Epistle to the Corinthians,
applies the word in three different places to denote our Lord: “the Patron and Helper of our weakness”
(xxxvi. 1); the Highpriest and Patron of our souls” (lxi. 3; lxiv.). It was the custom that the Roman
confraternities, especially those among the poorer classes, had a “patron” or “patrons,” who
were frequently ladies of rank and wealth; compare Liebenam,
Zur Gesch. und Organis. d. roem. Vereinswesens,
pp. 213-18. The Jewish synagogues in Rome, which externally resembled the pagan confraternities
for religious cults, not only had patrons but called their synagogues by their
names; Schürer, Die Gemeindeverfassung der Juden in Rom in der Kaiserzeit, p. 15 f.,
31. It is probable that Phoebe, who is called by St. Paul a “patroness of himself
and of many” (Rom. xvi. 1-3), had a position of this kind at Cenchrea, and
that this was the service she had rendered.
Archaeological investigation has proved how families among the privileged Roman aristocracy
were the patrons of their poorer Christian brethren. The “church in the house”
was not necessarily a “kitchen meeting.” The investigations of the late Commendatore
de Rossi have shown us that the Christian faith made its way at a very early
period into the families of some of the noblest and wealthiest Romans. They
could, and probably did, open their houses to their poorer brethren and give
their great audience halls
(basilica) for the worship of the common
brotherhood, interposing the protection of the legal sacredness of their private
life as a shield on all who joined in their devotions.“Nam servis, respublica et quasi civitas, domus est,” Pliny
Ep. viii. 16. Congregational meetings
of this kind had the appearance of an assembly of powerful patrons and their
humble clients, and thus took the form of a well recognized condition of Roman
social life in all its ramifications. This idea is con-firmed by the shape of
the earliest Roman churches, which, as has been before remarked, resemble the
audience hall of the wealthy Roman burgher. When buildings were erected for
the exclusive use of the Christian worship in happier days, the architects naturally
copied the arrangement of the buildings they had been used to, and unconsciously
transmitted architectural proof of the churchly organization of earlier times.
Here, for a third time, we can see the Christian fellowship organizing itself
under social usages well understood by the members of the infant brotherhood.
In the Epistles to the Corinthians, while we find exhortations to obey,
we do not find any words which designate those to whom obedience is due; nor have we
any description of the organization which prevailed in the Corinthian Church,
nor any advice given by the apostle about what it ought to be. The Christians
of Corinth lived amidst so many forms of associated life that if organization
was to be worked out by the congregation for itself, they would naturally have
more aptitude for it than most Christian communities. For the people of Corinth
were accustomed to confraternities of all kinds, and above all to private religious
associations for the practice of special cults. Under the universal state religion
of the Roman Empire there were innumerable religions with their different forms
of worship. The state religion had its colleges of priesthoods, its great temples
and its public sacrifices; these private religions had their associations for
the performance of their peculiar rites. The Jewish synagogues of the Dispersion
were enrolled as private religious societies, and seemed to their heathen neighbours
to be one out of many kinds of institutions for the practice of a religion admitted
to be lawful (religio licita), although it was the faith of only
a small minority of their neighbours.
The organization
of these confraternities, as far as the western division of the Empire is concerned,
is known in a general way; and although it differed in details in different
societies, certain common features can be recognized. The confraternities were
thoroughly democratic to the extent of admitting slaves to be members provided
their masters gave consent. The confraternity was regarded as a great family,
and the associates called each other “brothers” and “sisters.” They had a
common meal at stated times. They paid a monthly subscription to the common
fund (stips menstrua). They
were permitted to make their own laws provided nothing was enacted which came
into collision with the regulations of the State. These confraternities elected
their own office-bearers, who were commonly called decuriones;
and the society was strictly divided
into office-bearers and commons, though occasionally we find an intermediate class of honoured persons.This finds its parallel in the honoured class which existed
in the Christian congregations of the early centuries, and who ranked between
the clergy and the people—the confessors, martyrs, widows, virgins.
The confraternities exercised discipline over their members and inflicted fines
in money and in kind for offences. A book was kept (album)
containing the names of all the associates. Women were members of a large number of these
confraternities, more especially of the burial clubs.This peculiarity has descended
to modern times; it is not very easy, those who have tried it say, to induce
women to form trades unions, but they are always ready to become members of
burial clubs. Their places of meeting
were generally called scholae,”The σχολὴ Τυράννου” (Acts xix. 9) was probably such a place—the
meeting place of a confraternity, and named after the patron of the “gild”
according to a usual practice, with a hall which could be hired when not needed
for the meetings of the society.
because they were the scenes of leisure and re-creation, though the words
curia and basilica are sometimes
found (the Greek word is almost always οἶκος).
There they
had their common meals and their business meetings; the two were never held
together. “Item,” says a decretum,
“placuit si
quis quid queri aut referre volet, in conventu referat, ut quieti et hilares
diebus solemnis epulemur.” Almost all these confraternities had a patron or
a patroness, who was always elected by acclamation and never by a mere majority
of votes. Sometimes we hear of confraternities belonging to or having their
seat in a private house,The “collegium quod est in domu Sergiae Paulinae” corresponds to “the church
which is in the house of Philemon.”
consisting probably of the servants or slaves of the mansion. Almost all these
confraternities, like their lineal descendants the “gilds” of mediaeval times,
whether in England or on the Continent, had a distinctly religious side even
when they were not formed for the express purpose of practising a foreign cult.
They placed themselves under the protection of some deity or deities—merchants
honoured Mercury; the dealers in grain, Ceres and the Nymphs; the wine‑dealers,
Liber; the weavers and spinners, Minerva; and the fishermen, Neptune, etc.—and
paintings of the protecting deity and images of the emperors adorned the walls
of the Schola.For the confraternities which existed in the Graeco-Roman world, compare: Foucart,
Des Associations Religieuses chez les Grecs (1873); Lüders, Die dionysischen Künstler (1873); Ziebarth,
Das Griechische Vereinswesen (1895), the fullest and most accurate for the Greek associations; Mommsen,
De collegiis et sodaliciis (1843); Gérard, De corporations ouvriéres à Rome (1884); Boissier,
La religion romaine d’Auguste aux Antonins (1878), ii. 292 ff.; Cohn,
Zum römischen Vereinsrecht (1873); Liebenam, Zur Geschichte und Organisation des roömischen Vereinswesen (1890),
the fullest and most accurate.
For the relation of these confraternities to the primitive Christian organization,
compare: Renan, Les Apôtres (1866), p. 351 ff.; Heinrici, Zeitschrift für wissenschaftlichen Theologie
(1876), pp. 465 ff.; (1877) pp. 89 ff; Theologischen Studien und Kritiken (1881), pp. 556 ff.; Weingarten,
in his preface to Rothe’s Vorlesungen über Kirchengeschichte (1876), p. xiv.; and in Sybel’s
Historische Zeitschrift, vol. xlv. (1881), pp. 441 ff.; Hatch, The Organization of the Early Christian Churches
(1881), p. 36 ff.; Holtzmann, Die Pastoralbriefe (1880), pp. 194-202; Loening, Die Gemeindeverfassung des Urchristenthums
(1889), p. 8 ff.; and Geschichte des deutsehes Kirchenrechts (1878), i. pp. 195-210; Liebenam, as above, pp. 264-274; Schmiedel,
Encyclopædia Biblica (1902), pp. 3110-1; Ziebarth, as above, pp. 126-132; Réville, Les Origines de l’Episcopat
(1894), pp. 180-194.
A large number
of the Christian converts must have belonged to these confraternities before
their conversion; many maintained their places as members after their entrance
into the Christian Church in spite of all the efforts of masterful ecclesiastics,
like Cyprian of Carthage and some bishops of Rome, to prevent the practice.Cyprian’s Epistles, lxvii. 6: “Martialis also, besides frequenting the disgraceful and filthy
banquets of the Gentiles in their collegium, and placing his sons in the same collegium, after the manner of foreign nations,
among profane sepulchres, and burying them together with strangers . . . such persons attempt to claim for themselves the episcopate
in vain; since it is evident that men of that kind may neither rule over the
Christian Church, nor ought to offer sacrifices to God, especially since Cornelius,
our colleague, a peaceable and righteous priest, and moreover honoured by the
condescension of the Lord with martyrdom, has long ago decreed with us, and
with all the bishops appointed throughout all the world, that men
of this sort might indeed be admitted to repentance, but were prohibited from
the ordination of the clergy and from the priestly honour. “Martialis was bishop
of Astorga or of Merida in Spain, and was a libellaticus.
They must have known how the associations were
organized, and they must have carried that knowledge with them into Christianity. They
were likely to make use of that knowledge in the interests of the new faith
to which they had attached themselves.
This line of argument may easily be pressed too far. Scholars like Renan, Heinrici, Hatch
and Weingarten, to say nothing of Schmiedel,Encyclopædia Biblica, iii. 3110-3111. Schmiedel
seems to exaggerate the connexion between the confraternities and the Christian
societies when he refuses to see any connexion between the latter and the Jewish
communities and their synagogue system. have pushed the relation which
they think subsisted between the heathen confraternities and the organization
of the primitive Gentile Christian communities much further than the evidence
seems to warrant. Nothing that they have brought forward bears out the idea
that the Christian societies were framed on the model of these pagan confraternities.
On the contrary, all the evidence laboriously accumulated to establish the similarity
between the Christian organization and that of the pagan confraternities, has
not produced many points of resemblance which are not the common property of
all forms of social organization.The points of similarity which Heinrici has endeavoured to establish between the
Christian community at Corinth and the pagan confraternities do not amount to
mere than this; Hatch has certainly overrated the evidence he has brought forward
that episcopi were finance officials in the confraternities; points of resemblance found in the records
of Greek associations for religious purposes are almost entirely taken from
pre-Christian times, and it is forgotten that under the imperial rule the constitutions
and formations of confraternities for all purposes were entirely altered and
that we know almost nothing about these confraternities in the eastern provinces
of the Empire during the first century and a half of the imperial rule. What
can be shown is, that to an outsider there was an external resemblance of the
most general kind between the Christian communities and the confraternities; and this can be proved only in a general way: Pliny wrote to Trajan that
he had meant to proceed
against the Christians of Bithynia as belonging to an illicit confraternity (Ep. 96 (97));
Tertullian in his Apology plainly pleads for the recognition of the Christian Churches as lawful confraternities;
Bishop Zephyrinus succeeded in getting the Roman church recognized as a burial
club in the end of the second century; and Lucian, in his
Peregrines Proteus, describes Peregrinus while a Christian in words which would be applicable to the official
of a Greek confraternity for religious purposes (θιασάρχης),
which would imply that he looked on the Christian community as θίασος
or an association for the promotion of a private cult. Compare Liebenam, Die Geschichte
and Organisation des römischen Vereinswesen, pp. 264-74, and Ziebarth,
Griechische Vereinswesen,
pp. 126-32. The primitive Christian communities
organized themselves independently in virtue of the new moral and social life that was
implanted within them; but they did not disdain to take any hints about organization
which would be of service from the pagan associations to which they had been
accustomed.
Here then
we have, not a fourth type, but a fourth root of early Christian organization.
A fifth may be found in the Jewish synagogues of the Dispersion;
for many of the converts must have been Jews, or Gentiles
who had become Jewish proselytes. The communities of the Jewish people scattered
over the Roman Empire occupied very different positions in different places.
In Alexandria and in Cyrene they had acquired almost complete political independence,
and formed one large and separate community distinct from the surrounding population.
In Rome, they had no rights that could be called political, and were divided
into a number of separate communities apparently quite independent the one of
the others.
Everywhere however throughout the Roman Empire, thanks to the legislation of Julius Caesar
and Augustus, the Jews had acquired complete legal protection for their religion.Both Julius Caesar and his nephew aid successor began legislation against the confraternities
that abounded; but the Jewish communities were recognized by them as
lawful confraternities.
This had been held to include the right to administer their property within
their own communities according to their own laws, and to have a limited jurisdiction
over their own members.
Thus even where they had the fewest political rights the Jewish communities were always
recognized as lawful associations permitted to practise the rites of a
religio licita. The unit of the Jewish organization was the synagogue. In Alexandria the syngagogues
seem to have been united under a common council; but in Rome, as has been said,
the synagogues were independent associations, each having its own council, its
own president, and its own office-bearers.These synagogue communities were sometimes named after their patrons—the
“synagogue of the clients of Augustus,” of Agrippa, of Volumnus; sometimes after the quarter
of Rome where they stood—the synagogue of Campus Martius, of the Subura, etc.; sometimes after the occupations of the members—the synagogue of the burners
of lime. Schürer, Geschichte des jüdischen Volkes im Zeitalter Jesu Christi (3rd ed. 1898), iii. 44-7. The privileges of administering
their own property and of exercising jurisdiction over their own members, made
these synagogues as much civil as religious communities, and it is very difficult,
if not impossible, to distinguish between the two sides. At the head of each
community was a council, the γερουσία, with a president, the
γερουσιάρχης;
the official leaders of the community were called ἄρχοντες, and these
archons were commonly elected for a term of years and sometimes for life.The term “elder,” which one expects, is
not found in inscriptions nor in laws until the fourth century;
archon is found almost universally. Schürer seems to think that the members of the
gerusia were the elders and
that they were not office-bearers, but the honoured heads of the community by whom the archons were
appointed. If so this would be a parallel to what Harnack believes to be the organization of the early Christian
communities, where the elders were not office-bearers but honoured persons from whom the episcopi were chosen. They were purely
civil officials; they decided questions of property; they had some criminal
jurisdiction; and they were permitted to punish disobedience. The communities
had also almoners—at least three, who are commonly classed among the ecclesiastical
office-bearers, but whose work was almost purely civil. The only purely ecclesiastical
office was that of ἀρχισυνάγωγος.
All the actions of public worship, reading the Scriptures, preaching, praying,
were performed by the private members, and it was the duty of the official to select those
who were to take part in the services. Some
synagogues had more than one ἀρχισυνάγωγος,
and in later times the title must have
become an honorary one, for we find it given to women and to boys. Besides this
purely ecclesiastical official there was the “servant of the synagogue”
(ὑπηρέτης), who seems to have combined the
offices of school-master, beadle and public executioner; he taught the children,
brought in and removed the copies of Scripture used in public worship, and
corporal punishment for misdeeds was administered by him.For the organization of the Jewish synagogue system, compare Schürer,
Geschichte des jüdischen Volkes im Zeitalter Jesu Christi (3rd ed.
1898), ii. pp. 427-463 (Eng. Trans. ii. 55-68, 243-270); also his
Gemeindeverfassung der Juden in Rom in der Kaiserzeit (1879); Vitringa,
De Synagoga vetere (1696).
However the internal organization of these Jewish communities
differed from the pagan confraternities, their external appearance was such that
they were undoubtedly classed among them, and by the names they gave their
officials and by some of their customs they would appear to have tried to carry
out the likeness as far as possible.Schürer notes these customs among others: the Greek communes were accustomed to honour
with garlands and with special seats at the public entertainments their public
benefactors, the leaders of the synagogues voted garlands and front seats in
the synagogues to theirs; slaves were set free in the temples, among the Jews
they were brought to the synagogues; women were honoured with
titles—presbytera, mater synagogae, archisynagogos. As for the
names of office-bearers, none of them are exclusively Jewish; even ἀρχισυνάγωγος
has a pagan use so common that it is impossible to say that it is of strictly
Jewish origin.
This synagogue organization has some points in common with that of the early Christian communities,
and these were probably taken over into Christianity, but the differences were
so great that it is impossible to say that the one organization comes from the
other. Whether we regard its connexion with the pagan confraternities on the
one hand, or with the Jewish synagogues on the other, it may be said that the organization
of the Christian communities proceeded by a path peculiar to themselves. Starting from
the simplest forms of combination
they framed their ministry to serve their own needs in accordance
with what they saw was best fitted for their own peculiar work.Schürer, Theologische Literaturzeitung for 1879, pp. 544-6. This did not
mean that the training acquired in pagan confraternity or in Jewish synagogue
was altogether without effect on the members of the infant Christian churches,
or that usages suitable for their purposes were not adopted; but it
does mean that the organization of the primitive Gentile churches
was not a copy either of pagan confraternity or of Jewish synagogue. What is
to be insisted upon is that, on the supposition that the apostles did not prescribe
any definite form of Church government (and there is not only no evidence that
they did, but the indications are all the other way), the Christians of Corinth
and of other cities in the East and in the West were sufficiently acquainted
with forms of social organization to be able to organise their communities in
such a way that the possibilities of rule and service which lay in the possession
of those gifts of the Spirit that manifested the presence of Christ, could find
free exercise for the benefit and edification of the whole community.
One thing,
however, in this connexion must not be forgotten, as it often is. The infant
Christian churches came into being in the Graeco-Roman world at a time when
the imperial policy was extremely jealous of any forms of social organization,
and when its officials were on the watch to prevent any new development of
the principle. Julius Caesar, on political grounds, had suppressed all confraternities
except those of ancient origin,Suetonius, Caesar, 42: Cuncta collegia, praeter antiquitus constituta, distraxit. but, also from motives of policy, had expressly
excepted the Jewish synagogues.Josephus, Antiquitates, XIV. x. 8: “Julius Caius, praetor of Rome, to the magistrates, senate and people of
the Parians, sendeth greeting. The Jews of Delos, and some other Jews that sojourn there, in the presence of
your ambassadors, signified to us, that, by a decree of yours you forbid them
to make use of the customs of their forefathers and their way of sacred worship.
Now it does not please me that such decrees should be made against our friends
and confederates, whereby they are forbidden to live according to their own
customs, or to bring in contributions for common suppers and holy festivals,
while they are not forbidden to do so even in Rome itself; for even Caius Caesar,
our imperator and consul, in that decree wherein he forbade the Bacchanal rioters
to meet in the city, did yet permit these Jews, and these only, both to bring
in their contributions, and to make their common suppers. Accordingly when I
forbid other Bacchanal rioters I permit these Jews to gather themselves together,
according to the customs and laws of their forefathers, and to persist therein.
It will therefore be good for you, that if you have made any decree against
these our friends and confederates, to abrogate the same, by reason of their
virtue and kind disposition towards us.” His nephew and successor Augustus
followed in his uncle’s footsteps, and in addition had ordered all religious associations
to be placed under the strictest control and surveillance.Dio Cassius, lii. 36; Suetonius, Augustus, 32. The well-known contempt
which the first emperor entertained for Oriental religions was doubtless partly
responsible for this.Dio Cassius, liv. 6. The Jewish synagogues were again specially exempted.
All new confraternities had to get a special permit from the senate, if they
were in the senatorial provinces, and from the emperor, if they belonged to
the imperial ones. The only associations which were perhaps exempted were the collegia tenuiorum, when
they were also burial clubs; but it is doubtful whether there was ever a general
concession made till the time of Severus. There existed, however, throughout
the empire a multitude of confraternities which had not received the sanction
of either senate or emperor, and which were therefore illicit, but which were
undisturbed although under police supervision. They could be suppressed at
any time, and it was provided that no very serious punishment accompanied the
suppression.“Collegia si qua fuerint illicita, mandatis et constitutionibus et senatusconsultis dissolvuntur;
sed permittitur eis, cum dissolvuntur, pecunias communes si quas habent dividere pecuniamque inter se partiri: Dig. XLVII. xxii. 3. Christianity was never recognized as
a religio licita
till the time of Constantine, and could never have received official
sanction for its assemblies; but it was not impossible for the Christian churches
to take the place of an illicit confraternity provided they had such an external
resemblance to some well recognized confraternities as would permit the police
to connive at
their existence. It
is undoubted that the Christian Church was at first believed by the Romans to
belong to the tolerated and protected Judaism. Tertullian meets the charge that
Christianity was “hiding something of its presumption under the shadow of an
illustrious religion (Judaism), one which has at any rate the authorization
of law.”Tertullian, Apology, 21. So long as the Roman Government did not perceive the difference between
the Christians and the Jews, the infant Christian churches could remain sheltered
under the laws which permitted legalized confraternities;De Rossi, Roma Sottereana, iii. 509; Bulletino di Archaeologia Cristiana (1865), pp. 90-94;
Liebenam, Zur Geschichte and Organisation des römischen Vereinswesen, 268. Holtzmann, Die Pastoralbriefe,
197. The protection was not restricted to those who were Jews by birth; it extended to proselytes
(σεβόμενοι); cf. Bulletino di Archaeologia Cristiana (1865), p. 91.
but when the difference
became manifest, and when Jews themselves began to denounce the Christians,
some other shelter was required.Authorities differ about the date when the Roman officials first recognized the difference. Ramsay (The
Church in the Roman Empire, p. 266 ff.) differs from most German authorities
in thinking it to been have much earlier than the time of Domitian; I agree with
him thoroughly. When we remember the wise political dread of religious
combinations which the emperors from Augustus downward showed; their discernment
that religion was the most powerful political motive power in the East; the
presence in every province of men trained to note the beginnings of all
movements which might disturb the state; and when we glance at the objective
picture of that old system of ruling provinces which modern India furnishes—none
but an arm-chair critic would deny it. British officials in India know of all
the small beginnings of religious movements in their districts long before the
public know anything about them, if they ever acquire the knowledge. This could be and no doubt was
furnished by the general external resemblance of the Christian societies to
the pagan confraternities for religious practices. Hence conformity
with the usages of a pagan confraternity gave the Christians the best means of escaping the
attention of the authorities, alert to notice any attempts to start altogether
new associations.Schmiedel, Encyclopædia Biblica, 3111; Holtzmann, Die Pastoralbriefe, 197 f. Schmiedel, however, is not warranted in
making the deductions he does from the external conformity; there must have
been the same outward conformity between the Christian communities and the Jewish
synagogues. It is evident that the Christian communities had some usages
in common with the confraternities, and precisely those which would be the most
likely to attract attention. They met together for a common meal (which was
one of the things that Pliny noticed);Pliny, Epist. 96 (97). they made a distinction
between the meetings for the common meal and those for edification and for business; they honoured the
dies natalis of a martyr as the confraternities
celebrated the birthdays of benefactors; they exhibited a reverence for their
dead brethren in ways that could be compared with the practices of the confraternities;For the burial usages of the confraternities, compare Liebenam,
Zur Geschichte and Organisation des römischen Vereinswesens (1890), p. 254 ff.;
Schultze, Katacomben (1882), pp. 9-14, 48-53; De Rossi, Roma Sottereana, iii. 501-507.
above all, after the time of the Emperor Nerva they tried to assimilate themselves
to the collegia tenuiorum, which obtained an easier
recognition on the part of the authorities, and this came to a head when Bishop
Zephyrinus was able to get the Roman Church registered as a burial club.This is commonly inferred from the fact mentioned by Hippolytus, that Zephyrinus
“appointed him (Calixtus) over the cemetery”; Refutation (Philosophumena), ix. 7. There
was sufficient external resemblance between the confraternities to enable Tertullian
to plead that the Church should be recognized as a legally permitted association,
and to make Pliny suggest that he might proceed
against the Christians as members of an illicit collegium.Compare above p. 128, n. 2.
All these things enable us to see how the Christian churches during the earliest
part of their existence could maintain a
position of precarious security in face of the imperial policy of not permitting
new associations. But we are scarcely warranted in drawing conclusions about
the inward organization of the primitive Christian communities. What we can
infer is, that the Christians of the primitive Gentile churches had the ordinary
experience to enable them to make use of all the divine gifts of rule and service
in creating for their churches from their midst a ministering service.
Churches like that of Corinth and Philippi, whatever may have
suggested their forms of organization, and whatever bands held them together,
had within them persons with the “gifts” which enabled them to offer wise
counsels, to assist their neighbours, to lead the devotions and to manage the
affairs of the community. If it be said, as it is sometimes done, that the churches
of Corinth and Rome were not properly organized because we do not hear of bishops
or presbyters or deacons, then that means that a Christian community could be
addressed as a Christian church, could be called “Christ’s Body,” could admit
catechumens by the sacred door of baptism, could assemble together for public
worship, could partake together of the Holy Supper, could exercise Christian
discipline, and all this without
office-bearers set apart for the purposes of the ministry in regular and ecclesiastical fashion.
It shows, as nothing else can, that the Church comes before the ministry, and
that it creates for itself and its own needs its ministering service; the natural
leaders led, the people followed, the organization grew and the new moral and
social life had full liberty to develop itself in all manner of Christian service.
The two types of the earliest
local ministry, the serving and the leading, the ἀντιλήψεις
and the κυβερνήσεις, the διακονεῖν
and the ἐπισκοπεῖν appeared
first as forms of doing what service was required of them, and then as permanent offices.
Hitherto, with one exception, we have been working at those
portions of the New Testament whose dates are well ascertained. Our material
has been drawn chiefly from the earlier
Epistles of St. Paul, all of which belong to the years before 57 A.D.
When we come to the material given in the Epistle of James, 1 Peter, and the
Pastoral Epistles, we are at once confronted with questions of date and authorship,
on which modern scholars hold very varying opinions.
For our purposes, however, these questions are by no means
so important as might at first be supposed. No critic, whose opinions deserve
serious consideration, denies the truth of the pictures of the ecclesiastical
organization exhibited in the Pastoral Epistles or in the later chapters of
the Acts of the Apostles. While they may refuse to admit that St. Paul or St.
Luke was the author and while they may relegate the composition to the last
decade of the first or to the second or third decades of the second century,
they all admit that the representations of ecclesiastical polity found in these
documenta are true for this later period and may be true for a much earlier one. The Church, it is held universally, did pass
through the stage of organization shown in these documents. The only question
is the date of the stage.
No reasonable critic would affirm that a special feature of ecclesiastical
organization may not have been in existence long before it is mentioned, or
that the date when we first hear about it is the date of its origin, unless
there is the express statement that it took its beginning at that time. For
example, when it it said that Paul and Barnabas did not see
elders set over the churches of Derbe, Lystra and Iconium (Acts xiv. 23), no one denies
that the passage is evidence for the existence of elders
in these churches in the beginning of the second century. Only some critics
believe that the statement so conflicts with St. Paul’s own account of his conduct
towards his missionary churches that it is impossible to accept the idea that
the office of eldership,
which was certainly present when the document was written, dates as far back
as the planting of the churches. They say that the writer, not unnaturally, attributes
the polity of his own time to the earlier period. Others, who accept the late
date of the document, find certain corroborative evidence
of the existence of elders in these
churches long before this date, and have no
difficulty in believing that the institution of the
office may
have come from the missionary journey of St. Paul, whatever the date or authorship
of the document which relates the circumstance. The same remark applies to the
Pastoral Epistles. If the late date of the documents be accepted, and if it
is also believed that the accounts of the organization of the churches given
in them indicate a difference of polity from what appears in the undisputed
Epistles of St. Paul, the result is not to discredit the information the documents
give us about ecclesiastical organization, but to accept it as evidence for
what existed in the first and second decades of the second century. If the late
date of composition be maintained, and if it is held that the information given
is not inconsistent with what existed in earlier days, then nothing compels
us to conclude that the beginnings of the polity described are as late as the
accepted date of the documents describing them. In either case the
documents are held to describe
truly the condition of the ministry of the
Church at an earlier or at a later period—the question of time being settled
not by the date of the document but by a comparison between the information
it gives with what we know of the earlier period. The matter involved does not
concern a general conception of ecclesiastical organization, but whether a
certain stage of development, which did exist some-time, was of an earlier or
of a later appearance—a question which, when we consider the utmost limits of
time involved, is comparatively unimportant.
We need not, therefore, concern ourselves here with the problems which the date and authorship
of the Book of Acts and of 1 Peter suggest.Personally I am not disposed to brush aside the difficulties which the Book of Acts presents; they relate
chiefly to the limited time which the Eusebian chronology (and
it appears to me to be the most trustworthy) allows for the events recorded
down to the conversion of St. Paul; but difficulties seem to me to be increased
and not lessened by any proposed reconstruction. So far as our subject of investigation is concerned all
“critics” recognize the election of the “Seven” as an historical fact;
and the only remaining question of organization is the statement that “elders
“ were appointed (not “ordained,” for that is not the word) in the churches
of the Galatian mission by Paul and Barnabas; and this it seems to me is rendered
highly probable by evidence which is altogether independent of the date and
authorship of the Acts of the Apostles. As to the date of the book, I follow
Professor Sanday who believes the book to have been written about 80 A.D.
and that its author was St. Luke. Dr. Harnack on the other hand declares that the date of the book is some time
between 79 and 93 A.D. Geschichte der altchristliche Literatur bis Eusebius, II.;
Chronologie, i. 246-50. But prevailing critical opinions about
the Pastoral Epistles place the portions which concern our subject so very late
that it is necessary either to dissent from them or to relegate the information
these documents give to the period which produced the Epistles of Ignatius and
the Sources of the Apostolic Canons.The “critical view” of the date of the Pastoral Epistles may perhaps be best
taken from the short summary in Harnack’s Geschichte der altchristliche Literatur bis Eusebius, II., Chronologie, i. 480-5,
supplemented from Holtzmann, Die Pastoralbriefe (1880). It is as follows:—The
three Epistles, 1 and 2 Timothy and Titus, go together and are to be treated
as a whole; the same arguments and the same results apply to all. These epistles
contain some genuine sayings of St. Paul—a few verses in 2 Timothy scarcely
a third of Titus, but not a verse of 1 Timothy—enough to say that the writings
are founded on genuine apostolic letters. But in the state in which they have
come to us they represent an entirely different authorship. The reasons given
for this judgment may be classed under three heads: the language is different
from St. Paul’s, and in particular the epistles contain a very large number
of words and phrases quite unlike what St. Paul uses in his authentic works; warnings are given against erroneous beliefs and especially against Gnostic
opinions which were not in existence before the death of St. Paul; the description
of the ecclesiastical organization is entirely different from what we find in
the authentic letters of St. Paul. When it is sought to determine the date of
the epistles two definite points of time present themselves. Polycarp distinctly
quotes 2 Timothy ii. 12; and the redaction cannot be later than 110 A.D.
On the other hand the kinds of errors which the author denounces and warns against
had no existence until the close of the first century. Hence the probable date
of the letters must be sometime between 90-110 A.D. But,
it is said, portions must be much later; the closing verses, 17-21, of 1 Tim.
vi. were evidently added after the real end of the epistle at verse 16. Of these
verses 17-19 contain warnings which find a parallel in the admonitions of the
Pastor of Hermas and belong to a period later than 100 A.D.;
while verses 20-21 have no connexion
with the rest of the epistle, are directed against the “antitheses” of Marcion and
cannot be earlier than 130 A.D. Similarly
verses 1-13 in 1 Tim. iii. and verses 17-20 in 1 Tim. v. 17-20,
and verses 7-9 in Titus i., have little connexion with the context and are portions of an ancient
book of discipline. They present striking parallels to the Sources of the Apostolic Canons and cannot be much earlier than 130
A.D. This is what “criticism” makes of the Pastoral Epistles. It places those portions
which concern our subject as late at 130 A.D. and
forbids us to use them to describe the organization of the Churches within the
first century. The reasons given are briefly these: a quotation from St. Luke’s gospel is called a scripture and
that of itself, it is said, is sufficient to show the late date of the document; Timothy is represented as the president of a college of elders and in this
capacity is the judge and administrator of justice—functions which are much later than even 100 A.D.
A few remarks
may be admitted in the way of briefly indicating why I refuse to accept the “critical” theories about these epistles. While I gratefully acknowledge Dr.
Harnack as the greatest living authority on early Church history, I never read
what he has to say about the two subjects of Gnosticism and ecclesiastical organization
without longing that he could spend a few months in the mission field where
aggressive work is being done among educated pagans whose minds are full of
the same curious oriental faiths and their allied philosophies as were present
to the earliest Christian converts in the first and second centuries. I am convinced
that if this experience were his he would modify much that he has said both
about Gnosticism and about ecclesiastical organization. The Oriental mind, tenacious
of its own beliefs and at the same time curiously receptive in religious conceptions,
strives from the first to weave Christian thoughts into its system of Oriental beliefs and is surprised that the amalgam
thus produced is not accepted as Christian doctrine by the missionary. The very errors denounced by the Pastoral Epistles may be found among
Hindu inquirers who never get further than inquiry and a certain measured sympathy with Christian teaching. They are the beginnings of Gnosticism apparent
to the missionary long before they have acquired the definite shape of such a system as the Arya Somaj,
to take one of the forms which modern Indian gnosticism has assumed. If the living picture were studied fresh insight would
be acquired about ancient documents. It would be seen for example, that if Timothy
or Titus were acting as deputy for an apostle or missionary it does not follow
that he must be president of a college of elders in order to be obliged to listen
to accusations against “elders” or to act as the one who rebukes in public
and in private. The more I study these pastoral epistles the more evident it
becomes to me that they are just what every experienced missionary has to impart
to a younger and less experienced colleague when he warns him about the difficulties
that he must face and the tasks, often unexpected, he will find confronting
him. It is scarcely to be wondered at then that the Pastoral Epistles are always
among the earliest portions of the scriptures translated in almost every Christian
mission. A study of the living picture would also teach students that while
the declaration of Hegesippus may be accepted that gnosticism did not trouble
the Church till about the time of Trajan (which is the deduction usually drawn from his statements given in Eusebius,
Hist. Eccles. III. xxxii. 7) that need not prevent our believing that incipient
gnosticism had to be guarded against from the very beginning.
At the same time it is very probable that the Pastoral Epistles contain many
interpolations in which statements about errors and even directions about discipline
have been somewhat altered to suit the requirements of the middle of the second
century, That is what would naturally happen to a document which was used, as
we know these epistles were used, for a manual of ecclesiastical procedure (the
Muratorian Fragment tells us that). The insertion of “scripture”
(γραφὴ) might easily have come in in this way. But all this does not prevent
me accepting these epistles as the work of St. Paul or of a companion who wrote
for him. It may be said that the supposition that these letters come from St.
Paul requires us to believe that the apostle was released from his first captivity,
and made missionary journeys of which no record has remained; but this is rendered
more than likely by the statement of Clement (I. v. 7) that St. Paul visited
the furthest parts of the West (τὸ τέρμα τῆς δύσεως)—an expression which, notwithstanding all that has been said against
the idea, seems more naturally applicable to Spain than to Rome. As for the
language—“Tous ceux qui ont 1’experience de la parole en publique ne savent-ils
pas que le ton n’est plus le même quand on parle à une assemblée que lorsqu’on
s’addreese à une peraonne en particulier” (Réville, Les Origines de l’Episcopat (1894), p.497.)
These Pastoral Epistles were
extensively used in the Primitive Church as a document giving directions about ecclesiastical
organization and discipline. The Muratorian Fragment tells us this.“Ad Filemonem una, et ad Titum una, et ad Timotheum duas, pro affecto
et dilectione in honore tamen ecclesiae catholice in ordinatione ecclesiastice
descepline sanctificatae sunt.” Like all
documents used in this way, they were apt to be interpolated to suit the needs
of time and place. Statements about prevailing errors
to be shunned were liable to be altered in order to be more sharply
descriptive of existing heresies or tendencies to heresy and disciplinary directions
might easily have taken a more technical language to suit a later period. But
when due allowance is made for these natural effects of the primitive use of
these documents, there does not seem to be evidence strong
enough to warrant our refusing to believe that they are what they
declare themselves to be—letters from St. Paul to two of his most trusted fellow-workers,
instructing them how to carry on his missionary work, which he was not able
to superintend personally. If this be the case these letters show us what St.
Paul was in the habit of doing in the mission fields which be-longed peculiarly
to himself. TitusTitus had been one of the earliest gentile converts from heathenism—a
convert or spiritual son of St. Paul himself (Titus i. 4). The apostle had esteemed
him so highly that he had taken him up to Jerusalem when he went there to plead
the cause of gentile liberty. Titus went with St. Paul to be shown as a specimen
of what these gentile converts of his were like (Gal. ii. 3); and he had passed
the test so well that the leaders of the Church at Jerusalem had not required
that he should be circumcised. He had been employed by St. Paul on work involving
tact and confidential discretion (2 Cor. xii. 18), and had acquitted himself
well. had accompanied the apostle, released from his Roman captivity,
to Crete, and had been left there to complete the work which the apostle, pressed
for time, could not stay to finish. His duty was to see that “elders” were
chosen in every local church. The charge recalls the account given in the Acts
of the Apostles of the missionary journey of Paul and Barnabas through the
district which included the cities of Derbe, Lystra and Iconium. On that missionary
tour the apostles did not see to the appointment of “elders” when their converts were first gathered from Judaism
and heathenism. They allowed the believers in the new faith some little time
to prove themselves. It was on their return journey, when they were “confirming
“ their converts, that the elders were appointed. So here Titus was left till the sufficient time had elapsed,
and then he was to see to the selection of elders
in the local churches of Crete. His work was one that could be finished within
a comparatively short time, for the apostle expected him to follow to Nicopolis,
where St. Paul was to pass the winter. There is no suggestion that his function
was anything like a permanent office in the Church. The work given him to do
is perfectly familiar to modern missionaries.
The other deputy was Timothy.Timothy
was the favourite fellow-worker with the great apostle. When we piece together
his story from the Acts of the Apostles and from St. Paul’s epistles, we find
something like the following. When St. Paul left Antioch with Silas on his second
visit to the Galatian Churches, feeling sadly, no doubt, that Barnabas was
no longer with him, either he or his companion had an assurance given in “prophecy” that St. Paul
would find in a brief time a helper who would be to him as another Barnabas
(1 Tim. i. 18; iv. 14). When St. Paul reached Lystra he suddenly recognized
in a young man there the fellow-worker who had been divinely promised to him. “And behold,”
says Luke, “a certain disciple was there, named Timothy, the son of a Jewess who
believed; but his father was a Greek. Him Paul
would have to go forth with him” The apostle received him with the kindly Jewish benediction,
laying his hands on his head (2 Tim. i. 6); and the elders of
the Church also gave the young man their benediction before he set out on his
new life-work (Acts xvi. 1-4; 1 Tim. iv. 14). There is a striking parallel
between the “call” of Timothy and the earlier “call” of the great apostle
himself—the vision of Ananias and the prophetic intuition of St. Paul; Ananias’
benediction, when he laid his hands on the future head of the Apostle to the
Gentiles, and the benediction of Timothy by St. Paul; the blessing of Saul
and Barnabas by the “prophets and teachers” at the head of the Church at Antioch,
when they started on their first mission tour, and the blessing of the elders of
Lystra when Timothy started on his life work as an apostle or evangelist. From
this time he and St. Paul were almost always together; they were like father
and son. Timothy’s name occurs frequently in the epistles of St. Paul. When
difficult questions arose in St. Paul’s mission Churches which needed delicate
handling and when the Apostle could not go himself to settle them Timothy was
his favourite deputy (1 Cor. xvi. 10; 1 Thess. iii. 2). The apostle saw himself
living his life over again in the person of his son Timothy. He had come with the apostle
to Ephesus, and circumstances, we know not what, had required that one of the
two should remain and “confirm” the Church there. St. Paul had other work
to do; Timothy was selected to remain, and he received two letters advising
him how to act. Such is the setting of these Pastoral Epistles as related in
the writings themselves.
In these letters to Titus and to Timothy we find, as we might
expect in such documents, much more detailed references to the organization
of the churches than in the Epistles addressed to the churches themselves. We
find unmistakably an official ministry which appears to consist of two grades. We see evidence
of a congregational roll on which the names of the poor, who are to receive the
support of the congregation, are entered. There are also traces of a ministry
of women. We find the apostle laying down rules to guide his deputies in the
selection of office-bearers and in the removal of ecclesiastical excommunication.
In short, we find a great deal more definite information
about the organization and the ministry of the primitive churches than in any other of the New Testament writings.
If we believe that the apostle was above all things a missionary,
and that his deputies were to do the work of missionaries, which seems to be
the only view which is consistent with the nature of the function and the description
of their work which is given in the New Testament writings, these Pastoral Epistles
may be expected to show us the organization of the primitive Gentile
churches from the inside, while
in the Epistles of St. Paul, written either
before or during the Roman captivity, we see the same organization from the
outside. They tell us how the apostle personally superintended the building
into churches of the communities of believers his preaching had gathered together.
The two sets of letters are complementary. In the earlier letters we see the
apostle encouraging every form of spontaneous action, and how he made the infant
communities feel that the whole responsibility lay upon their shoulders. In
the later epistles the master-builder shows his deputies how carefully he was
accustomed to guide the exercise of that responsibility with scarcely felt touches
of the hand.
The duties of the two deputies varied with the wants of the places in which they were set.
Timothy had to do with an older community whose special circumstances demanded
special care; Titus had to deal with comparatively newly-established congregations,
and to guide them carefully but unobtrusively to organize
themselves. Both had to do the work which the apostle was himself accustomed
to do in similar circumstances. It was the most difficult and delicate work
that falls to the lot of a missionary—to guide into right channels of self-government communities
comparatively young in the faith, and to do it in such a way that the community may feel that
it is doing the work itself, and will be able to sustain itself when the guiding
hand shall be removed. In modern times nothing tests the ability of a missionary
for his work like this very task.
The apostle
gave both Titus and Timothy a master-thought to guide them. The infant Christian
communities were to be looked on as
Households
of God,
and as every
great household needs servants who superintend, so
the Household
of God
needs men
who have the oversight. He that has proved faithful in small things is the most
likely to prove faithful in all-important work, and the man who has shown that
he can guide and rule his own household well is declared to be the best fitted
to super-intend the Household of God. Hence we are told very little about the
special duties of the presbyters or bishops, or
whatever their usual name was, and find little mention of qualities fitted
for special functions. What the apostle insists on is character, and
that kind of character which is shown in family relationships.
Titus is told that a presbyter or elder must
be a man who is above suspicion, who is a faithful husband“A faithful husband” appears to be the best translation of γυναικὸς ἄνδρα—one who
acts on the principles of Christian morality and is not
led astray by the licentious usages of the surrounding heathenism. and whose children
are Christians of well regulated lives. He is not to
be self-willed, nor soon angry, nor given to wine, nor turbulent, nor given
to money; he is to be a lover of strangers, a lover of what is good, sober-minded,
upright, pious and temperate in all things. Besides, he ought to be so well-grounded
in the principles of Christian morality and religion that he can exhort the
brethren and answer the common Jewish and heathen objections to the Christian faith.
Timothy was placed in temporary charge in a district where the Christian community had existed
for a longer period; and the differences in the advice given all gather round this fact.
The office-bearers selected by
the community were not to be taken from the most recently converted, but from
men who had some experience of Christianity, and whose character had stood the
test of time.1 Tim. iii: 10; 2 Tim: ii. 2. The office of “oversight” had become sought after, and there
was the more need for careful selection.1 Tim. iii. 1. But as in the letter to Titus what
St. Paul insists on is character, as that has displayed itself within the family, for rule in the human household is the best training for
management within the Household of God.1 Tim. iii. 5. The list of qualifications is practically
the same as was given to Titus, with this
added, that he who has the oversight ought to be a man respected by the
heathen1 Tim. iii. 7. as well as by his fellow Christians.Harnack, who thinks that the verses in 1 Tim. which relate to the organization of the
Church are an interpolation and represent an old book of the Church Order not unlike the Sources of the Apostolic Canons
and perhaps derived with these fragments from a common source, points out a number of interesting
coincidences:—“Let a woman learn in quietness with all subjection.” (1 Tim.
ii. 11): “in order that it (the congregation) may be at
rest without disturbance, after it has been first proved in all subjection” (Apost. Can. ii);
“I permit not a woman to teach” (1 Tim. ii. 12): compare with the whole of
Apost. Can. viii., especially “How then can we, concerning women, order them services?” “The bishop must
therefore be without reproach, the husband of one wife, temperate, sober-minded,
orderly, given to hospitality, apt to teach, no brawler nor striker, but gentle,
not contentious, no lover of money . . . . moreover he must have good testimony
from them that are without” (1 Tim. iii. 2-7); “If he (the bishop) has a good
report among the heathen, if he is without reproach, if a friend of the poor,
if sober-minded, no drunkard, nor adulterer, not covetous nor a slanderer . . . it is good if he is unmarried;
if not, then the husband of one wife; educated . . . if unlearned, gentle” (Apost. Can. i.);
“Deacons, in like manner, must be grave, not double tongued, not given to much wine . . . and
let these also be first proved, then let them serve as deacons . . . let
the deacons be husbands of one wife, ruling their children and their own houses
well” (1 Tim. iii. 8, 9, 12); “The deacons shall be approved in every service
. . . husbands of one wife, educating their children, sober-minded . . .
not double-tongued . . . not using much wine” (Apost. Can. iv.); (of deacons)
“Not using much wine, not greedy of lucre” (1 Tim. iii. 8); (of widows)
“Not greedy of lucre, not using much wine” (Apos. Can. v.); “For they
that have served well as deacons gain to themselves a good
standing” (1 Tim. iii: 13); ‘For they who have served well as deacons
. . . purchase to themselves the pastorate” (Apost. Can. vi.); and so on.
It appears to me, however, that the interesting series of parallels affords
striking evidence that the statements in the Pastoral Epistles are much older
than those in the Sources of the Apostolic Canons. In the former it is women who are to be in subjection,
and the phrase corresponds to 1 Cor. xiv. 34; while in the
Sources of the Apostolic Canons
it is the congregation who are to be in subjection to the office-bearers: the leaders and the led of the Pauline Epistles have given place to the clergy
and the laity of a later period. Then in the Pastoral Epistles the deacons who
have served well gain to themselves “a good standing”; in the later document
they are promised clerical promotion, which is
a very different idea and suggests a much later period. Again in the former
document the senior office-bearers are to be faithful husbands (husbands
of one wife); in the latter it is said that it is better that they be not married,
which shows either a growth in ascetic sentiment or perhaps difficulties in
a fair distribution of the offerings of the congregation and the desire for
distributors who have no claims on themselves to influence their judgment, or
both of these conceptions. Compare Chronologie, pp. 483, 484.
The qualifications demanded of
deacons also practically consist of character tested by behaviour in the household—faithfulness
to wife, and evidence of parental control over children and wise dealing with
servants.1 Tim. iii. 8-10, 12, 13. It is also interesting to notice a ministry of women.
Presbyters or elders who rule well are to be honoured, and those
who in addition assist in the ministry of the Word are to be doubly honoured, or perhaps to receive a double honorarium
from the free-will offerings of the people. Elders who do not rule well are
to be looked after; but the apostle charges his deputy not to accept accusations
against them rashly, but to follow the old Jewish rule which required at least
two grave witnesses to any accusation affecting character. But if an elder,
or indeed any member of the congregation, did fall into sin, public rebuke was to be given without respect
of persons.1 Tim. v. 17-20. The apostle also insists that his deputy is to be very cautious
in admitting to Church Communion those who have lapsed. He is not “to lay hands
hastily,”1 Tim. v. 22. Compare Hort, The Christian Ecclesia, p. 175 ff.
according to the usual form in
restoration, “on any man, neither to be a partaker of other men’s sins.”
The picture
of the relief of the poor of the community is both vivid and homely. It brings
before our eyes not merely that far-off primitive Christian Church of Ephesus,
but also the present work of a Scottish country kirk-session. When the bread-winner
dies careful inquiries are to be made, whether the bereaved widow and orphans
have any means of support, or can receive any aid from their relations, who
are to be stirred up to do their duty to those who are left helpless. If the
children or grandchildren are able to work they are to be commanded to support
her who has been left a widow; but if such help fails, and if the widow is
too old to earn her own living and has always borne a good character, then she
is to be placed on the poor roll of the congregation and supported by the community.
According
to our view, these Pastoral Epistles are to be regarded as complementary to
the earlier Epistles of St. Paul, in so far as they give us information about
the organization of the Gentile Christian communities. The earlier epistles,
written to the various churches, reveal the principles of the growth of the
organization lying within the communities themselves; while the Pastoral Epistles,
written to guide the men who were to be the apostle’s deputies, and had to be
instructed in his methods,
show how he watched over the communities his preaching had gathered together. The apostle acted like a wise father, who
encourages every appearance of independent and responsible
action, but at the same time carefully guides it into the proper channels. From
one point of view it can be truly said that the churches of St. Paul’s mission
were thoroughly independent and acted on their own responsibilities; from another
the apostle or his deputies watched over and guided this activity. There was
control, but it was the control of the missionary, and partook largely of parental
monition and guidance.
If we combine what is given us in the earlier Epistles of St. Paul with what we find in the
Pastoral Epistles, we can discern
the principles of organization within the Pauline communities. According to the ideas of the
apostle, a Church of God was thoroughly organized when it found within its membership
a variety of persons endowed with various spiritual gifts producing activities
helpful to the whole community. That was the real basis of the common life,
the divine element without which all else was of little moment, and with which
everything else was a matter of executive detail. These gifts were divided into
two great classes, those which served for the ministry of the Word, and those
which were at the foundation of other kinds of ministry. It was from this second
class of “gifts” that the ministry of the local churches proceeded. Among
them we find two which crystallise into ecclesiastical office. St. Paul calls
them “wise counsels” and “helps”
(κυβερνήσεις and ἀντιλήψεις,
1 Cor. xii. 28); we may call them “oversight” and “subordinate service.”
Whatever may have been the original
principle of association, whatever
suggestions of social combination earliest
presented themselves to the minds of the primitive Christians in the Gentile
Christian communities, whatever the human bands that bound them together, these
two classes of officials were sure to emerge—the one fitted to guide and lead
the brethren and the other to render subordinate service.
Some time must have elapsed before
active services crystallised into offices, but it need not have been a long period.Compare the evidences of growth in organization collected by Gayford, Hastings’
Bible Dictionary, art. Church, i. 434. Things move fast
in young communities organizing themselves for the first time, and the spiritual
gift of discernment which belonged to the whole community was an instrument
of organization lying ready to hand. This gift of “discernment,” when applied
to teaching, implied that those who were really believed to be the mouthpiece
of the Holy Spirit were to be heard with reverence, and that the hearers ought
to fashion their lives according to what was taught. The same gift, when applied
to the discernment of abilities for rule and service, implied the
power to select and bestow office upon men so gifted, and the duty of the community
to obey its chosen leaders in all practical matters.
In young communities full of a fresh and active enthusiasm,
feeling that the possession of “gifts” of rule and help was the fulfilment
of the promise of the Master to be present with them, and that the “gift”
of discernment enabled them to select their leaders with something of divine
authority, activities helpful to the community would speedily become offices.
There is no reason to prevent us from believing that Stephanas and the others
whom the Corinthian Church are ordered to reverence were office-bearers in the
full sense of the word.Compare Schmiedel, Encyc. Bibl., art. Ministry, 3111 (d). Harnack and many others are disposed to deny this.
They argue that there is no trace of office-bearers properly so-called in St.
Paul’s writings composed before his Roman captivity, although they naturally
admit there must have been ministries from the very first, and that the ministries
took shape under the two conceptions of “oversight” and “subordinate service.”
It may be so, but the arguments do not convince me.Expositor (1887, Jan.-June), 328-31;
The arguments put shortly are:—St. Paul addresses his advice about discipline,
etc., to the whole community and not to special individuals who are in the position
of office-bearers; all the members of the Christian community are exhorted
to do what is enjoined upon the leaders (1 Thess. v. 14); the word
ἔργον (verse 12) shows that an office is not thought of;
while in Rom. xii. 6-8 presidency stands between “liberality” and “showing mercy,” and is described
as a “gift”! The same arguments, it appears to me, would exclude
the presence of office-bearers in the Didache and in the Epistle of Clement;
for there the exhortations to exercise discipline are addressed to the whole
community. The fact that the congregational meeting is the supreme judge does
not exclude the fact of office-bearers. Compare below pp. 171 ff. for the Didache and
176 n. for 1 Clement. If the
προϊστάμενοι of the Epistles to the Thessalonians and to the Romans were not office-bearers
they did the work of office-bearers. To assert that a period of fifty years
must have elapsed before the προϊστάμενοι
of the earlier epistles could become the official πρεσβύτεροι
of the Pastoral Epistles (which is practically
Loening’s contention), or that the development required eighty years (which Harnack requires), seems to me to be quite unwarrantable. As has been said before,
things move fast in young communities and, so far as the development in organization
goes, there is no reason whatever why the state of matters described in the
Pastoral Epistles should not have arrived at a comparatively early date.
It is quite in accordance with what has been said, that in all the New Testament
writings, and indeed in all the earlier books of discipline, the work done is
always thought more of than the persons selected to do it, and office-bearers
are honoured for their work’s sake rather than for their rank. The one thought
running through all the earlier documents is that the power to render special
service to the community—for rule and leadership according to primitive modes
of thought are always founded on “service” and never on “lordship”—depends on the possession
of “gifts” engrafted by the Spirit on individual character,
and the occasion of these particular services is their recognition by the community,
who appoint the brethren to serve it in ruling it. One of the chief services
which belonged to those who were placed at the head of the Christian communities
was to set an example to those under their charge, and what the leaders did
all the brethren in their several places were expected to do. Hence in the New
Testament writings, as well as in the earlier canons, the qualities which were
to determine the selection of men to be leaders were those qualities of stable
Christian character which all Christians ought to possess. The function of
the missionary or his deputy, as we can see from the Pastoral Epistles, was
to advise the community in their selection of those who were to be over them,
and to inculcate such principles of selection as would abide permanently in
their minds, and thus secure a succession of worthy office-bearers when the
first missionaries of the Gospel were no longer present to advise; or to use
the words of St. Clement of Rome: “Our apostles knew through our Lord Jesus
Christ that there would be strife over
the name (dignity) of the overseer’s office. For this cause, therefore,
having received complete foreknowledge, they appointed the
aforesaid persons (i.e. their first converts) and afterwards gave a further
injunction that if they should fall asleep, other approved
men should succeed to their administration”Clement, 1 Epist. xliv., 1; cf. xlii. 4; of. Sanday’s
The Conception of Priesthood (1898), pp. 70-2. The sentence in
Clement (1 Epist. xlii. 4) is:—“So preaching everywhere in town and in country, they appointed their
first-fruits (τὰς ἀπαρχὰς αὐτῶν) when they had proved them by the Spirit,
to be overseers and deacons unto them that should believe.”—a
description of what takes place now on every mission field of the whole Christian Church.
The earlier
Epistles of St. Paul show us, as has been said, that the services rendered to
the local churches by those whom the brethren are commanded to obey for their
works’ sake were of two kinds, which we have called “oversight” and “subordinate
service.” I think that we may presume that these were office-bearers, if not
from the beginning, at all events from a very early period; but we can at least
say that these two different kinds of service were rendered by the leaders to
the led. Later writings, both within and without the New Testament Canon, make
it plain that these services were rendered by two classes
of officials who bore official names, which still exist within the Christian Church.
We read of pastors, overseers, elders and deacons
(ποιμένες, ἐπίσκοποι, πρεσβύτεροι,
διάκονοι).Compare Lightfoot, Philippians (1881), 6th ed. pp. 95-9.; Loofs,
Theologische Studien and Kritiken (1890), 628-42; Schmiedel, Encyc.
Bibl.
pp. 3135-9; Loening, Die Gemeindeverfassung
des Urchristenthums (1889), pp. 58-63. Compare note
on ‘Presbyters’ and ‘Bishops’ at the and of the ohapter.
The references to the office-bearers
of the local churches are always in the plural, and the government must have
been collegiate. Whatever the special origin and primitive meanings of the first
three names, they appear to have denoted the same office, and the service they
gave was what the foremen or the προϊστάμενοι
of the Epistles to the Thessalonians
and to the Romans rendered to their respective communities. The terms “pastors”
(ποιμένες)
and “overseers” (επίσκοποι)
describe the kind of work done, and “elder” (πρεσβύτερος) was
the title of the office. This name naturally suggests a Jewish origin; for
among Jewish people we find “elders” from the earliest to the latest times.
The principles of social organization which were current among the Jews no doubt
insensibly moulded the earliest ecclesiastical organization in Palestine; and
when we find “elders” in charge of the community in Jerusalem, ready to receive
the contributions for the relief of those who were suffering from the famine
which overtook them in the reign of Claudius,Acts xi. 30. it is impossible to doubt that
the name came from their Jewish surroundings. At the same time it must always
be remembered that Christian “elders” had functions entirely different from
the Jewish, that the vitality of the infant Christian Communities made them
work out for themselves that organization which they found to be most suitable,
and that in this case nothing but the name was borrowed.It ought to be remembered that the organization which prevailed among the Judaising Christians, who refused
all fraternal intercourse with the Gentile believers, was on the strict Jewish
lines and was quite different from the Christian. Epiphanius tells us
(Heresies, xxx. 18) that their congregations were presided over by archons and an archisynagogos
like the Jewish synagogues of the Dispersion. Compare pp. 130-131. The respect which
St. Paul always inculcated toward the mother Church in Jerusalem and the reception
among the primitive Christian congregations of converts from Jewish synagogues,
can easily account for the presence of the name within Gentile Christian churches.
This does not mean that every Christian congregation had presbyters designedly
copied from the Jewish synagogue. The largest number probably copied their neighbours
when they came to make use of the word in a technical fashion. The constant
intercommunication between Christian communities which was such a feature of
primitive Christianity that the keen-sighted Lucian recognized it as their special
possession,Lucian, De Mode Peregrini, 12, 41. promoted
the gradual assimilation of constitution even when the beginnings were of different
origins. But it is not necessary to suppose that the Gentile Christian communities
took the word from Judaism. The term was common enough to denote rulers in the
Graeco-Roman civilization;Deissmann, Bible Studies, Eng. Trans. pp. 154 ff. and 233 ff. Deissmann shows that the term
πρεσβύτερος was common for the rulers of a a corporation in Asia Minor, and it must have
been familiar to the inhabitants of those towns which furnished the Christian communities among which
St. Paul saw elders chosen on his return mission journey through Derbe, Iconium and Lystra (Acts xiv. 23).
One of the most interesting series of facts which Deissmann has unearthed is that the term “elder”
was a religious official name in Egypt, and that the affairs of the whole Egyptian priesthood in the times
of the Ptolemies were conducted by an assembly whose members (twenty-five in number) were called
πρεσβύτεροι. Milton had very old
authority for his saying that “new presbyter is but old priest writ large.” and the frequent and familiar use of the word
to denote a ruling body in the ordinary social life around them, if it did not
altogether suggest the use, must have at least facilitated it and ensured its
spread. Besides, we must remember that the word “elder,” in the sense of ruler,
is one of the commonest expressions among all nations. The English have their
aldermen and the Romans had their senators, as Dr. Lightfoot has reminded us.Commentary on the Epistle to the Philippians (1881), 6th ed. p. 96.
We may add to this the well-known fact that in young Christian communities recently
won from paganism the word elder is applied naturally to those who have been earliest brought to
believe in Christ, and that the first office-bearers, or those to whom obedience
is due, are usually taken from the first converts, like Stephanas in the Corinthian
Church.
All this shows us that during the last decades of the first
century each Christian congregation had for its office-bearers a body of deacons
and a body of elders—whether separated into two colleges or forming one must
remain unknown—and that the elders took the “oversight” while the deacons
performed the “subordinate services.” These constituted the
local ministry of each Christian church or congregation—for
these terms were then equivalent. These men watched over the lives and behaviour
of the members of the community; they looked after the poor, the infirm, and
the strangers; and in the absence of members of the prophetic ministry they
presided over the public worship, especially over the Holy Supper.While everything goes to show that In primitive times the function of teaching was not confined to the office-bearers or rulers it
is difficult to believe that leadership and teaching were not frequently associated. The “prophetic” gift was so highly
prized that it was only natural that men possessing it in combination with the “gift” of oversight should
be selected. The use of the phrase “to shepherd” in connexion with the leaders of the Christian community as in
1 Peter v. 2 (ποιμάνατε τὸ ἐν
ὑμῖν ποίμνιον τοῦ Θεοῦ) appears to include more than simple oversight, and the word “admonish,” applied to
the προϊστάμενοι in Thessalonica, seems to
point to something more than mere leadership in the very early times.
Before the close of the first century the labours of apostles (and under this
name a large number of wandering missionaries must be included) had given birth
to thousands of these local churches. They were all strictly independent self-governing
communities—tiny islands in the sea of surrounding paganism—each ruled by its
session or senate of elders. There is no trace of one man, one pastor, at the
head of any community. The ruling body was a senate without a president, a kirk-session
without a moderator; and if its members did not themselves possess the “prophetic
gift,” their authority, however defined, had continually to bend before that
of the “prophets” and “teachers,” to whom they had to give place in exhortation
and even in presiding at the Lord’s Table. The organization of the Primitive
Christian Church in the last decades of the first century without one president
in the community, and with the anomalous prophetic ministry, has no resemblance
to any modern ecclesiastical organization, and yet contains within it the roots
of all whether congregational, presbyterian (conciliar) or episcopal.
It must not be forgotten that while each Christian community
was a little self-governed republic,
the visible unity of the corporate Church of Christ was never forgotten. Although
each local church was an independent society, although it was not
connected with other Christian communities
by any organization of a political kind, it was nevertheless conscious
that it belonged to a world-wide federation
of equally independent churches. Its self-containedness did not produce
isolation. On the contrary, every local church felt itself to be a real part
of the universal and visible Church of God to which many hundreds of similar
societies belonged. “All the churches of Christ,” said Tertullian, “although
they are so many and so great, comprise but one primitive Church . . . and are
all proved to be one in unbroken unity by the
communicatio pacis, et appellatio fraternitatis et contesseratio hospitalitatis.”De Praescript. 20.
They kept the conception of this unity alive in their hearts by the thought that all shared the same
sacraments, were taught the same divine mysteries, obeyed the same commandments
of God, and shared the same hope of the same kingdom. They made this corporate
unity apparent by mutual help in all Christian social work, and by boundless
and brotherly hospitality to all fellow-Christians. The picture of this corporate
unity was always before their eyes in the fraternal intercourse of church with
church by official letters and messengers, and was made vivid by the swift succession
of wandering “apostles,” “prophets” and “teachers,”
who, belonging to no one community, were the ministers of the whole Church of
Christ—the binding-stones which made it visibly cohere.
The view taken about presbyters
or elders at the close of the preceding chapter was for a long time undisputed
by all serious students of the conditions of the primitive Church. It may be
found stated at length in the late Dr. Lightfoot’s Note on “The synonymes `
‘bishop’ and ‘presbyter,’” in his Commentary on the
Epistle to the Philippians.Pp. 95-9 of the 6th ed. (1881). It has
been disputed by such distinguished scholars as Harnack, Sohm and Weizsacker,
and their divergence from the opinion which was previously held with great
unanimity arose after and in consequence of the publication of the late Dr.
Hatch’s Bampton Lectures in 1881.
The theory about early ecclesiastical
organization which embodies this change of view as to the relation between the
“presbyters” and “deacons,” will be discussed in an Appendix. The matter
which concerns us here is whether “presbyters “
were church officials, chosen and appointed as such, in the Church
of the first century, and identical with “bishops,” or whether Harnack is right
when he says that “We meet with chosen or appointed presbyters for the first
time in the second century. The oldest witnesses for them are the
Epistle of James, the Acts of the Apostles, the Pastoral Epistles, the Original Document
of the so-called Apostolic Ordinances, and the Shepherd of Hermas.”Expositor for 1887. Jan.-June, p. 334. In a footnote Harnack says, “It seems to me very improbable
that the Acts of the Apostles was written during the first century.”
Harnack’s opinion, if I do not
mistake him, is, when put briefly, as follows. He believes that in the last
decades of the first century there was at the head of each Christian congregation
what may be called a three-fold organization—a prophetic,
a patriarchal and an administrative one. The patriarchal rule was based upon
the natural deference of the younger to the older members of the community,
and the circle of elders, in all emergencies which affected the congregation,
could come forward as their guides; these elders watched over the conduct and
the evangelical character of the members, and admonished, punished and exhorted
the congregation. The elders were the natural heads of the community, the aged
members who were revered on account of age and character, but were not elected
or appointed officials. The real officials, who formed the administration,
were the bishops and the deacons—men who possessed the “gifts” of government
and of public service. They were appointed primarily to preside at public worship.
Originally there was no
distinction between the bishops and the deacons
save what came from age and experience, but their work naturally fell into two
divisions, in which the oversight belonged to the bishops and the subordinate
services were performed by the deacons. The bishops, in consequence of their
position as the officials appointed to conduct public worship, became naturally
the custodians and administrators of the property of the congregation, the
distributors of the gifts of the faithful, the recognized guardians of the poor,
the sick, the infirm and strangers, and the representatives of the society to
people outside.
Harnack, therefore, holds that presbyters and bishops were distinct from the first. He
believes, besides, that while a circle of elders, in the sense of “honoured” old men, existed from the most primitive times, there were no elected or chosen
elders forming a college of office-bearers till the second century; but he
thinks that the bishops were usually selected from the circle of honoured old
men, were sometimes called “elders,” and were invariably classed among them.
In reaching this conclusion he rejects as unhistorical the statement in Acts xiv. 23, which tells us that the apostles, Paul and Barnabas, saw to the appointment
of elders in the churches, which they had formed in Derbe, Lystra and Iconium; he believes that the “elders”
of Acts xx. 17 were bishops; he concludes
that the “elders” of 1 Peter v. 1 ff. were not office-bearers; he rejects,
as an interpolation, the verses in Titus i. 7-9,Compare Otto Ritschl in the Theologische Literatur-Zeitung for 1885, No. 25. which practically
assert the identity of bishops and presbyters; and he finds a complete justification
of his views in the statements about presbyters and bishops in the Epistle of
Clement to the Corinthians.
Let us accept, for the sake of argument, the critical conclusion of Harnack about the dates
of documentsIt is important to bear in mind the dates
which Harnack assigns to the various documents he deals with. The following
are taken from his Chronologie der altchristlichen Literatur bis Eusebius (1897):—1 Peter
was probably written, he thinks, some time between the years 83 and 93
A.D., but it may have been written one or two decades earlier, which gives at
the extreme limits of time 63-93 A.D. (pp. 454, 718). I Clement he dates about 93-95 but perhaps as late
as 97 A.D. (pp. 255, 718). The dates
he gives for the writings which he says are
the first witnesses for presbyters are:—The Epistle of James about 120-140 (pp. 491, 719); the Pastoral Epistles, or at
least those verses in them which are in question about 130 A.D.
(p. 483); the original document of the so-called
Apostolic Ordinances, about 140-180. Harnack classes the Acts of the Apostles
among this set of documents in the Expositor (1887, Jan.-June), p. 334, and says that the book belongs to the second century.
But in his Chronologie which was published ten years later, he says that the
Acts of the Apostles was written some time between 80-93 A.D.
(pp. 250, 718). There may not be much difference between the year 93
A.D. and the second century; but
the change of date lifts the Acts of the Apostles out from the other writings
named along with it in the Expositor, and places it as early as the Epistle of Clement to the Corinthians and perhaps
as early as the Epistle of Peter. and the interpolations which may have come into texts,
and then see what emerges from an examination of the authorities in which presbyters
and bishops are mentioned.
The Epistle of Clement to the Corinthians is the best starting point, for there is practical
unanimity among scholars of all schools that this document belongs to about
the middle of the last decade of the first century. The letter was sent from
the Roman Church to remonstrate with the Corinthian Christians
about the dismissal of the leaders of the Church there from their office. We find three
names given to these men—ἡγούμενοι, ἐπίσκοποι,
πρεσβύτεροι.ἡγούμενος and προηγούμενος,
I. i. 3; xxi. 6. ἐπίσκοποι, I. xlii. 4, 5. πρεσβύτερος,
I. i. 3; iii. 3; xxi. 6; xliv. 5; xlvii. 6; 1v. 4; liv. 2; lvii. 1.
Harnack’s contention is that πρεσβύτεροι invariably
denote the members of the circle of revered old men in the community, and that
when the term is used to denote office-bearers,I. xliv. 5; xlvii. 6; liv. 2; lvii. 1. they are so called because
they were always members of that circle. On the other hand, Light-foot,Lightfoot, Commentary on the Epistle to the Philippians (1881), 6th ed. p. 95 ff.; Loening,
Die Gemeindeverfassung des Urchristenthums (1889), p. 58 ff.; Loofs, Studien and Kritiken
(1890), pp. 628 ff.; Sehmiedel, Encyclopaedia Biblica (1902) p. 3134 if. If we apply the well-recognized critical principle that the statement
that there were “elders” in Derbe, Lystra and the neighbourhood when the book
which describes them was written, this change of date gives us “elected”
elders before the close of the first century. in
the past, and Loening, Loofs and Schmiedel in the present, declare that πρεσβύτερος
is the technical name for the office, while ἐπίσποκος
describes what was done (having ἐπισκοπή or oversight), or at all events that
πρεσβύτερος
and ἐπίσκοπος
are synonymous terms for the same officials.
One thing
to begin with is significant. Three men were sent from Rome to Corinth with
the letter, Valerius Bito, Claudius Ephebus and Fortunatus, “men that have
walked among us,” says the writer, “from youth to old age unblameably.” They
belonged, therefore, to that class whom Harnack supposes to have been generally
called “presbyters,” and if his theory were correct we should expect them to
be so designated in an official letter, but they are not.
In the Church
in Corinth some men had been thrust from office, and the office is always referred
to as ἐπισκοπήI. xliv. 1, 4.
This is what is said: “For it will be no light sin for us, if we have thrust out
of the oversight (ἐπισκοπή) those
who have offered the gifts (i.e. the prayers of the congregation) unblameably
and holily. Blessed are those presbyters who
have gone before, seeing that their departure was fruitful and ripe, for they
have no fear lest any one should remove them from their appointed place. For
we see that ye have displaced certain persons though they were living honourably,
from the ministration (λειτουργία) which
they had kept blamelessly.”I. xliv. 4-6. Everything implies that the men who had been
thrust out from their ἐπισκοπή were called presbyters.
This inference is strengthened by what follows: “It is shameful . . . that it should
be reported that the very steadfast and ancient Church of the Corinthians,
for the sake of one or two persons, maketh sedition against its presbyters.”I. xlvii. 6.
“Only let the flock of Christ be at peace with its duly appointed presbyters.”I. liv. 2.
“Ye therefore that laid the foundation of the sedition, submit yourselves unto the presbyters.”lvii. 1.
The only sentence in the epistle which lends itself to the theory of Harnack is: “Let us reverence our rulers
(προηγούμενοι), let us honour our elders (πρεσβύτεροι),
let us instruct our young men in the lesson of the fear of God; let us guide our
women toward that which is good”;xxi. 6. where ‘elders’ evidently mean old men.
Sshmiedel’s remark on the rhetorical effect of substituting “elders”
(πρεσβύτεροι) for “old men” (πρεσβῦται)
is a sound explanation of the use of the words.“In iii. 3 allusion is made to the deposition of certain Church leaders, but in dependence
on Isaiah iii. 5, where of old age it is said: “the child will press against
the old man,” Clement can very well have preserved this meaning in his words “the young are
stirred up against the elder,” as he has
also retained the other general antithesis from Isaiah: “the base again the
honourable.” Yet the selection of the word “elders” (πρεσβύτεροι)
instead of “old men” (πρεσβῦται) points to the fact, only too well known to the readers,
that it was against official presbyters that the rising was. “Elders” (πρεσβύτεροι)
in this case has a double meaning which rhetorically is very effective; and so
also young men. For since according to xlvii. 6 only one or two persons had
given occasion to the offence, it is possible that these were young persons, but
at the same time also that they stood in the position of laymen towards the
presbytery in so far as these were official persons.” Encyclopaedia Biblica, p. 3135.
It appears to me that the Epistle of Clement, on which
Harnack so firmly relies to establish his conclusion that “elders”
had no official position until the second century, fails him utterly, and
that his own earlier position is much more in accordance with the facts of the
case. In his edition of the Epistles of Clement, published in 1875, Harnack said, commenting on the words
episcopi et diaconi (xlii. 5): “Luce clarius est, duo in clero ordines tum temporis (i.e. in the time of
the apostles) fuisse, episcopos (= presbyteros) et diaconos.”Patrum apostol. opera, I. p. 132 n. (p. 68, n. 4, in ed. of 1876). This
seems still to hold good.
When we turn to 1 Peter (v. 1, 2) we find there that, even if we discard the disputed reading
“exercising the oversight” (ἐπισκοποῦντες), the
elders are told to “shepherd the flock of God which is among you.” There is
no word in the whole round of primitive ecclesiastical phraseology which is
more frequently used to express the relation of office-bearers than “to shepherd” (ποιμαίνειν);
and the difference between “shepherds” and “flock” is much greater than between
the more aged and the younger members of the society.Loofs says that he is so convinced that the presbyters of 1 Peter v. 1 are office-bearers,
that if the argument needed it (which it does not) he would rather believe with
Mosheim and others that the νεώτεροι were deacons; Studien and Kritiken (1890),
p. 638. Schmiedel, who takes the same view, asserts that the fact that the presbyters
have to be warned against “discontent with their office, greed and ambition” points against the early date of the epistle
(Encyclopaedia Biblica, p. 3134); he would not have said this had he known much about Churches in the mission field; the
pregnant remark of Denney (Hastings’ Dictionary of the Bible, iii. 82 b), that
tendencies to antinomianism seem inseparable from every revival of religion,
religion transcending even while it guarantees morality, ought to be kept more
in mind than it is by students of early Church history.
In Acts xx. 17, St. Paul summoned the presbyters (τοὺς πρεσβοτέρους) of the Church
of Ephesus to meet him at Miletus; he charged them to “shepherd the Church of God”; he called the Church a “flock”
(ποίμνιον); and he said that the Holy Spirit had made them overseers
(ἐπισκόπους) in this
flock. Whatever be the date or authorship of the book the fact remains that the author did believe that the presbyters
(not some of them) were the “overseers” and the “shepherds” of the Church
in Ephesus. They were the office-bearers there and were called both presbyters
and overseers or bishops.
These statements carry us a long way. They prove to us that before the close of the first century
bodies of presbyters existed as ruling colleges in Christian congregations over
a great part of the Roman Empire. The Epistle of Clement proves this
for the Roman Church. The First Epistle of Peter proves it for Pontus, Galatia,
Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia.1 Peter i. 1. The Apocalypse confirms the proof for Ephesus,
Smyrna, Pergamus, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia and Laodicea.Rev. iv. 4, 10; v. 5, 6, 8, etc. The Acts of
the Apostles adds its confirmation for Ephesus and Jerusalem.Acts xx. 17, 28 (Ephesus); xi. 30;
xv. 4, 6, 22; xvi. 4;
xxi. 18; (Jerusalem). The writings
all imply that the colleges of presbyters at the head of congregations were
no new institution. They had evidently existed for a long time. It will be observed
that the places include the sphere of the mission-journey of Paul and Barnabas.
They seem to me to confirm what the Acts of the Apostles tell us of the institution
of presbyters by the apostles.Acts xiv. 23. All this has been reached on the dates of the writings as given by advanced critics.
The proofs for the identity of the offices of elders and bishops in the Church of the first
century have often been collected. They may be arranged thus: (1) Acts xx. 17; St. Paul sent for
the elders of Ephesus, and in his address to them said that “the Holy Spirit had made
them bishops; (2) in 1 Peter v. 1, 2, elders are told to act as pastors and as bishops
(πρεσβύτεροι . . . ποιμάνατε . . . ἐπισκοποῦντες);
(3) in 1 Clement it is made clear that at Rome presbyters or elders and bishops are the same officials;
(4) in 1 Timothy a description of bishops is given (iii. 1-7), then follows
what is required of deacons (iii. 8-13);
in v. 17-19 the former ministers are alluded to as presbyters; (5) in
Titus i. 5-7 we find that “thou shouldest set in order the things that were wanting,
and appoint elders in every city . . . for the bishop must be.”; (6) in the Peshito Syriac Version of the New Testament
ἐπίσκοπος is usually
translated by kashisho—elder or presbyter; (7) the opinion of the ancient
Church, founding on these passages, and voiced by Jerome, unhesitatingly declared
that in the apostolic age elders and bishops were the same; and this idea may
almost be said to have prevailed throughout the Middle Ages down to the Council of Trent.Compare Lightfoot, Commentary on the Epistle to the Philippians (1881), 6th ed. 95-9; Loofs,
Studien and Kritiken (1890), 639-41; Lightfoot gives quotations from Jerome, but omits some of his strongest
sayings; it may be useful to quote at greater length from his
Commentary on Titus, i. 7:—Idem est ergo presbyter, qui episcopus; et antequam diaboli instinctu studia in
religione fierent, et diceretur in populis: ego sum Pauli, ego Apollo, ego
autem Cephae, communi presbyterorum consilio ecclesiae gubernabantur. Postquam
vero unusquisque eos, quos baptizaverat, suos putabat esse, non Christi; in
toto orbe decretum est, ut unus de presbyteris electus superponeretur caeteris,
ad quem omnis ecclesiae cura pertineret, et schismatum semina tollerentur. Putat
aliquis non scripturarum, sed nostram esse sententiam, episcopum et presbyterum
unum esse, et aliud aetatis, aliud ease nomen officii; relegat apostoli ad
Philippenses verba, dicentis (then follow the passages quoted above in the text)
. . . Haec propterea, ut ostenderemus, apud veteres eosdem fuisse presbyteros,
quos et episcopos; paulatim vero ut dissensionum plantaria evellerentur, ad
unum omnem sollicitudinem esse delatam. Sicut ergo presbyteri sciunt, se ex
ecclesiae consuetudine ei, qui sibi praepositus fuerit, esse subjectos; ita
episcopi noverint se magis consuetudine, quam dispositionis dominicae veritate,
presbyteris esse majores, et in commune debere ecclesiam regere.” Gieseler in his
Compendium of Ecclesiastical History, i. pp. 88-90, n. 1, collects a large number of authorities to show that this opinion
of Jerome was held throughout the Mediaeval Church until the time of the Council
of Trent. He concludes by saying “Since the Tridentine Council, the
institutio divina of episcopacy and its original difference from the presbyterate became the general
doctrine of the Roman Catholic Church, which the English Episcopalians
also followed in this particular, while the other Protestant Churches
returned to the most ancient doctrine and regulation on the subject.”
The word episcopus had a long and varied history before it was used in connexion with
the Christian Church. Hatch has
tried in a very interesting but not quite conclusive manner to show that episcopi were
officers of administration and finance;Bampton Lectures (1881), pp: 36-46. Lightfoot has shown that the Attic bishop
was the commissioner appointed to inspect a newly acquired province, and that the word was used in
a similar way outside the sphere of Athenian influence. In the Septuagint episcopus means
an official set to oversee work, a military officer, a commissioner to carry
out the orders of the king.Commentary on the Epistle to the Philippians, pp. 95, 96. But while all these parallels are interesting
much may be said for the more commonplace idea that the word episcopus means simply one who has an
episcope, one who has oversight or superintendence. If so the word is not, during the first
century, the technical term for an office-bearer; it is rather the word which
describes what the office-bearer, i.e. the elder, does. The elder was the episcopus,
overseer or superintendent, while the deacon rendered the subordinate services.
The office connected itself therefore with the κυβερνήσεις,
while deacon was related to the ἀντιλήψεις of
1 Cor. xii. 28.Compare for example the suggestive phrase in Hermas: ἐπισκέπτεσθε ἀλλήλους καὶ
ἀντιλαμβάνεσθε ἀλλήλων (Vis. iii. 9).
The use of the words in the earliest Christian literature seems to bear out
this idea,The word ἐπίσκοπος is used of Christ in 1 Peter ii. 25
and of God in 1 Clem. lix. 3. The word ἐπισκοπὴ is used of the providence of God in
Luke xix. 44 and in 1 Pet. ii. 12. In 1 Clement
ἐπισκοπὴ, in the sense of exercising oversight, is a much more prominent
thought than ἐπίσκοπος. The author speaks of
ὄνομα ἐπισκοπῆς,
λειτουργία ἐπισκοπῆς,
δῶρα ἐπισκοπῆς not
ἐπισκόπων; Hermas of
ἐπίσκοποι . . . ἐπισκοπήσαντες ἁγνῶς.
Loofs has collected a number of similar phrases from later authorities in Studien und Kritiken (1890), p. 629,
showing that there are traces of this way of regarding ἐπίσκοπος
as late as the end of the second century. Then in Titus i. 7 the article is
prefixed (τὸν ἐπίσκοπον) to denote that a type is spoken of: cf. Lightfoot,
Commentary on the Epistle to the Philippians, p. 97, n. 1. This leads to the conclusion in the end of the preceding chapter
that elder is the name for the office, while bishop is the title describing
what the elder has to do. It can claim the support of Professor Sanday of Oxford and of Professor
Loofs of Halle.After declaring that he does not regard ἐπίσκοπος
any more than ποιμὴν or ἡγούμενος
as a technical term denoting an office, Loofs goes on to say:—“Mir scheint in der vorschnellen Annahme,
ἐπίσκοπος sei frühe Amtsname, Titel gewesen, ein
πρῶτον ψεῦδος vieler neuerer Konstructionen zu liegen; die
ältere Anschauung halte ich durchaus
nicht für veraltet; ἐπίσκοπος ist
eine Funktionsbezeichnung and bis ins endende zweite Jahrhundert hinein gehen die
Spuren davon, dass man ein Bewusstsein davon hat, dass
ἐπίσκοπος weniger Amtsname als Amtsbeschreibung ist.” Studien und Kritiken
(1890), p: 628. Compare Professor Sanday, The Conception of Priesthood, pp. 61-62. Dr. Loofs asserts that in his opinion the idea that ἐπίσκοπος
is the name of an office, and not the term describing the work done by the official, is
the πρῶτον ψεῦδος of many of the
modern attempts to investigate and describe primitive ecclesiastical organization.
CHAPTER V
THE MINISTRY IN THE SECOND CENTURY
During the first century we can see the
local churches creating their ministry. The same independence marks their action
in the second century. They can be seen changing the ministry they have inherited.
The beginnings of the change date from the early decades of the second century;
by the end of the century it was almost complete. The change was two-fold, and concerned
both the prophetic and the local ministry. Stated in the briefest manner it may
be described thus: the “prophetic” ministry passed away, its functions being appropriated
by the permanent office-bearers of the local churches; and every local church came
to supplement its organization by placing one man at the head of the community,
making him the president of the college of elders. The one part of the change which
came about in the second century, that which gave the senate of the congregation
its president, was simple, natural and salutary; it came about gradually and at
different times in the various portions of the Empire; it was effected peacefully,
and we hear of no disturbances in consequence.Ritschl’s idea that the dissensions
in the Church in Rome witnessed to in the Pastor of Hermas arose from the attempt
to force on this change finds little acceptance. Compare Ritschl, Die Entstehung
der altkatholischen Kirche (1857), pp. 403, 535. The other change, which
meant the overthrow of the “prophetic” ministry of the apostolic and immediately
subsequent period, was a revolution, provoked a widespread revolt and rent the Church
in twain.
To understand the change in the ministry of the local churches
it is to be kept in mind that at the close of the first century every local church
had at its head a college or senate or session of rulers, who were called by the
technical name of elders, and were also known by names which indicated the kind
of work they had to do—pastors, overseers (ἐπίσκοποι).
This was the ministry of oversight. To each congregation there was also attached
a body of men who rendered “subordinate service,” and who were called deacons—but
whether they formed part of the college of elders, or were formed into a separate
college of their own, it is not easy to say. The change made consisted in placing
at the head of this college of rulers one man, who was commonly called either the
pastor or the bishop, the latter name being the more usual, and apparently the technical
designation. The ministry of each congregation or local church instead of being,
as it had been, two-fold—of elders and deacons—became three-fold—of pastor or bishop,
elders and deacons. This was the introduction of what is called the three-fold ministry.
It is commonly called the beginning of episcopacy; but that idea is based on the
erroneous conception that a three-fold ministry and episcopacy are identical.The
Presbyterian or Conciliar system of Church government is as much a three-fold ministry
as episcopacy.
In order to show what the change was and what it meant, three
relics of the oldest Christian literature may be taken, the Didache or the
Teaching of the Twelve Apostles, certain fragments which are sources of the
Apostolic Canons, and the Letters of Ignatius of Antioch. Authorities differ
about the dates of these documents, but it may be taken as well ascertained that
they all belonged to the years between 100 and 180 A.D.My own opinion inclines
to the following dates: The Epistles of Ignatius, about 116
A.D.; the Didache, not earlier than
135 A.D.; the Sources of the Apostolic
Canons, between 140-180 A.D. Compare
note on next page.
In the first mentioned we find the Christian society ruled by
a college of office-bearers who are called “overseers and
deacons”; in the second we see one bishop or pastor (the terms are
synonymous in the document), a session of elders and a body of deacons, but the
elders rule over the bishop as they rule the congregation, and the bishop is not
their president; in the third we have the three-fold ministry of bishop, elders
and deacons constituting a governing bodyIn the Ignatian Epistles the bishop,
elders and deacons are named together twelve times: Magn. ii. vi., xiii.;
Trall. vii.; Philad. pref., iv., vii.; Smyrn. viii., xii.;
Polyc. vi.; Trall. ii.; Philad. x.; and, in the first ten at
least, the three classes of office-bearers form an inseparable unity. at
the head of the congregation or local church.
The Didache or Teaching of the Twelve ApostlesThe manuscript of the Didache was discovered in 1873 in the
library of the monastery of the Holy Sepulchre in the Phanar or Greek quarter of
Constantinople by Philotheus Bryennios, Patriarch of Nicomedia. It was published
by him in 1883. It is now known by numerous editions. Of these by far the best comes
from the pen of Professor Harnack of Berlin, and it is to that edition that the
references in the notes here are made. It is difficult to say what country gave
birth to this manual. The external evidence is all in favour of Egypt; and Harnack
and Lightfoot conclude that it came from that land. The only evidence worth mentioning
which seems to invalidate this conclusion is the sentence in the eucharistic prayer:—“Just
as this broken bread was scattered over the hills and having been gathered
together became one, so let Thy Church be gathered together from the ends of the
earth into Thy kingdom”—words which cannot refer to Egypt but which might appropriately
describe the corn of the Lebanon or the regions beyond the Jordan. But there is
no reason why the eucharistic prayer might not come from Palestine and be received
into the Churches of Egypt. The external evidence proves the use and the knowledge
of the manual in Egypt, and the internal, with the exception of the sentence quoted,
confirms the idea. A few Anglican scholars have done their best to minimise the
value of the book and its evidence. A good example of this depreciation is to be
found in Bishop Gore’s The Ministry of the Christian Church (1893), 3rd ed., App.
L. p. 410. It is very difficult to determine the date. The Didache quotes the
Epistle of Barnabas and is quoted by Clement of Alexandria, and the date assigned is practically
determined by the date fixed for the Epistle of Barnabas. The probable date of this
epistle depends on whether the events referred to in the sixteenth section describe
the condition of things in the time of Domitian or of Hadrian. Personally I am inclined
to think that the references in the Epistle of Barnabas are to the later period.
If this be the case it is scarcely possible to place the Didache earlier than 135
A.D., i.e.
later than the Ignatian letters. The majority of scholars
place it very much earlier. The commonest date is about 100 A.D.—Wordsworth,
Hitchcock and Brown, Spence, Bonwetsch, Massebieau; a few place it earlier—Funk
and Loening, between 80 and 100 A.D.. Zahn dates it 80-120 and more exactly
about 110 A.D.; Bryennios, its first editor, gives 120-130, and Harnack 130-160
A.D. as the probable date. Hilgenfeld, who finds traces of Montanism in the
writing, places it later than 160. For our purposes an exact determination of
date is unnecessary; all that we have to deal with is that the Didache describes
the condition of a Christian organization some time between the Epistles of S. Paul and the third century. is a short
Christian manual, of composite character, containing rules
for the conduct of individual men and women, and regulations for the guidance
of small Christian communities, hundreds of which must have been scattered over
the wide face of the Roman Empire in the second century. The sixteen paragraphs
of this little manual are well-arranged when compared with most manuals of the
same kind. The first six contain simple directions for living the Christian
life, based upon the Beatitudes of our Lord and the Ten Commandments. They seem
to have formed the instruction administered to catechumens before baptism. Then
follow directions about baptism, fasting and prayer and the Eucharist. Three
sections are devoted to injunctions which concern the “prophetic ministry.”
Then follow instructions about the Lord’s Day services, and the selection of
office-bearers. The whole concludes with a warning about the last days.
Tertullian has said: “We Christians are one body knit together
by a common religious profession, by a unity of discipline and by the bond
of a common hope.”Apology 39; elsewhere (De Praescrip. 20) he speaks of the
contesseratio hospitalitatis which linked all Christians together. This little manual reads like a commentary on the saying.
Every wayfaring stranger seeking food and lodging was to be received and fed
if he came with a profession of the Christian faith. The letter of commendation
which was in use among the Jews and to which St. Paul refers, was not required
to ensure a hospitable
receptionCompare 2 Cor. iii. 1. These commendatory letters became the rule at a later
period in the Christian Church. Compare Smith’s Dictionary of Christian Antiquities, I. 407. for one night at least. It was better to be imposed upon sometimes than to
miss the chance of entertaining a brother Christian. But this hospitality was
not to be without discrimination. “Let every one coming in the name of the
Lord be received, but afterwards ye shall test him and know the true from the
false; for ye shall have insight. If he cometh as a traveller, help him as much
as you can; but he shall not remain with you unless for two or three days if
it be necessary. If he will take up his abode with you and is an artizan, let
him work and so eat; but if he has no trade provide employment for him, that
no idler live with you as a Christian. But if he will not act according to this
he is a Christ-trafficker; beware of such.”Chapter xii. The brotherly love of these early
Christians was a real and practical thing which no experience of imposition
seems to have damped. Their simple rules are witness to the fact that they were
sometimes imposed upon, and Lucian’s account of the impostor Peregrinus, shows
how a heathen could see that their charity was often abused.Peregrinus Proteus, 13.
One does not naturally
expect to find an elaborate ecclesiastical organization among these simple
folk, and there are no traces of it. The Didache reveals a state of matters
not unlike what we see in the Epistles of St. Paul. The control in all things
evidently rested with the community met in congregational meeting. It is to
the community as a whole that all the directions are addressed. It receives,
tests, finds work for or sends away the travelling strangers who ask assistance
or hospitality. It discharges all these duties of Christian benevolence which
we find elsewhere laid upon the president.In Justin Martyr’s Apology it is the president
(προεστὼς) who succours strangers and travellers:
Apology, i. 67. It is the community, in congregational
meeting, which tests and receives or rejects the members of the “prophetic
ministry” when
they appear. The injunctions about
baptism, fasting, prayers, are all given to the whole community,“Now concerning
baptism, thus baptize ye : having first uttered all these things (i.e. the instructions
given in cc. i.-vi.), baptize into the name of the Father and of the Son
and of the Holy Ghost in living (running) water. But if thou hast not living,
baptize in other water: and if thou canst not in cold then in warm. But if thou
hast neither, pour water thrice upon the head unto the name of the Father, the
Son and the Holy Ghost. But before the baptism let the baptizer and the baptized
fast and whatever others can; but the baptized thou shalt command to fast for
one or two days before,” c. vii. and not to
the office-bearers; and yet office-bearers did exist among them whom the community
are required to elect and to honour.
The manual bears evidence to the value of the “prophetic
ministry.” Its members are to be honoured in a very special fashion. If a prophet
is present he is to preside at the Lord’s Table, and his prayers are to follow
his heart’s promptings;“But permit the prophets to give thanks
as much as they will,” x. 7. if no prophet was present, one of the office-bearers
presided; but he had to use a fixed form of prayer. The duty of obeying the
members of the “prophetic ministry” who speak the Word of the Lord is laid
down in the most solemn manner. Prophets and teachers who happen to be residing
within the community are to be supported by the members; the first fruits are
to be set aside for them; and in this respect they are like the high priests
of the Old Testament.“Every first fruit . . . thou shalt take and give to the
prophets; for they are your high-priests,” xiii. 3.
The figures of these prophets, true and false, which are somewhat
shadowy in the New Testament, take definite shape in this ancient church directory.
We see the stir in the community when the prophet arrives. The women hasten
to set apart the first baking of bread, the first cup of the newly opened wine-skin
or jar of oil, the first yard or two of the newly spun cloth“Every first
fruit then of the produce of the wine-press and of the threshing-floor, of oxen
and of sheep, thou shalt take and give to the prophets. . . . If thou bakest
a baking of bread, take the first of it and
give according to the commandment. In like manner when thou
openest a jar of wine or oil, take the first of it and give to the prophets;
and of money and clothing and every possession take the first, as may seem good
unto thee, and give according to the commandment,” xiii. 3-7. for the use of
these men, gifted with magnetic speech,
who have come to edify the little society and instruct them in the ways of the Lord.
Not that every one who comes among them saying that he is
a prophet is to be received as such. If he asks for money, if he does not practise
more than he preaches, if he has not the ways of the Lord—then he is a false
prophet and is to be sent away.xi. For the Christian communities felt that they
had the presence of their Lord with them according to His promise, and had the
gift, however rudely it might be shown and exercised, of testing even “prophets” and “apostles.”
When the members of this prophetic ministry were received
they were the only persons permitted to abide within the community without earning
their living by artisan or other labour. Their labour was the instruction and
edification of the members of the society.“But every true prophet who will settle among you is worthy
of his support. Likewise a true teacher, he also is worthy, like the workman,
of his support”; xiii. 1, 2.
Although the community was honoured with the presence of these
gifted men, and although the congregational meeting was, as in the Churches
of Corinth and Thessalonica, the centre and seat of rule, the brethren were
directed to elect office-bearers. The context gives the reason. “But on the
Lord’s Day do ye assemble and break bread and give thanks, after confessing
your transgressions, in order that your sacrifice may be pure. But every one
that hath controversy with his friend, let him not come together with you until
they be reconciled. . . . Therefore appoint for yourselves bishops and deacons
worthy of the Lord, men meek and not avaricious, upright and proved, for they
too render you the service of the prophets and teachers.”xiv. 1-2; xv. 1, 2.
The office-bearers are needed to act as judges in quarrels within
the community, and to act as the “wise men” whom St. Paul asked
the Corinthians to appoint.1 Cor. vi. 5. They are also, whether in turn or otherwise we do not
know, to preside at the Holy Supper and to edify the community, for they are to
serve as “prophets and teachers.”“They render you the service of the prophets and teachers.
Therefore neglect them not; for they are your honoured ones along with the prophets
and the teachers”: xv. 1, 2. This passage is rightly regarded by Harnack, and in
this Sanday follows him, as of the utmost importance to enable us to trace the development
of the Christian ministry in the primitive Church. It must be referred to later.
It is sufficient to say here that we see the change taking place whereby the ministry
of the local Church secured the place at an earlier period possessed by the prophetic
ministry. Compare Harnack’s edition of the Didache in Texte und Untersuchungen,
II. i. 58 note; ii. 140 ff.; Sanday, Expositor (1887), Jan.-June, p. 14 ff. The
word τιμη was specially used to denote the respect due to spiritual guides (compare
Harnack’s note for references); it is a question whether the “honoured ones” are
also those who “receive an honorarium” (for the Greek word has the double reference);
the prophets and teachers received the firstfruits in preference to the poor. Did
the bishops and deacons who are placed among the honoured spiritual guides partake
of these first fruits also? The Didache does not answer the question. There is no division of labour indicated between
the bishops (presbyters) and the deacons; and the same qualities of meekness, uprightness,
proved Christian character and the absence of avarice are demanded of both.
What went on in the smaller took place in the larger Christian
communities; the outlines of the picture sketched for us in the Didache appear also
in the Epistle of ClementIn the Epistle of Clement we find that the congregation is the
supreme authority; the letter is addressed to the whole Church:—“To the Church
which sojourneth in Corinth” (preface); the evil-doers are urged to do “what is
ordered by the people” (liv. 2). The office-bearers are a number of presbyter-bishops
and deacons (compare above pp. 159 ff.). The epistle says little or nothing about
a “prophetic ministry” but that is not to be wondered at as it was written for a
definite purpose which had nothing to do with the question. In Hermas we have the
same organization and the distinct traces of prophets and their ministry. and in the quaint Pastor of Hermas. At the head of the
community, as regular office-bearers, were a number of men presbyter-bishops
with deacons as their assistants, but the congregation is seen to be the
supreme judge in the last resort. The people rule and form a little democracy; they
choose their office-bearers who lead their devotions and act as arbiters in all
disputes. They are a self-governing community. They can even reject the services
of men who assert that they are members of the prophetic ministry. They can do
this in God’s name. They are a theocracy as well as a democracy. The “gifts” of
the Spirit are present in their midst and are manifest in the power of judging.
Our second document is what Harnack calls the Original Sources
of the Apostolic Canons.A summary of the critical history of the Apostolic Canons (to
be distinguished from the Apostolic Constitutions) will be found in Harnack’s edition
of the Didache (Texte und Untersuchungen, II. ii. p. 193-209) followed by Harnack’s
critical reconstruction based on the discovery of the Didache (pp. 209-25), and
lastly the full text of the canons (pp. 225-37), tables and summary (pp. 237-41).
According to generally accepted critical opinions the compiler of the Canons used
four sources, the Epistle of Barnabas, the Didache (or more probably an abridgement
of the Didache), and two fragments from an old ecclesiastical law-book. It is with
these fragments that we have now to do, or rather with the first of them. Harnack
dates it at some time between 140 and 180 A.D.
These fragments, with commentary and excursus, have been published by Harnack in
the Texte und Untersuchungen,
II. v. Professor Sanday appears to agree with Professor Harnack about these fragments:
Expositor (1887), Jan.-June, pp. 20, 21, 106.
Harnack’s edition of the Sources has been translated into English by L. A. Wheatley
under the title Sources of the Apostolic Canons (1895). These sources are but fragments, preserved because they
have been incorporated in a much later law-book of the Christian Church. We do not
know from what land they came nor how wide or narrow was the sphere of their authority.
They show us, however, what a small Christian community was in the last decades
of the second century, and they describe the way in which it was created out of
a number of Christian families. We can see the birth and growth of a Church with
its complete organization. In many respects the process described can be seen now
in any mission field, especially among peoples of ancient civilization. Perhaps
the most interesting thing about it
is that every body of Christians however small is ordered to form itself into
a congregation, and the implied thought that the Christian life must be lived
within an orderly Christian society before the full benefits which accompany
it can be enjoyed.
The document takes us back to a time when a few Christian
families found themselves the only believers in the midst of a surrounding paganism.
Few or many, they are commanded to organize themselves as a church.“If there are few men, and not twelve persons who are competent
to vote at the election of a bishop, the neighbouring Churches should be written
to, where any of them is a settled one, in order that three selected men may
come thence and examine carefully if he is worthy.” Sources of the Apostolic
Canons, pp. 7, 8. (Here and elsewhere I quote from the English translation of
Harnack’s edition in the Texte und Untersuchungen, II. v.) If the
families number less than twelve, or rather if they include fewer than twelve
persons entitled to vote in the election, it is supposed that they need aid
in the first important step in the organization, which is the selection of some
one to be their pastor or bishop—the names are synonymous in the document.The word ἐπίσκοπος occurs in i. 4, 22; ii. 15, 19; and
ποιμὴν in ii. 18.
In this case they are to apply to a neighbouring Christian community which has
been established for some time, and ask them to appoint three men to assist
them to select their pastor.The phrase is ἐκλεκτοὶ τρεῖς ἄνδρες. Various parallels may
be found to the employment of three chosen men to conduct together work requiring
tact and experience. The most obvious is the mission of the three men Claudius
Ephebus, Valerius Bito and Fortunatus to Corinth from Rome (1 Clem. lxiii. 1).
Harnack finds in the three men selected to assist the small congregation in
the selection of a bishop the anticipation of the much later rule that the
consecration of a bishop required the presence and co-operation of the three
neighbouring bishops. He finds a middle point in the fact evidenced by the letter
of Cornelius of Rome to Fabius of Antioch (Euseb. Hist. Eccl. VI., xliii. 8,
9) that by the middle of the third century it was the custom that bishops were
consecrated by three neighbouring bishops (Sources of the Apostolic Canons (1895),
pp. 36 ff.). This afterwards became the law and is found in canons of many
councils (the Council of Arles in its twentieth canon being
the first). Hence comes the saying “All Christendom becomes presbyterian on
a consecration day.” It is evident from the continual repetition of the law
that the Churches found it somewhat difficult to enforce their regulation. Along with these three,
presumably experienced Christians, but not necessarily office-bearers,
they are to select some one (whether from their own number or from the outside
is not said) to be their bishop. A list of qualifications is given them to direct
their choice, from which it appears that character and Christian experience
are the things really needful for the office.The qualifications are divided into two classes those indispensable
and those desirable. “That is if he has a good report among the heathen, if
he is faultless, if a friend of the poor, if honourable—no drunkard no adulterer,
not covetous nor a slanderer, nor partial or such like” (i. 10-15). These are
the necessary qualifications. Then follow the desirable: “It is good if he
is unmarried; if not then a man of one wife; educated, in a position to expound
the scriptures; but if he is unlearned, then he must be gentle and filled with
love to all, so that a bishop should never be as one accused of anything by
the multitude “ (i. 10-23); Sources of the Apostolic Canons, pp. 8-10. A pastor or bishop is to be one
whose character stands so high that no one may be expected to bring any charge
of misconduct against him. He is not to be given to drinking, nor to covetousness
nor to foul living. He must not be a respecter of persons. It is better that
he should be unmarried, but if he has a wife he must be a faithful husband.
It is advisable that he should be an educated man and able to expound the Scriptures,
but that is not indispensable. If he is unlearned he must at least be gentle
and full of love towards all persons. He has to represent the community to
the outside world, and must therefore be a man whom the heathen respect. He
is to be the leader in public worship, and the elders are to support him, seated
on his right hand and on his left. He must be a valiant fighter against sin,
and the elders are to aid him in this duty also. He is, under the control of
the elders, to administer the property of the Church, which in these early days
consisted of the gifts brought by the faithful to the meeting for thanksgiving.
They were handed over to him,
and distributed under the watchful supervision of the elders.
Besides the pastor the congregation is required to appoint
at least two elders or presbyters.“Hence the presbyters must be already advanced in life, abstaining
becomingly from communication with women, willingly sharing with the brotherhood,
not having regard to the person, companions in consecration with the bishop
(συμμύστας τοῦ ἐπισκόπου), and fighting on his side, collecting
the congregation together, kindly disposed towards the pastor. The elders on
the right should look after the bishops at the altar, in order that they may
distribute the gifts and themselves receive the necessary contributions
(ὅπως τιμήσωσι καὶ ἐντιμηθῶσιν, εἰς ὃ ἂν δέῃ).
The elders on the left shall look after the congregation in order that it may
be at rest and without disturbance, after that it has been first proved in all
submission. But if one who is admonished should answer rudely; those at the
altar should unite and condemn such an one to the punishment deserved by a general
resolution, so that the others may be in awe, in order that they (the elders)
look not at the person of any one, and that it may not spread as a cancer and
be taken up by every one “ (ii.). They are to be men advanced in years and
presumably unmarried (the meaning of the phrase is somewhat doubtful).The phrase
is τρόπῳ τινὶ ἀπεχομένους τῆς
πρὸς γυναῖκας συνελεύσεως. They
must not be respecters of persons. They are to be ready to assist the pastor
at all times in the conduct of public worship and in dealing with sinners. They
are the rulers in the strict sense of the word. They are responsible for summoning
the people to public worship, and it is their place to preserve order during
Divine Service. The women who visit the sick are to report to them and not to
the bishop. They are to see that the bishop distributes in a proper manner the
offerings of the faithful. They have charge of the discipline of the congregation
including the pastor.The relation of the elders to the bishops is expressed by
the word προνοήσονται; this has been translated in the English version “shall assist,” which cannot be right, for the same word is used to express the
relation of the elders to the people, and it is evident that the power of discipline
is meant (ii. 19, 23).
Every church must have at least three deacons, who are to
be the ministers of the people in their private and home life. They are to report
on any unseemly conduct which may call
for discipline at
the hands of the elders. They are to be men well esteemed in the congregation,
faithful husbands, with well-behaved families.“They shall be approved
in every service, with a good testimony from the congregation, husbands of one
wife, educating their children, honourable, gentle, quiet, not murmuring, not
double-tongued, not quickly angry, not looking on the person of the rich, also
not oppressing the poor, also not given to much wine, intelligent, encouraging
well to secret works, while they compel those among the brethren who have much
to open their hands, also themselves generous, communicative, honoured with all
honour and esteem and fear by the congregation, carefully giving heed to those
who walk disorderly, warning the one, exhorting the other, threatening a third,
but leaving the scoffers completely to themselves” (iv.). Sources of the Apostolic
Canons, pp. 17-19. It is their duty to move among the people,
“and carefully give heed to those who walk disorderly, warning one, exhorting
another, threatening a third, but leaving scoffers entirely to themselves.”
They were to be men of generous disposition, for part of their duty was to insist
that the wealthier members of the Brotherhood, as the congregation is called,
“open their hands” to support the poor and for other ecclesiastical needs,
and example is better than precept. In short their duties, as laid down in these
ancient canons, are almost identical with those of the deacons in presbyterian
churches now, both in what they do and in what they are to refrain from doing.
Every church
was also to have a ministry of women. Three were to be appointed. They are called
widows, and a curious division of duties is
enjoined.“Three widows shall be appointed, two to persevere in prayer for all those
who are in temptation, and for the reception of revelations where such are necessary;
but one to assist the women visited with sickness. She must be ready for service,
discreet, communicating what is necessary to the elders, not avaricious, not
given to much love of wine, so that she may be sober and capable of performing
the night services and other loving services if she will; for these are the
chief good treasures of the. Lord” (v.), Sources of the Apostolic Canons, pp.
19-21. One of them is to act as a combination
of nurse and Bible-woman. She is to assist the sick women of the congregation.
To this end she “ must be ready for the service, discreet and not avaricious,
nor given to much love of
wine, so that
she may be sober and capable of performing the night services and other loving
ministry if she will.” The duty of the other two was to “persevere in prayer
for all who are in temptation”; and they were also to pray for the reception
of revelations where these were necessary. They took the place in the congregation
of the old prophetic ministry, and were among the number of the New Testament
prophetesses.
There was another official. The congregation is told to appoint
a Reader. He is to be an experienced Christian. His duty is to read the Scriptures
during Divine Service, and it is required that he should have a good voice and
a clear delivery. He is told to come early to the church on the Lord’s Day.
He is to be able to expound the Scripture that he has read. He is to remember
that “he fills the place of an evangelist.” The Reader in these ancient times
did what the pastor or bishop was expected to do in later times. There was the
more need for the office when we remember that the bishop might be an unlearned
man, and by unlearned was frequently meant one who did not know the alphabet.
Such is a picture of a small Christian
Church in the last decades of the second century. It may be taken as the type
of hundreds. It is independent and self-governing, but it is not isolated. It
is a brotherhood (ἀδελφότης), consisting of brethren organized under office-bearers
chosen by themselves, but it has relations with, and a knowledge of, a wider
brotherhood of which it is a minute part. When need comes it can appeal for
and get help in the selection of its pastor. Its ministry need not be learned;
Christian character, saintly behaviour, the power to exhort and teach which
comes from deep Christian experience, are more highly valued than ability to
read. The Brotherhood has the Wise Men whom St. Paul desired to see in the Corinthian
Church in its elders or presbyters who share the responsibilities of the pastor’s
work, and in this respect are his assistants, but whose superintendence and
rule extends over the pastor himself in other respects. We see the deacons going
out and in among
the members of the society, encouraging, warning, rebuking, if need be, and endeavouring
to excite to Christian liberality by precept and example. We descry through
the mists of seventeen hundred years the homely and simple ministry of women;
on the one hand an active motherly woman, able to nurse her sick sisters, strong
enough to endure, as women only can, long periods of night-watching, giving
wholesome motherly advice to the women and girls of the community; and on the
other two solitary women, in the weakness and loneliness of their sex and of
their widowhood, powerful to wrestle with God in prayer, and to assist with
their supplications the whole congregation and the strong men who are tempted
and tried in the daily battle of life. The strong supporting the weak; and the
weak, powerful in prayer, helping the strong; the picture is one which only
a Christian community could show, and there it often appeared. Early Christian
literature abounds in references to the prayers of the widows of the congregation.
They are expected to bear the whole burden of the brethren upon their hearts,
and to entreat the Lord in prayer. The prayers of believers are the sacrifice
of primitive Christianity, and because the widows abound in prayer they are
the altar of sacrifice.Compare Polycarp, Epistle to the Philippians, 4; in the
Canons of Hippolytus (ix. 59) widows are to be highly honoured because of their
copiosas orationes et infirmorum curam. In Apostolic Constitutions, iii. 12, 13,
it is said: “For it becomes widows when they see that one of their fellow widows
is clothed by any one or receives money or meat or drink or shoes, at the sight
of the refreshment of their sister to say: Thou art blessed O God, who hast
refreshed my fellow widow. Bless O Lord, and glorify him that has bestowed these
things upon her, and let his good work ascend in truth unto Thee and remember
him for good in the day of his visitation.” Compare Apost. Constit. iii. 5, 7.
These ancient fragments of old ecclesiastical canons are,
however, specially interesting, because they represent the transition stage
between the organization of the churches, shown
in the Epistle of Clement to the Corinthians or in the Didache,
and the three-fold ministry of the third century. They do this in
two ways; The prophetic ministry has departed, but its memories
linger in the prayers of the widows for revelations and in the exhortation to
the Reader that he holds the place of an evangelist. For our immediate purpose,
however, it is most interesting to have in the fragments an organization lying
between that of a church or congregation, ruled by a college of presbyter-bishops
as in the Didache, and one where the bishop or pastor is the president of a
compact circle of elders and deacons, and where these office-bearers have their
fixed places under their head. In these fragments the bishop or pastor has neither
the power nor the position he afterwards came to occupy almost universally in
the third century.
But there is this advance on the older organization. There
is now one man who has a distinct position which he occupies by himself. He
is the recognized leader of the congregation or church in several definite ways.
He represents the congregation to those outside, else why should it be a necessary
qualification for office that he is respected by the heathen? He leads the congregational
worship in the meeting for thanksgiving at any rate, and if he is learned and
can expound the Scriptures, probably at the meeting for edification also. The
gifts of the congregation are given into his hands for distribution, and he
is the almoner. He stands alone and separate from the other office-bearers in
all this. In these respects also he stands forth as the representative of the
unity of the congregation or church.
On the other hand, he has not yet
been placed in the position which the bishop or pastor afterwards held. In the
Apostolic Constitutions it is the bishop who calls the congregation together
for worship; here that duty belongs to the elders, who also watch over the behaviour
of the people while in Church.Apostolic Constitutions, ii. 57; cf. Sources of the Apostolic Canons, ii. 15: the same
word συναθροίζειν being used in both as the technical term to summon to Church. In later ecclesiastical manuals the deacons
and deaconesses report tai the bishop; there they, or at least the deaconesses, report to
the elders, who have the responsibilities
for the sick and infirm of the congregation, which in later days belonged to
the bishop.Apostolic Constitutions. iii. 19 orders
the deacons and deaconesses: “Tell your Bishop of all those that are in affliction;
for you ought to be like his soul and senses.” Sources of the Apostolic Canons,
v. 8, 9, directs the Widows to “communicate what is necessary to the presbyters
or elders.” In the Canons of Hippolytus, c. 5, the deacons are ordered to report
to the bishop. Of. Riedel, Die Kirchenrechtsquellen des Patriarchate Alexandrien
(1900), p. 203. All these things show that the discipline of the congregation is in the hands
of the elders exclusively, and that the bishop is not the president of their
court. If any doubt remained on this head it must vanish when we consider the
unique regulation that the bishop himself is under the supervision of the elders
in one of the most important of his functions.Apostolic Constitutions, ii. 25, 35, make it plain that the bishop
was accountable to no one but God in his duty as almoner. The bishop is thus
addressed: “Let him use those tenths and first fruits, which are given according
to the command of God, as a man of God; as also let him dispense in a right
manner the free-will offerings which are brought on account of the poor, to
the orphans . . . as having that God for the examiner of his accounts who has committed
the disposition to him” (ii. 25). And in the thirty-fifth section the people
are enjoined: “Thou shalt not call the bishop to account nor watch his administration,
how he does it, when or to whom, or where, or whether he does it well or ill
or indifferently; for he has One who will call him to account, the Lord God.” When he acts as almoner they
are to see that he acts rightly, and, what is of the highest importance for
understanding the situation, the word used to express the control of the elders
over the bishop is the same word (προνοεῖσθαι), which describes their power
of discipline over the congregation. The bishop has emerged from the circle
of presbyters, but he is not their president; and while he is the leader of
the congregation in many respects he is, in one respect at least, like the members
of the congregation, amenable to the discipline of the elders.
Probably had
we other relics of ecclesiastical manuals belonging to this transition period
we should find other instances of organizations on the road towards the three-fold ministry,
but travelling by different paths.
We know that the three-fold ministry grew more rapidly in some places than in
others, and the organization probably passed through several transition stages,
of which this is one, before it attained to maturity.
Our third group of writings consists of the famous Letters of Ignatius of Antioch—a
series of documents which have provoked an immense amount of criticism which
cannot be said to be ended. Without entering into the controversy we may accept
the results of the scholarly criticism of the late Dr. Lightfoot in this country,
and of Dr. Zahn in Germany, according to which the Seven Epistles in the shorter recension
are genuine documents. These letters came from the head of the Christian community
in Antioch in Syria. Ignatius had been seized in an outburst of persecution
and was being dragged across Asia Minor, a prisoner in charge of a band of Roman
soldiers. He wrote to the Christians of Ephesus that he was on his way from
Syria, in bonds for the sake of the common Name and hope, and was expecting
to succeed in fighting with wild beasts at Rome, that by so succeeding he might
have power to become a disciple.To the Ephesians, 1. The journey was an apprenticeship in suffering;
for the ten soldiers, who guarded him, treated him as ten leopards might have
done, and only waxed worse when they were kindly entreated.To the Romans, 5. The churches of
Asia Minor had sent him comforting messages by special delegates. The letters
are his answers.The letters of Ignatius were
generally known during the later Middle Ages in the form of seventeen epistles,
of which fifteen were believed to come from the pen of Ignatius while two (one
from the Virgin and another from a Mary of Cassobola) were addressed to Ignatius.
Renascence criticism disposed of the claims of four of these letters. There
remained thirteen, twelve from the pen of Ignatius and one (from Mary of Cassobola)
addressed to him. This collection is now known as the Long Recension, and it
was this collection which was the subject of fierce controversy in the end of
the sixteenth and during the seventeenth century. At the basis of these attacks
made on the genuineness of these letters lay two facts: that Eusebius knew of
seven letters only and that these thirteen contained passages evidently
unknown to Eusebius or to any of the ancients. The learned Englishman,
Ussher, afterwards archbishop of Armagh and primate of all Ireland, observed
that the quotations made from Ignatius by some English writers from the thirteenth
century onwards corresponded with those found in Eusebius, Theodoret, etc.,
and concluded that there must exist in England a manuscript which would represent
the Ignatius known to the ancients. After a prolonged search two such manuscripts
were brought to light, both of them in Latin. They contained seven letters
but in a form shorter than the generally received letters. Ussher accepted six
of these shorter letters as the genuine epistles of Ignatius (he refused to
accept the letter to Polycarp). His book was published in 1644. Soon afterwards
(1646) Isaac Voss published six letters from a Greek MS.—his MS. did not give
the Epistle to the Romans; and in 1689 the full Greek text of the seven letters
was published by Ruinart. It was generally admitted that, if any genuine letters
of Ignatius had descended to the present time, they were these seven in the
shorter form; but many critics still refuse to admit the genuineness of any
of the letters.
The controversy was raised again in 1845 by the publication
of Cureton’s Ancient Syriac Version of the Epistles of S. Ignatius to S. Polycarp,
the Ephesians and the Romans. The author had found two Syriac MSS. in the library
of the British Museum containing the three epistles mentioned in his title and
in a still shorter form than those published by Ussher. He maintained that these
three short letters were the genuine remains of Ignatius. He defended his position
in a second work, Vindiciae Ignatianae (1846), and in his most complete treatise,
Corpus Ignatianum (1849). His views at once attracted attention and were very
largely adopted, though many distinguished scholars still defended the seven
letters, while others refused to accept even Cureton’s three in the brief form.
This controversy was almost ended by Zahn, who, in his Ignatius von Antioch
(1873), showed very successfully that Cureton’s three Syriac letters were epitomes
of the three in what were called the Short Recension. This opinion was supported
by the late Dr. Lightfoot’s elaborate work, Apostolic Fathers, part II.,
S. Ignatius, S. Polycarp (1885). The result
of these two works has been that in Germany, France and England the seven letters,
in the shorter form published by Ruinart in 1689, are generally accepted as
the genuine remains of Ignatius. Many critics still refuse to accept the letters
in any form as genuine, but their criticism is mainly of the subjective and
unconvincing kind. The only writer whose book deserves serious consideration
and who dissents from the conclusions of Zahn and Lightfoot is Bruston, who,
in his Ignace d’Antioche (1897), refuses to admit the genuineness of the
Epistle to the Romans and combines his critical opinions with the theory that Ignatius
was not the Bishop of Antioch but a deacon in the Church there.
Many scholars are of the opinion that the letters of Ignatius were known
to Lucian and that he used his knowledge in writing his story De Morte Peregrini. They think
that the imprisonment of Peregrinus, the visits paid to him by delegates from
the Churches of Asia Minor, and the letters written by him to the Churches which
were received with reverence, were all incidents suggested by the letters of
Ignatius. The idea seems to me somewhat far-fetched; the points which Lucian
seizes and makes use of may easily have been suggested by a general observation
of usages common to early Christianity and need not be attached to any particular
person however famous; but compare Lightfoot, S. Ignatius, S. Polycarp, i. pp. 331 ff.
They exhale the fragrance of a saintly and impassioned Christian
life. They dwell on the need that the sin-sick children
of men have for the One great Physician of souls.To the Ephesians, 7. The Christian
preacher of the second century lives in them still, embalmed
there and treasured up for a life beyond life. We find in them
bursts of poetic fancy: the Lord was a Star which shone forth
in the heaven above all stars; and its light was unutterable;
and its strangeness caused astonishment; and all the rest of the constellations,
with the sun and the moon, formed themselves into a chorus about the star; but the Star itself
far out-shone them all.Ibid. 19. They abound in simple but striking metaphors,
such as the lyre and its strings, the athlete and his training;
the chorus with its keynote; the wheat ground in the hand-mill.To the Ephesians, 4; To the Philadelphians, 1; To Polycarp, 1, 2; To the Romans, 4.
We find quaint emblems: “Ye are stones of a temple,
which were prepared beforehand for a building of God, being
hoisted up to the heights through the engine of Jesus Christ,
which is the Cross, and using for a rope the Holy Spirit; while
your faith is your windlass, and love is the way that leadeth
up to God.”To the Ephesians, 9. They show deep knowledge of the human heart:
“No man professing faith sinneth, and no man possessing love
hateth”Ibid. 14.—a sentence which might have
come from Thomas à Kempis. Sometimes the words seem insensibly to take the
form of a prophetic chant, and have a rhythmic cadence all
their own.Compare especially the Epistle to the Philadelphians, 7:—
Χωρὶς τοῦ ἐπισκόπου μηδὲν ποιεῖτε·
Τὴν σάρκα ὑμῶν ὡς ναὸν Θεοῦ τηρεῖτε·
Τὴν ἕνωσιν ἀγαπᾶτε·
Τοὺς μερισμοὺς φεύγετε·
Μιμηταὶ γίνεσθε Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ·
Ὡς καὶ αὐτὸς τοῦ πατρὸς αὐτοῦ.
Ignatius had evidently visited Philadelphia and had addressed
the brethren there, and in his address he had felt the prophetic afflatus, had
interrupted himself with a loud cry, and these sentences were part of what he
had said. They are an example of the prophetic utterances.
Throughout there is that
taste of Oriental extravagance which makes them so natural.As where he says:—“These men
ye ought to shun as wild beasts for they are mad dogs, biting by stealth,” To the Ephesians, 7.
The letters breathe the storm and strain of a time of persecution. The
rallying cry which rolls from the first to the last is union! Keep united! Close
the ranks! Intimate union with Christ; that is the main thing, and that which
comes first. This is how he puts it. “For being counted worthy to bear a most
godly name, in these bonds, which I carry about, I sing the praise of the churches;
and I pray that there may be in them union of the flesh and of the Spirit which
are Jesus Christ’s, our never-failing life—an union of faith and of love which
is preferred before all things, and—what is more than all—an union with Jesus
and with the Father, in whom, if we patiently endure all the despite of the
prince of this world and escape therefrom, we shall attain unto God.”To the Magnesians, 1.
Varying pictures of the Christian Churches rise in his imagination. Now
they are ships driven and tossed in the storm of persecution; there must be
a strong man at the helm and discipline in the crew; they need a favouring wind
and a sheltering haven.To Polycarp, 2. Or they are so many households of God: the office-bearers
are the upper servants set there by the Master to rule, and the other members
obey the Master Himself when they are submissive to those whom He has set over
them.To the Ephesians, 6.
Or they are disciple
companies, cherishing an imitation of Christ, not in the solitary fashion of
Thomas à Kempis, but in companionship. The pastor represents Jesus, the elders
are His apostles,To the Magnesians, 6; To the Trallians, 2, 3; To the Smyrnaeans, 8. and the deacons and the faithful those who followed Him
in Galilee—and all, pastor and elders and people, look for the footprints the
Master has left, and try to set their steps where He trod. Perhaps this picture
of a disciple company is his favourite one. It has been a thought tenderly cherished
through the centuries, and has often been set forth with a certain quaint realism.
Columba and twelve companions came from Ireland to Iona. Columbanus with twelve
companions appeared among the Franks and the Burgundians to preach the Gospel.
Bernard and twelve companions left Citeaux to found his new dwelling at Clairvaux.
In each case the chronicler lovingly adds: “a disciple company.”
We miss the main thought in Ignatius
if we neglect to see that the unity which is his passion is primarily and fundamentally
something spiritual and mystical. The Person of Christ is the centre round which
the Church crystallizes. By His death on the Cross and by His Resurrection our
Lord has elevated a standard round which His troops of believers can rally and
form a disciplined army.To the Smyrnaeans, 1:—“Truly nailed up in the flesh for
our sakes under Pontius Pilate and Herod the Tetrarch . . . that He might set
up a standard unto all ages through His resurrection, for His saints, whether
among Jews or among Gentiles, in one body of His Church.” This sacred mystical attraction is the inward essence
and source of that union which he has always in view. So strong is it that all
believers may be said to have one mind, a godly concord and one spirit of perseverance.To the Magnesians, 7, 15:—“But
let there be one prayer in common, one supplication, one mind (νοῦς), one hope,
in love and in joy unblamable which is in Jesus Christ. . . . Fare ye well in
godly concord, and possess ye a stedfast spirit which is in Jesus Christ.” The unity
which he insists upon is first of all a union with Christ Jesus, and then, and
arising from that, a common religious
belief and a common affection diffused throughout all believers who ought to live in
a harmony of love. The unity Ignatius yearns after is first of all a unity of
faith and love.“Run in harmony with the mind of God” (Ephesians, 3); “In your concord and
harmonious love Jesus Christ is sung; do ye, each and all of you, form yourselves
into a chorus, that being harmonious in concord and taking the key-note of God
ye may in union sing with one voice through Jesus Christ to our Father” (Ephesians,
4); cf. To the Magnesians, 1.
But this unseen mystical unity
ought to make itself manifest according to the ordinances of Jesus and of His
apostles. It can make itself seen in the best way in the attachment of believers
to the visible local church which is the assembly of believers for prayer,
exhortation, and for the celebration of the Holy Supper and for baptism. Those
who are truly the Lord’s, and who share in the invisible mystical union, cannot
fail to assemble together with one heart and mind, nor to unite in one common
prayer. Ignatius addresses himself more than once to men who seem to think that
the Christian life can be lived apart from the Christian visible fellowship;To the Ephesians, 5, 13, 20; To the Magnesians, 7.
and he declares that apart from the office-bearers there is not even the name
of a Church.To the Trallians, 3. Christians ought to manifest this inward unity which they have
in an external unity, which can best show itself in the manifestation of mutual
respect for each other, in reverencing each other and in loving one another
in Jesus Christ.“Therefore do ye all study conformity to God, and pay reverence
one to another” (Magnesians, 6). “Attempt not to think anything right for
yourselves apart from others” (Magnesians, 7). “Be obedient to the bishop
and to one another” (Magnesians, 13).
This submission which is due by
all believers to each other is specially due to those who have been placed at
the head of the Christian communities, and who are there to be examples to their
flocks.“Let there be nothing among you which shall have power
to divide you, but be ye united with the bishop and with them that preside over
you as an example and a lesson of incorruptibility” (Magnesians, 6). The office bearers in this
sentence are called προκαθήμενοι, which may be compared with the
προϊστάμενοι
of the Epistle to the Romans and to the Thessalonians. Submission to one another and to the office-
bearers—a submission founded on love—is the outward manifestation of the inward mystical union which
all true believers have with Christ, who is the true centre of the union. For
Ignatius never loses sight of the mystical union fed by faith and love.He calls a church τὸ πολυεύτακτον τῆς κατὰ Θεὸν ἀγάπης
(Magnesians, 1).
The real centre of this unity is God and Christ Who is God;
the real oversight lies with Him. In his fervent Oriental way which expresses
abstract thoughts in defective, though picturesque, material and external representations,
Ignatius sees this Divine and invisible unity manifest in the bishop (or in
whatever may be the visible centre of the ecclesiastical rule).“Give place to him (the bishop) as to one prudent in God;
yet not to him, but to the Father of Jesus Christ, even to the Bishop of all. . . .
For a man doth not so much deceive this bishop who is seen, as cheat the
other Who is invisible” (Magnesians, 3). For it must
not be forgotten in attempting to interpret the thoughts of Ignatius that he
belonged to what has been called the “enthusiastic” age of the Church, and
that he shared in an exalted degree in the spirit of his times. He claimed to
be a prophet and to possess the prophetic gift. “I am in bonds,” he says, “and can comprehend heavenly things and the arrays of angels and the musterings
of principalities, things visible and invisible.”To the Trallians, 5. He describes how, when he
was preaching at Philadelphia, the prophetic afflatus suddenly possessed him,
and he felt compelled to cry out “with a loud voice, with God’s own voice,
Give ye heed to the bishop and the session and the deacons.” His hearers thought
that this had been a studied reference to persons accused of causing division
in the Church, but Ignatius assured them that was not so. The Divine afflatus
had possession of him, and it made him cry out:
“Do nothing without the bishop; keep your
flesh as a temple of God; cherish union; shun divisions; be imitators of Jesus
Christ, as He Himself also was of His Father.”To the Philiadelphians, 7. With the prophetic eye he
saw the invisible and mystical unity which
lay hidden within the actual visible Christian community, and every little local
church was a symbol of what existed in the Heavenly Places where God was the
centre and source of unity. It is from this mystical standpoint that we must
view the impassioned exhortations to obey the office-bearers,“The bishops established in the furthest parts of the world
are in the counsels of Jesus Christ” (Ephesians, 3). “Every one whom the Master
of the House sendeth to govern His own household we ought to receive, as Him
that sent him. Clearly therefore we ought to regard the bishop as the Lord Himself” (Ephesians, 6). Those who “obey the bishop as Jesus Christ” live a life after
Christ” (Trallians, 2). “It is good to know God and the bishop; he that honoureth
the bishop is honoured of God; he that doeth anything without the knowledge
of the bishop serveth the devil” (Smyrneans, 9). To obey the bishop is to obey
“not him, but the Father of Jesus Christ, even the Bishop of all,” while to
practise hypocrisy towards the bishop is “not to deceive the visibly one, so
much as to cheat the One who is invisible” (Magnesians, 3). “As many as are
of God and of Jesus Christ, are with the bishop” (Philadelphians, 3). Compare
Lightfoot, Apostolic Fathers, S. Ignatius, S. Polycarp, i. 375 f.; Commentary
on the Epistle to the Philippians (1881), 6th ed. pp. 236, 237), for a complete
list of passages. Almost equally strong language about obedience to elders or
presbyters and deacons will be found on the same pages. remembering
also that obedience to the rulers in the Church is only the superlative of
the submission of love which all Christians owe to one another.
When due allowance is made for the exaltation of the writer,
and for the Oriental extravagance of language natural to a Syrian, the exhortations
of Ignatius do not differ so widely from the calm injunctions issued in the
measured language of Rome to the church of Corinth which we find in the Epistle
of Clement: “Let us mark the soldiers that are enlisted under our rulers, how
exactly, how readily, how submissively, they execute the orders given them.
All are not prefects, nor commanders
of thousands, nor of hundreds,
nor of fifties, and so forth; but each man in his own rank executeth the orders
given by the prince and the government.”Clement, 1 Epistle xxxvii.
It is also to be remembered that Ignatius is writing to churches
in Asia Minor, exposed to the temptations to division caused by the presence
of men teaching the separative doctrines of a Judaising Christianity and of
Doketism. The epistles themselves afford abundant evidence that these sources
of division existed and had proved strong temptations in the communities to
which he was writing.“But I have learned that certain persons passed through
you from yonder, bringing evil doctrine” (Ephesians, 9); “It is better to keep
silence and to be, than to talk and be not” (Ephesians, 15). “It is monstrous to talk of
Jesus Christ and to practise Judaism. . . . I would have you
be on guard betimes, that ye fall not into the snares of vain doctrines” (Magnesians, 10-11); compare the
Epistle to the Trallians, 6-11, where the brethren are warned against Doketism; the
Epistle to the Philadelphians, 6, where the warning is against Judaism; and
the Epistle to the Smyrneans, 5-7, where the error is Doketism. His passionate anxiety was that each local church should
present an unbroken front and manifest a complete unity. The simple means which
he believed would effect this was that all Christians should rally round the
office-bearers who were at the head of the little Christian societies. Most,
though not all, of the churches he addressed had the three-fold ministry in
some form or other, and he enforced obedience to that form of ecclesiastical
rule. “There is no indication that he is upholding the episcopal against any
other form of Church government, as for instance the presbyteral (i.e. the government
by a college of presbyters without a president). The alternative which he contemplates
is lawless isolation and self-will. No definite theory is propounded as to
the principle on which the episcopate claims allegiance. It is as the recognized
authority of the churches which the writer addresses, that he maintains it.
Almost simultaneously with Ignatius, Polycarp addresses the Philippian Church,
which appears not yet to have had a bishop, requiring its submission
‘to the presbyters and deacons.’Compare Réville, Les Origines
de l’Episcopat (1894), p. 497 f. If Ignatius had been writing to this church,
he would doubtless have done the same. As it is, he is dealing with communities
where episcopacy (the three-fold ministry) had been already matured, and therefore
he demands obedience to their bishop.”Lightfoot, S. Ignatius, S. Polycarp, i. 382. He makes no attempt certainly when
writing to the Roman Church, which was still under the government of a college
of presbyter-bishops without a president, to insist that the three-fold ministry
is an essential thing to the well-being of a Christian community.The three-fold ministry developed much more slowly in Rome
than in Asia Minor. Compare Lightfoot. Commentary on the Epistle to the Philippians
(1881), 6th ed. p. 217 ff.; Réville, Les Origins de l’Episcopat (1894), p. 420 ff. What is more,
he evidently regards union with the college of elders as the same thing as union
with the bishop; for he invites the malcontents at Philadelphia, who had repented,
to return “to the unity of God and of the council of the bishop.”Epistle to the Philadelphians, 8.
We can scarcely look for a calm statement about the organization
of the Christian churches in letters of this kind. They were the impassioned
outpourings of a man on his way to death; full of fears, not for himself, but
for the brethren he was leaving behind in a persecuting world. It is pathetic
to see the fiery, impassioned words of the martyr used as missiles by some reckless
preacher of episcopal supremacy, or subjected to the scalpel of a cold-blooded
critic, neither of whom seem to recognize the Oriental extravagance of language
which makes them so natural. Yet the letters do give us a good deal of information
about our subject.
Ignatius insists that the unity of the society has for its
centre and source of strength the supremacy of the pastor, who is always called
the bishop. His writings are a proof that the three-fold ministry in some form
or other did exist, early in the second century, in some parts of the Church
though not in others.
But they are not
to be taken as proof that the Ignatian conception of what the three-fold ministry
ought to be existed in any part of the Church whatever.In some form or other or in some stage of its growth. Lightfoot has drawn
a distinction between chief over the presbyters and chief of the presbyters,
and the second phrase, he says, suits very well the beginning of the Epistle
of Polycarp:—“Polycarp and the presbyters that are with him.” Then there is
the form given in the Sources of the Apostolic Canons, cf. above pp. 183 f.
According to the conception of Ignatius, every Christian community ought to
have at its head a bishop, a presbyterium or session of elders, and a body of
deacons. These constitute its office-bearers to whom, jointly and severally,
obedience is due. Ignatius regards these three elements as going together to
form one whole. He mentions the three classes of officials together twelve times
in his seven epistles, and in ten out of the twelve they form an inseparable
unity—presumably they do so also in the remaining two, but that is not evident
from the passages themselves.To the Magnesians, 2, 6, 13; To the Trallians, 7; To the Philadelphians,
preface, 4, 7; To the Smyrnaeans, 8, 12; To Polycarp, 6; To the Trallians, 2;
To the Philadelphians, 10. Compare Réville, Les Origines de 1’Episcopat (1894),
p. 496:—L’exaltation du pouvoir épiscopal
qui se donne libre tours à travers les Épîtres d’Ignace fait trop souvent perdre
de vue aux commenteurs cette intime association de 1’autorité presbytérale et
de 1’autorité épiscopale, qu’un examen plus attentif dégage très clairement.” There is not a trace of sacerdotalism in the
sense that the Christian ministry is a special priesthood set apart to offer
a special sacrifice; there is a great deal about the sacredness of order, but
not a word about the sanctity of orders. Ignatius only once refers to priests
and high priests, and he does so in the thoroughly evangelical fashion of contrasting
the imperfect Old Testament priesthood with the perfect priesthood of the Redeemer.To the Philadelphians, 8, 9. Compare Lightfoot, Apostolic Fathers, S. Ignatius,
S. Polycarp (1885), i. 381, 382; ii. 274, 275. Zahn, Ignatii et Polycarpi Epistulae
(1876), p. 79. The bishop is not an autocrat. There is a “council of the bishop,” which includes
the bishop himself.To the Philadelphians, 8. Compare Lightfoot, S. Ignatius, i. 380; ii. 269. The people are told to obey all the office-bearers,
bishops, elders and deacons.Obey the bishop:—Ephesians,
6; Trallians, 2; Smyrnaeans, 8, 9; Magnesians, 3, 4; Polycarp. 4, 6; Philadelphians,
7. Obey the elders:—Ephesians, 2, 20; Magnesians, 2, 7; Trallians, 13. Obey
the deacons: Polycarp, 6,; Magnesians, 6; Trallians, 3; Philadelphians, 7; Smyrnaeans, 8. The ruling body is a court in which the bishop
sits as chairman surrounded by his council or session of elders; and the one
is helpless without the other, for if the bishop is the lyre the elders are
the chords, and both are needed to produce melody.To the Ephesians, 4. There is no apostolic succession
in any form whatsoever; even in the poetic conception of the disciple company
it is the elders who represent the apostles.“It is worthy of notice that
though the form of government in these Asian Churches is in some sense monarchical,
yet it is very far from being autocratic. We have already seen that in one passage
the writer in the term ‘council of the bishop’ includes the bishop himself
as well as his presbyters. This expression tells its own tale. Elsewhere submission
is required to the presbyters as well as to the bishop. Nay sometimes the writer
enjoins obedience to the deacons as well as to the bishop and to the presbyters.
The ‘presbytery’ is a ‘worthy spiritual coronal’
(ἀξιοπλόκου
πνευματικοῦ στεφάνου)
round the bishop (Magn. 13). It is the duty of every one, but
especially of the presbyters ‘to refresh the bishop unto the honour of the
Father and of Jesus Christ and of the apostles’ (Trall. 12). They stand in the
same relation to him ‘as the chords to the lyre’ (Ephes. 4). If obedience is
due to the bishop as to the grace of God, it is due to the presbytery as to
the law of Jesus Christ (Magn. 2). If the bishop ocupies the place of God or
of Jesus Christ, the presbyters are as the Apostles, as the council of God (Magn.
6; Trall. 2, 3; Smyr. 8). This last comparison alone would show how widely the
idea of the episcopate differed from the later conception, when it had been
formulated in the doctrine of the Apostolic succession. The presbyters, not
the bishops, are here the successors of the apostles.” Lightfoot, S. Ignatius,
i. pp. 382, 383. Lastly, there is no trace of diocesan
rule. We undoubtedly find the phrase τὸν ἐπίσκοπον Συρίας;
but as Lightfoot and Zahn, to say nothing of others, have pointed out, it must be translated “the
bishop from Syria.” A bishop of Syria would have been an anachronism in the fourth century, and is
much more so in
the second.Lightfoot, S.
Ignatius, i. 383; ii. 201, 202; Zahn, Ignatii Epistulae, p. 59 n.; and his Ignatius
von Antioch, p. 308. It is unquestionable that the bishop is made the centre of everything
in the Church or congregation. “It is not permitted without the bishop either
to baptize or to hold a love feast,”To the Smyrnaeans, 8. and the love feast must include the Holy
Supper. It is even declared that when men and women marry they should unite
themselves with the consent of the bishop, that the marriage should be after
the Lord and not after concupiscence.To Polycarp, 5. But this only means that in such a solemn
action as matrimony the blessing of the Church should be joined to the civil
contract.
But if there be no sacerdotalism,
no apostolic succession, no one-man rule, and no diocese; if every Christian
community is to be organized under a leader, who is called a bishop and some-times
a pastor, who presides over a court of elders,The πρεσβυτέριον or court of
elders, i.e. kirk-session, is mentioned frequently by Ignatius:—To the Ephesians,
2, 4, 20; To the Magnesians, 2, 13; To the Trallians, 2, 7, 13; To the Philadelphians,
4, 7; To the Smyrnaeans, 8, 12. It is called the “council of God” in the Epistle
to the Trallians, 3 (συνεδριον θεοῦ). and has under him a body of
deacons; further, if, as the Sources of
the Apostolic Canons inform us, every small Christian community, even when
consisting of fewer than twelve families, is to have its bishop, its elders
and its deacons; if nothing is to be done without the consent of the pastor
or bishop, neither sacrament nor love-feast, nor anything congregational—then
while the resemblance to modern episcopacy, with its diocesan system, is but
small, there is a very great amount of resemblance to that form of ecclesiastical
organization which re-emerged at the Reformation and which is commonly called
the presbyterian, though it might be more appropriately named the conciliar
system of Church government.
A more minute examination of the letters reveals some details
of the organization of the churches which were familiar to Ignatius.
For one thing, it seems clear that
whatever the authority of the bishop may have been, it did not extend beyond
his own church or congregation. The corporate unity of the Churches of Christ
was still a sentiment, strongly felt no doubt, but not yet expressed in any
kind of polity. Ignatius did not write as a bishop of the Catholic Church; he
says expressly that he was no apostle.“I did not
think myself competent for this (writing more sharply), that being a convict
I should order you as though I were an apostle” (To the Trallians, 3). Throughout
the letters there are constant references to his impending martyrdom. He wrote as a confessor of Christ to
brethren who might soon be required to confess Christ in the same way of threatened
martyrdom. Nor does Polycarp claim to write as a superior to the Philippians.
He wrote because he had been asked for advice.Epistle of Polycarp to the Philippians, 3. The various churches were still
independent units in fraternal intercourse with each other, but without any
signs of inter-congregational jurisdiction.
The Epistle to Polycarp show what
Ignatius believed to be the duties of a bishop within his own community. He
was the administrator of the finances of the Church; to him the widows and the
poor of the congregation had to look for their support, and the funds to buy
the manumission of slaves were in his hands;To Polycarp, 4. he had the moral oversight of
the whole congregation, and was therefore the president of the court of discipline;To Polycarp, 3, 5.
he had the right to call, and presumably to preside over, the congregational
meetings;To Polycarp,
4; Ignatius evidently thought that Polycarp did not hold congregational meetings
often enough:—“Let the meetings be held more frequently.” It is interesting
to notice that all the duties which Ignatius supposes to belong to the bishops
in the Church at Smyrna are supposed by Polycarp to belong to the elders in
the Church at Philippi; with the exception of presiding at public worship, which
is not mentioned; Polycarp, Epistle to the Philippians. 6-12 he had the sole regulation of the sacraments of
Baptism and of
the Holy Supper and of everything congregational.To the Smyrnaeans, 3, for the bishop's duties with regard to the eucharist,
baptism, and the love-feasts; To Polycarp, 5, with regard to marriage. Yet the
advice to meet more frequently for the eucharistic service is given to the Ephesian
community (Ephesians, 13). But large as were the bishop’s
powers, he had to exercise them under serious limitations. There is not a hint
that the bishop can by himself, or even in conjunction with his session or elders,
excommunicate an offender. The power which Ignatius urges Polycarp to use is
only that of moral suasion.To Polycarp, 2, 3, 5. It is more than probable that the final power in
all cases of discipline lay with the congregational meeting, as was the case
in Corinth in the time of St. Paul. It is the congregation who are warned against
false teachers and evil-minded persons, and they are directed to act in certain
ways with regard to them.To the Ephesians, 7; To the Magnesians, 11; To the Philadelphians, 6; To the Smyrnaeans, 4. The passages, however, do not warrant us in drawing
any distinct conclusion. On the other hand, it is clear that the congregational
meetings had powers. It was they who appointed delegates and messengers. The
Christians at Smyrna are asked directly to send a delegate into Syria, whereas
the bishop is only asked to convene a meeting of the congregation in order that
the messenger may be appointed; and elsewhere it is made plain that this power
belonged to the whole Church, who could order on a mission their bishops as
well as their elders or their deacons.To the Smyrnaeans, 11; To Polycarp, 7; To the Philadelphians, 10; To the Ephesians, 1, 2;
To the Magnesians, 2, 6; To the Trallians, 1.
Readers who know something about
the work of Church extension at home and on the mission field, may wonder how
it was possible in these early centuries that the smallest bodies of Christians
could have had, and were commanded to have, such a complete ecclesiastical organization
as these Epistles of Ignatius and the Sources of the Apostolic Canons require,
and how they could be at the same time so independent and self-supporting.
A large part of the problem of ecclesiastical extension in our own days, at
home and on the mission field, has to do with money. Churches and other buildings
have to be erected, and a salaried ministry has to be supported. But it must
be remembered that in those early days the ministry was not paid as we understand
payment, and that money for buildings was not needed. Church buildings did
not exist until the second century was drawing to a close, and then only in
large and populous centres. The only property which the Church had besides its
copies of the Scriptures, its congregational records and perhaps a place of
burial, were the offerings, mostly in kind, which the faithful presented during
the meeting for thanksgiving, and which were almost immediately distributed.
Justin Martyr gives the earliest description in his Apology. “On the day called
Sunday, all who live in town or country gather together in one place, and the
memoirs of the apostles or of the prophets are read as long as time permits;
then when the reader has ceased the president verbally instructs, and exhorts
us to the imitation of these good things. Then we all stand together and pray,
and, when prayer is ended, bread and wine are brought and the president offers
prayers and thanksgivings, according to his ability, and the people assent,
saying Amen. Then there is a distribution to each of that over which thanks
has been given, and a portion is sent by the deacons to those who are absent.
Then they who are well to do and are willing, give what each thinks fit; and
it is collected and deposited with the president, who succours orphans and
widows and those who, through sickness or any other cause, are in want, those
who are in bondage and the strangers sojourning among
us—in a word all who are in need.”Justin, Apology, i. 67.
The gifts so bestowed and distributed
were the property of the early Church—all that it had. Both Justin and Tertullian
insist on the fact that these offerings were of free-will,
contrasting them,
it is probable, with the monthly compulsory payments made by the members of
confraternities; but this did not hinder indications being given about these
offerings. We find a continuous series of recommendations that the first fruits
of all the necessaries of life ought to be given. All the oldest ecclesiastical
manuals, from the Didache downwards, contain injunctions to the people about
these first fruits. In the Didache these offerings went to support the prophets,
and failing them the poor of the community; and the Pastoral EpistlesDidache, xiii. 1; 1 Tim. v. 9. The Pastoral Epistles perhaps teach us that the
ministry have a share; cf. 1 Tim. v. 17, 18; 2 Tim. i. 4-7, but the seventh
verse of the latter passage suggests that the share is not by way of stipend. mention
a church roll of members who ought to share because of their poverty. In the
quotation just made from Justin Martyr these first fruits are distributed among
the widows, orphans, poor strangers and so on; Tertullian describes a similar
mode of distribution; so do the Canons of Hippolytus, which expressly prohibit
any claim on the part of the ministry to share.Tertullian, Apology, 39. Canons
of Hippolytus, Canon xxxii. (Riedel) Kirchenrechtsquellen des Patriarchats Alexandrien, p. 221. In the ancient
Sources of the Apostolic Canons the elders superintend the bishop, while he makes the distribution,Texte und
Untersuchungen, II. v. 13-15, or Sources of the Apostolic Canons, p. 13.
but in Justin and in the Canons of Hippolytus the full control of this distribution
lies with the president or bishop. It is probable that the members of the ministry
from the beginning had some share in these offerings, but not in the way of
stipend, and only if they could be classed among the poor. The ancient Sources
of the Apostolic Canons teach us that the pastor may share if need be, but not
by way of stipend. Dr. Hatch has only summed up what the history of the whole
period teaches when he says: “The funds of the primitive communities consisted
entirely of voluntary offerings. Of these offerings those office-bearers whose
circumstances required it were entitled to a share. They received
such a share only on account of their poverty. They were, so far, in the position
of the widows and orphans and helpless poor.”The Organization of the Early Churches (1881), p. 147.
The idea that when men are once
set apart for the function of office-bearers in the Christian Church it becomes
the duty of the Church to provide them with the necessaries of life does not
belong to the times of primitive Christianity. The office-bearers of the early
Church were clergy in virtue of their call, election, and setting apart by special
prayer for sacred office; but they worked at trades, carried on mercantile pursuits,
and were not separate from the laity in their every-day life. We find bishops
who were shepherds, weavers, lawyers, shipbuilders,A shepherd, Socrates, Eccles. Hist. i. 12; a weaver, Sozomen, Eccles. Hist. vii. 28; a shipbuilder,
S. Gregorii Magni, Epistolae, xiii. 26; a lawyer, S. Gregorii Magni, Epistolae,
x. 10. Compare Cyprian De Lapsis 6. Basil, Epistolae, 198. Compare Hatch,
The Organization of the Early Christian Churches (1881), p. 148, who, besides giving
the well-known individual instances quotes regulations from the Theodosian Code
and from the Statuta Ecclesiae Antigua proving the general practice. The eighty-seventh
of the Canons of Basil says that “none of the clergy are to engage in merchandise
but that they are to learn a handicraft and live of the labour of their hands.”
Riedel, Die Kirchenrechtsquellen des Patriarchats Alexandrien (1900), p. 270. and so on, and the elders
and deacons were almost invariably men who were not supported by the churches
to which they belonged. An interesting series of inscriptions was found on the
gravestones of the cemetery of the little town of Corycus, in Cilicia Tracheia,
records of the Christian community there. They can scarcely be older than the
fifth, and not later than the sixth century. One of them marks the burial place
of a master potter and another that of a goldsmith, both of whom were elders
or presbyters of the Church there.Bull. de Corr. Hell. vii. 230 ff. The power of the laity in the early Church
did not depend simply on the fact that they chose the office-bearers and had
some indefinite influence over councils, as some modern writers put it,As for example the Rev. R. B. Rackham in Essays on Church Reform (1898), p. 30 ff. but
on the
fact that in
the earliest times none of the office-bearers, and for many centuries few of
them, depended upon the Church as a whole to provide them with the necessaries
of life. They were clergy, as has been said, in virtue of their selection for
office and of their solemn setting apart to perform clerical functions; but
they had daily association with the laity in the workshop, on the farm, in the
warehouse, in the law-courts, and in the market-place. They held what must seem
to be a very anomalous position to mediaeval and modern episcopalians. When
the ancient practice is revived, as it was by the Reformed Church at the Reformation,
episcopalians speak disdainfully of lay-elders and lay-deacons, as if an ecclesiastical
stipend and not consecration by prayer and the laying on or giving of hands
were the true and essential mark of ordination. But the practice had its value
in the early centuries and has its importance now. It knit clergy and laity
together in a very simple and thorough fashion, and brought men, whose life
and callings made them feel as laymen do, within the circle of the hierarchy
which ruled, and so prevented the hierarchy degenerating into a clerical caste.
During the last decades of the second and throughout the third
century the conception of Ignatius, to him perhaps only a devout dream,Compare Ramsay, The Church in the Roman Empire, pp. 370-1,
where he says that Ignatius is not an historian describing facts but a preacher giving advice; and adds that he does not find
in Ignatius proof that bishops were regarded as ex-officio supreme, that his
language is quite consistent with the view that the respect actually paid to
the bishop in each community depended on his individual character, and that
his reiteration of the principle of the authority of the bishop, which came
to him as a revelation, makes it evident that he did not find his ideal in actual
existence. Compare also Sanday in the Expositor (1888, July-Dec.),
p. 326. dominated the whole Church, or at least a great part of it. Every Christian community
had at its head a single president who is almost always called the bishop. He
presided over the session of elders, over the body of deacons, and over the
congregation. The whole Christian activity of
the community found its centre in him, as it does in presbyterian congregations
in the present day. He presided over the public worship in all its parts; had
chief charge of the sick and of the sinful; he was over the discipline and over
the administration of the property of the community whatever that happened to
be. This was his position as a matter of fact. On the other hand, his position
theoretically was by no means so unique. There is many a trace in the ancient
canons, as we shall afterwards see, that the bishop was only primus inter pares
in the session of elders, and that he was distinguished from them by two things
only—a special seat in the church and the power to ordain elders and deacons.
The practice made him the centre of the whole congregational life and the ruler;
the theory recalled the earlier days when every congregation was governed by
a council of elders who had no president. We find the theory in such law-books
as the Canons of Hippolytus;Compare below, p. 248. it was repeated by Jerome; it never lacked supporters
during the Middle Ages, of whom Thomas Aquinas was one; it re-emerged at the
Reformation when the Reformed Church revived the ecclesiastical organization
of the early centuries; and the same difference
between theory and practice exists among
the Reformed Churches in the present day.
The great change in the ministry which we have seen evolving
itself in the three documents selected, and which belonged to the second and
third centuries, was that the ruling body in every congregation changed from
being a session of elders without a president and became a session with a president.
The president, sometimes called the pastor, but usually the bishop, became
gradually the centre of all the ecclesiastical life of the local Christian church
and the one potent office-bearer. We have now to ask how this came about. In
answer one thing only can be asserted with confidence. The change came gradually.
It provoked no great opposition. It was everywhere, or almost everywhere, accepted.
But when we seek for the causes that
produced the change,
or ask what were the paths along which the change manifested itself—then we
can only give conjectural answers.
Probably the main impulse came
from the pressure of temptation—intellectual and moral—and persecution, and
the feeling that resistance to both would be strengthened by a more thorough
unity than could be attained under the leadership of a number of men who had
no individual head. One man can take a firmer grip of things. Divided responsibility
continually means varying counsels. What is the business of many is often the
work of none. A divided leadership continually brings with it fickle and impotent
action. The need for an undivided front in time of danger was what inspired
Ignatius, when, with the eye of a statesman and the fire of a prophet, he pleaded
for the union of the congregation under one leader. The circumstances of the
times and the voices of those who led in the movement, all suggest that the
supreme need of the moment was unity; and that unity could be best won and maintained
by the change which was made.
The paths along which the change
progressed probably differed in various places. It is quite unnecessary to
suppose that the process was everywhere the same. It is much more natural that
there should have been several at work simultaneously. Differences in racial
temperament and in experience in the art of governing; greater or less exposure
to the disruptive influences of strange teaching; more or less capacity to
endure temptations; differences in local environment and in inherited political
usages, might easily produce different modes in the evolution of the ecclesiastical
organization. Dr. Lightfoot has shown, with his usual careful minuteness, how
the three-fold ministry came into being much sooner in some parts of the Empire
than others, and that it appeared first in Asia Minor,Commentary on the Epistle
to the Philippians (1881), 6th ed. p. 206 ff. which differed in the
fact that it was more exposed to the divisive influences of strange teachings,
and that the people had been
long accustomed to the rule of one man in secular affairs. It
well may be imagined that the different social surroundings which belonged to Rome, to the cities
of Greece, and to Asia Minor, bred different ecclesiastical conditions, which
led to the selection of differing paths in the development of the ecclesiastical
organizations.
Professor Ramsay has suggested, ingeniously, one way in which the change may
have come. His idea is that any member of the session of presbyters or elders
became an episcopus or overseer when he was given the oversight of any special
duty by his brethren. The episcopus who did his work well would naturally continue
to do it, and the tendency was for his function to become permanent. One of
the most important duties which fell to the college of elders was correspondence
with other Christian churches and the reception and entertainment of the delegates
who came from other churches to visit them. The elder who had the oversight
of, or was the episcopus for this work, naturally became a very important man.
He was the representative of his own church to all Christians outside it. He
might easily come to represent the unity of the Church to those who also were
inside it, more especially as he was the official who would naturally be selected
to hold the property of the congregation when it became possessed of a place
of burial. Thus he came to stand forth from among the other elders as the episcopus
par excellence. Thus gradually one of the presbyters or elders became the episcopus
for everything within the community, and the session of elders received its
permanent head.The Church in the Roman Empire (1893), p. 367 ff. There is a great deal to be said for this conjecture. For one
thing, there is evidence that the appointment of one of the elders to look
after the communications with other churches was actually a custom;In the Pastor of Hermas, the old lady who represents the Church and who has
given Hermas a revelation orders him to make two books and give one to Clement
and the other to Grapte, “and Clement will send his to the foreign
countries, for commission has been given him to do so, and Grapte will admonish
the widows and the orphans; but you (Hermas, who was a presbyter) will read
the words in this city along with the elders who preside over the Church,”
Visiones, ii. 4. for another
it gives a reasonable explanation of
those lists of bishops in various churches dating back
to times when all the evidence shows that there was no real permanent president in existence.
They are the lists of the men who, being the foreign correspondents, represented
the unity of their respective churches to all Christians outside, and were therefore
regarded as the most prominent members.
It is also probable that the celebration of the Holy Supper suggested one permanent president. It
is easy to conceive how the meeting for “exhortation” could be conducted by
a session of elders, but it is very difficult to imagine a collegiate superintendence
of the meeting for “thanksgiving.” Did the members of the session of presbyter-bishops
or elders take it in turn to preside, or in what way was it done? We do not
know. But we do know that in the second century there was one official who presided
at the Lord’s Supper, and that he, the προεστὼς
or president of Justin Martyr,Apology, i. 67.
is clearly the anticipation of the later bishop. There was evidently some close
connexion in thought between the one bishop and the unity of the congregation
or church at the Holy Supper. One bishop, one place of celebration (θυσιαστήριον)
and one Eucharist are almost
equivalent terms in Ignatius. This thought would lead us to imagine that the
episcopus was the presbyter or elder selected by his brethren to preside at
the Eucharist, and that he was bishop while he was so presiding.Tertullian in his De Praescriptione Haereticorum, 41, speaking
of the condition of the Gnostic or Marcionite Churches, says:—“itaque alius
hodie episcopus, cras alius.” Sohm (Kirchenrecht, i. 119 n.) takes this as a
proof of the condition of things in the most primitive days. He infers that
in the earlier times when there were several bishops in each community the
one who presided at the Eucharist was the bishop for that day, and gave place
to another on another day who thus became the bishop in his turn. It is doubtful
whether we can infer anything about primitive usages from these references in
Tertullian. The presbyter
who had a special gift for this sacred work would naturally
be frequently called to undertake it, and the duty might easily become a permanent
one. In the Sources of the Apostolic Canons it is the bishop or pastor who presides
at the Holy Communion, although he is under the disciplinary authority of the
elders.
It may also be said that the need for one authority in doctrinal
matters led to the selection of one man, and to placing on him the responsibility
of seeing that the members of the congregation were not tempted away from the
true faith by irresponsible teachers, who offered themselves to instruct the
community. This conception, as we shall see later, was developed in a special
way with reference to the office-bearer by Irenaeus, and some critics see it
foreshadowed in the letters of Ignatius.
No one way needs to be selected as the only path by which
the organization advanced, and the college of elders received a president who
was the permanent head of the community, and the living and personal representative
of its unity. They might all have their effect and that simultaneously.
It must always be remembered that the duty of presiding at
the Holy Supper, which is invariably seen to belong to the bishop as soon as
he emerges from the college of presbyters or elders, brought with it the control
over the gifts of the faithful which were presented after the Eucharistic service,
and formed for long the only property of the congregation. If we add to this
that the presbyter or elder chosen for this highest portion of the worship was
frequently a man possessed of the prophetic gift as Ignatius was, additional
reverence and obedience would not fail to be bestowed upon him; and we can see
how the old reverence for the “prophetic ministry” could easily be transferred
to the new authority.
Whatever paths led to the change in the ministry whereby the
rule was transferred from a college of elders without a president to a college
with a president, when once the change was made the power of the episcopus grew
rapidly; and one source
of this increase of authority lay in the fact that he was
always the administrator of the property of the local church.
Without any apostolic sanction, in virtue of the power lying
within the community and given to it by the Master, the Church of the second
century effected a change in its ministry quite as radical, if not more so,
as that made by the Reformed Church in the sixteenth century, when it swept
away mediaeval excrescences, restored the bishops to their ancient position
of pastors of congregations, and vested the power of oversight in councils of
greater and lesser spheres of authority. What was within the power of the Christian
people of the second century belongs to it always when providential circumstances
seem to demand a change in the organization, for the ministry depends on the
Church and not the Church on the ministry.
CHAPTER VI.
THE FALL OF THE PROPHETIC MINISTRY AND THE CONSERVATIVE REVOLT
The prophetic
ministry of the apostolic and immediately sub-apostolic times passed away in
the course of the second century, and its overthrow was a much greater alteration
of the organization of the churches than the institution of a three-fold ministry,
important as that was. The difference may be seen from two extracts. “Every
prophet,” says the oldest ecclesiastical manual, “who speaketh in the Spirit,
ye shall neither try nor judge; for every sin shall be forgiven, but that sin
shall not be forgiven.”Didache, xi. 7.
That comes from a time when the prophetic ministry was the great controlling power. “Wretched
men,” says Irenaeus, “who wish to be false prophets . . . holding aloof from
the communion of the brethren”; and the test of being in communion with the
brethren is “to obey the elders who are in the Church.”Irenaeus, Contra Haereses, III. xi. 9 and IV. xxvi. 2. That comes
from the end of our period.
The change between the time when the prophet was not to be judged, but to be obeyed, and
when disobedience to his commands was believed to be “an unpardonable sin”; and the time when the test of a true prophet was obedience to the office-bearers
of the local church, whose superior he had once been, amounted to a revolution.
It was so, and the overthrow of the supremacy of the prophetic ministry rent the Church in twain.
It was inevitable. The more close and firm the organization of the local churches became the less
room remained for the exercise of the prophetic ministry, which in the nature
of things claimed at once freedom for itself and the power of ruling in some indefinite way over
the churches which admitted its exercise among them. A careful examination of the scanty records of the second century
reveals that the early prophetic ministry was active within the churches down
till the Montanist revolt, and that in the churches which shared in that movement
it was continued, and its place within the Church became accentuated. It is
also possible to show in what way the office-bearers of the local churches could
gradually come to take the place of the prophetic ministry, and how with the
great body of Christians this could be done naturally and without any strong
feeling that there was a real breach with the past.
In St. Paul’s summary of the gifts which the Spirit bestows, and which when manifested within
a community of Christians make it a Church, it can be seen that all these gifts
may be divided into two classes—those which enable their possessors to edify
the brethren by speaking the word of God, and those which fit them for serving
the community in many practical ways. Two of these practical gifts, “pilotings” (κυβερνήσεις) and
“aids” (ἀντιλήψεις)
foreshadow in the abstract the concrete offices of overseer and servant; and from them
the office-bearers of the local churches derive their origin. The task of edifying
by speech belonged primarily to the first class of gifted persons, and the work of edifying
by wise counsels and all manner of brotherly
services belonged to the two branches of the second class out of which the local
office-bearers developed. Edification by the Word of God was the most
important need of the churches; and if the
“gifted” apostles, prophets and teachers failed any community their services
had to be supplied somehow.
The Didache shows
us the transition stage, and explains how this need was supplied in an ordinary
way when the extraordinary means failed. “Appoint, therefore, for yourselves
bishops and deacons worthy of the Lord, men that are meek and are not covetous,
upright and proved; for they also render you the service of the prophets and teachers. Therefore neglect
them not, for they are your honoured ones, together with the prophets and teachers.”
These
words in italics show us at once the point of junction between the prophetic
and the local ministry, and indicate how the latter could fulfil the duties
of the former. They also reveal the possibility of the abolition of the prophetic
ministry as a permanent part of the organization
(to use the word in its widest sense) of the local churches. When the wave
of spiritual enthusiasm and illumination which came with the earliest proclamation
of the Gospel had somewhat spent itself, there was need to supply through the
ordinary office-bearers of the churches that exhortation and instruction which
in the earliest times had been left to the inspiration of those gifted
with the power of speaking the Word of God. Hence the Didache“The peculiar value of the Didache
consists in this, that it reveals to us the process in the moment of transition. It brings
down the bird as it were upon the wing. The sentence italicized explains why
the permanent officials of the Christian Churches did not possess at first
all the functions which they possessed later. They did not possess them because
the more prosaic duties which they themselves discharged were supplemented
by that extraordinary wave of spiritual exaltation which swept over the whole
primitive Church. In that age the wish of Moses was well-nigh fulfilled, that
‘all the Lord’s people were prophets.’ The difficulty was not to incite to
the attainment of such gifts, but to regulate and control them. One by one they
became rarer, and disappeared. The apostolate was the first to go. Prophecy
lasted until it was finally discredited by Montanism. The class of teachers
survived still longer into the third century; indeed, it would hardly be wrong
to regard the Catechetical School of Alexandria as a systematizing of this office,
with learning and philosophy substituted for the primitive enthusiasm.” Sanday,
Expositor (1887, Jan.-June), p. 17.
counsels
the community to select men for its office-bearers in the knowledge that they
may be called upon to supply this need. But when once the local churches began
to have their spiritual needs satisfied within their own circle and the bands
of association grew stronger, it is easy to imagine that the power
of the office-bearers grew strong enough to withstand the members of the prophetic ministry unless
the prophets were content to take a secondary place. The very fact that the
office-bearers could “render the service of the prophets and teachers” inevitably
tended to place them, the permanent officials of the local churches, permanently
in the position of the exhorters, instructors, and leaders of the
public worship of the communities. Hence, while we can trace the presence and the power of the prophetic ministry
during a great part of the second century, we can also see that complaints against
false prophets became more and more common, and that there was a tendency to
make the test of true prophecy subordination on the part of the prophets
to the control of the permanent office-bearers of the churches.Perhaps the earliest trace of this is to be found in Clement, 1 Epistle,
xlviii. 5: “Let a man be faithful, let him be able to expound a deep saying, let him
be wise in the discernment of words, let him be strenuous in deeds, let him
be pure; so much the more ought he to be lowly in mind, in proportion as he seemeth to be greater; and he ought to seek the common advantage of all, and
not his own.”
We can see that the transition from the time when the prophets
were supreme to the days when they were expected, if true prophets, to be subordinate
to or at least deferential towards the office-bearers of the community, was
the more easily effected when we remember that it is highly probable that some
men among those chosen to lead the brethren by their gifts of governing had
also the power of exhortation and instruction. This was probably the case from
the earliest times. The προϊστάμενοι of 1 Thessalonians
v. 12, not only laboured among the brethren but “admonished”; and to “admonish”
(νουθετεῖν) seems to imply more than mere leading. Whatever be the date of the Pastoral
Epistles, it is clear that by the time they were written, the functions of instruction
and leadership were conjoined; and few critics, even among those who dispute
the Pauline authorship, will be inclined to place them as late as Harnack does.If leadership implied instruction in the earliest times (1 Thessalonians) the fact that in the Pastoral Epistles
leadership involves instruction does not imply that these epistles are late. Then, as before remarked, those office-bearers
who stand forth most clearly in these ancient times were almost all men who had
the prophetic gift. We have already seen how the divine afflatus descended on
Ignatius while he was preaching in Philadelphia, and made him cry forth words
which the Spirit put in his mouth. The prophetic gift was to be found among
the office-bearers of the local churches before the conflict of jurisdictions
arose, and the office-bearers who possessed it had all the divine authority
which was supposed to belong to the prophetic order.
All these circumstances have to be taken into account in attempting to describe the great
change in the ministry which the second century witnessed; and the last-mentioned
is useful in enabling us to see how, while the overthrow of the prophetic ministry
was sufficient to provoke a disruption of the Church, it could nevertheless
be accepted by the great mass of the Christian people.
We have no specific information in the documents of post-apostolic Christianity to tell
us how and by what steps the great revolution was brought about; but the conditions
and needs of the time enable
us to put ourselves to some extent in the place
of the men who carried out the change.
Several distinct sets of circumstances require to be kept in mind.
In the first place, the second century was a time of great fermentation in the world of intellectual
paganism. In the east of Europe and among the Greek inhabitants of Asia Minor
the old religions had lost almost all their real power. The same may be said of the people of Italy
also, and especially of the more cultured classes of Rome. It is something pathetic to learn that the only one of the
ancient Greek deities whose cult was still practised with something of the old
reverence and fervour was Esculapius, the god of bodily health, and that he
was called Soter, the Saviour, as if men had despaired of salvation of soul
and could hope for no more than the health of the body. On the other hand, worships strange
to Greek or Roman, coming from the far East, with painful initiations and purifications
fur those who felt the power of sin or the fickleness of imperfection within
them, and weird philosophies for the cultured, spread far and wide, counting
their votaries by thousands and permeating all classes of society.
Among them
were systems of cosmical speculation and mystic theosophy, curiously similar
to what we find in Hinduism, and possessing that strange power of absorbing
and assimilating religious ideas foreign to themselves, which is still such
a feature of Oriental speculation. Votaries of these theosophies were attracted
towards the doctrines of Christianity, caught at the Christian conceptions of
redemption and of the Person of Christ, and tried to find room for them among
the medley of their fantastic beliefs. They set redemption within the circle
of their thoughts about the inherent evil in matter, and the Person of Christ
found its place among the doctrines of emanation. Christianity attracted them
as it still attracts cultivated Hindus. The Brahma Somaj, the Prathana Somaj,
the Arya Somaj, strange attempts to absorb some features of Christianity into
Hinduism in the nineteenth century, had their parallels in some of the Gnostic
speculations of the earlier centuries.
Strange as
it may seem to us, those weird speculations had an attraction for many cultivated
persons who had embraced the Christian faith; for if the whole phenomenon of
Gnosticism was, as it seems most likely to have been, a scheme of thought essentially
pagan, trying to assimilate some leading Christian ideas, there were sides to
the movement which show us men who were really Christians attempting to make
use of these speculations as the metaphysical framework on which to stretch
their Christian thoughts and to give them the shape of a rationalized theology.
These metaphysics of “wonderland,” where the categories of Aristotle and
the ideas of Plato assumed bodily shapes, married and begot a fantastic progeny, filled the intellectual
atmosphere of the times, and were the air which thinkers
breathed. The Church was face to face with the danger of seeing its historical
verities dissolve into the shadowy shapes of a meta-physical mythology. For
when Gnosticism entered into the Christian societies, and claimed to be a philosophical
Christianity, the very life of the Church was threatened.Compare Hatch, The Organisation of the Early Churches (1881), pp. 91, 92.
Nor were these the only difficulties of intellectual speculation which the Church of
the second century had to face. We are apt to think that the apparent contradiction
between an Almighty Maker of all things and the miseries of life is the peculiar
property of our own age. That is not so. Men felt keenly the contrasts which
trouble modern minds. They lived in a civilization as intellectually trained
as our own. How could the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father
of Mercies and the God of all Love, inspire the Old Testament, where the Jews
were ordered to exterminate their enemies and threaten and practise all kinds
of cruelties? How can creation, groaning and travailing in pain, be the work
of that God Who has manifested Himself in Jesus Christ? Nature is not merciful. It
seems hard and pitiless. The mystery of pain broods over it and in it. History
is full of battle and pestilence, of turmoil and misery.
Among men who had ideas like these Marcion was a leader. His solution of the problem was
that the God of the Old Testament and the Creator of the Universe were very
like each other and very unlike the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.
The Being who had created scorpions and sent venimous creeping things into
the world was not unlike the God Who had commanded the slaughter of the Amalekites
and had inspired the imprecatory Psalms. An old world Count Tolstoy, Marcion
said that Christ’s Christianity had nothing to do with any part of the Old Testament,
nor with much of the New. The New
Testament had indeed come from Jesus Christ, but it had been sadly corrupted by the votaries
of the God who created the Universe. He constructed a Canon of Scripture for
himself and for his disciples, and into his Scriptures no portion of the Old
Testament was admitted, and from them much of the New was excluded. He went
back to the Pauline Epistles, the earliest literary creations of the Christian
inspiration, to seek in them the purest records of the teaching of that Saviour,
Who, unheralded, as he thought, by any partial anticipations, had come suddenly
to reveal to the world the hitherto absolutely unknown God of Love and Mercy. Marcion
was a man of deep and genuine religious character,
of an intensely practical nature, and without any tendency to speculation.
He stood forth in that age of mixed faiths, of eclectic paganism and Gnostic
Christianity, as a teacher who had mastered a clear and definite, if narrow,
creed. His sincerity, his piety, his energy and his wonderful powers of organization,
created not merely bands of devoted followers, but a church which, according
to the ideas of those who belonged to it, was a reformation and a purification
of the existing Christianity. Within it asceticism was practised in a manner
hitherto unknown within Christianity. No married persons could ever rise to
be more than catechumens, and members were required to abstain from all sexual
relations; rigid laws about meats and drinks were laid down and enforced;
martyrdom was to be welcomed, not shunned, and the hatred of the great mass
of their fellow-Christians was an additional burden to be endured. Wherever
Christianity had spread the followers of Marcion appeared, formed themselves
into separate churches, with the same ceremonies of worship, the same ecclesiastical
organization, or one very similar, the same, if not greater, strictness of moral
living, and an intenser joy in martyrdom. The dogmatic unity of the Church,
if it ever had been truly and thoroughly one, was broken. Other bodies of Christians,
with separate organizations, appeared standing between the Marcionite and the parent churches, and pagans could
sneer at a divided Christianity and ask the Christians which God, they who
preached His Unity, really worshipped?Compare especially Origen, Contra Celsum, v. 59-64.
Can we wonder then, that in face of these anxieties the leaders of the Christian churches
felt the need for a closer fellowship and a firmer grasp of what they believed
to be the verities of the faith? Irenaeus voiced the clamant need of the Church.
His rallying cry is familiar enough. It is one which has arisen always in such
crises. It was practically this; “Back to the Christ of history: back to
the fixed verities of the Christian faith.”
But how was it possible to get back to these fixed verities of the Christian faith, and
by a path that all could tread? All the more important writings of the New
Testament were already recognized as Scripture in the West, but the prevailing
attitude of mind was towards allegorising, and the Epistle of Barnabas shows
how unhistorical this mystical interpretation could become. If Barnabas could
find a text and proof for the Cross and for Baptism in Psalm i. 3,“Again He saith in another prophet, ‘The
man who doeth these things shall be like a tree planted by the courses of waters,
which shall yield its fruit in due season; and his leaf shall not fade, and
all he doeth shall prosper. . . . Mark how He has described at once both the
water and the cross. For these words imply, Blessed are they who, placing their
trust in the cross, have gone down into the water; for, says He, they shall
receive their reward in due time: then He declares, I will recompense them.’” Epistle of Barnabas, xi.
the Gospels might be drawn upon for proofs as satisfactory for the Gnostic metaphysical
mythology. Tertullian confesses as much, and naïvely remarks that he does not
risk contradiction in saying that the Scriptures were “even arranged” by the
will of God in such a manner as to furnish materials for heretics.De Praescriptione Haereticorum, 39; cf. 19.
The bent of the philosophy of the day was to dissolve facts into theories, and the
Platonists in their expositions of Homer had taught orthodox Christian and Gnostic
alike their elusive methods of exegesis. Then, apart from the impossibility of using a sound exegesis which
yielded a common method of interpretation,
the question of what was the canon of the New Testament Scripture was one of the matters in dispute
between the organized Christian Church and those believers in Christ who were
outside its pale. Marcion had a canon of his own, as we have already seen;
the various Gnostics had theirs, not always the same—for what we call the
apocryphal Gospels and Acts were received by many. Nor could an appeal be made
to any short common creed. There was none as yet common to all Christendom,
although what lies at the basis of the Apostles’ Creed was received throughout the Church and had
become fixed in a form of words in the West.The Apostles’ Creed in its earlier form, the old Roman Creed, can be traced as far back as 150 A.D. Various Gnostics had their creeds
differing from each other, and to them they appealed.We can reconstruct the creed of the Gnostic Apelles from Hippolytus (Refutation of all the Heresies,
vii, 26); “We believe, That Christ descended from the Power above, from the Good, and that He is the
Son of the Good; That He was not born of a Virgin and that when He did appear,
He was not devoid of flesh; That He formed His Body by taking portions of it
from the substance of the universe, i.e. hot and cold, moist and dry;
That He received cosmical powers in the Body, and lived for the time
He did in the world; That He was crucified by the Jews and died; That being
raised again after three days He appeared to His disciples; That he showed
them the prints of the nails and (the wound) in His side, being desirous of
persuading them that He was no phantom, but was present in the flesh; That
after He had shown them His Flesh He restored it to the earth; That after
He had once more loosed the chains of His Body He gave back heat to what is hot, cold to what is cold, moisture to what
is moist and dryness to what is dry; That in this condition he departed to
the Good Father, leaving the Seed of Life in the world for those who through
His disciples should believe in Him.” Cf. Tertullian, Adversus Marcion, i. 1 (Marcion’s
regula fidei); De Praescriptione Haereticorum, 42; Irenaeus, Against Heresies. III. xi. 3. Disputes also existed
about the true apostolic tradition whether Jesus had or had not entrusted His
apostles with a secret doctrine in addition to what He openly taught, and whether
that “secret teaching” had been communicated to any by the apostles, and
if so to whom.The Pistis Sophia, the only complete Gnostic treatise which has descended to us, has a great deal to say
about this secret teaching of our
Lord and how it was given and transmitted and was the teaching which the author of the
book accepted. The book has been translated into English by G. R. S. Mead (1896). Compare
Irenaeus, Against Heresies, III, ii. 1.
Amidst this medley of beliefs and assertions Irenaeus assured the faithful that it was easy
to know what the simple and fixed verities of the Christian faith really were.
They are everywhere the same. Ask Christians of the most different classes,
whether cultured inhabitants of centres of civilization or nomade Scythians
roaming over the steppes in waggons and unable to read or to write, and the
answer will be everywhere the same. He describes what the answer will be, and
gives a short string of sentences resembling the Apostles’
Creed.Against Heresies, I. x. 1; cf. III. iv. 2. The Church,
he says, though scattered throughout the world, preserves this creed, “as if it were some precious
deposit in an excellent vessel”III. xxiv. 1; elsewhere, “The apostles, like a rich man in a bank lodged in the
hands (of the Church) most copiously all things pertaining to the truth: so
that every man, whosoever will, can draw from her the water of life” (III. iv. 1). Varieties
of language do not interfere with the meaning of the truths of the faith; “the churches which have been planted in Germany do not believe nor hand down
anything different, nor do those in Gaul, nor those in the East, nor
those in Egypt.”Against Heresies, I. x. 2. He declares that the sentences which he gives
as containing the simple verities of the Christian belief can be proved to be
what he has said, because there are in the Christian Church successive generations
of men who go back to the time of the apostles who were the companions of Jesus.
His argument is always: I know a man who knew a man who knew an apostle.The sentence condenses his argument; but it is interesting to remember that he uses the
words himself:—“I have heard from an aged elder who had heard it from those
who had seen the apostles, and from those who had been their disciples” (IV. xxvii. 1).
There are in the various churches scattered throughout the world successions of men who
have been taught generation by
generation what the fixed verities of the Christian faith are. In some of these churches
the successions go back to the times of the primitive apostles themselves, who
taught the first generation of believers. If questionings arise, if speculations
trouble, if plain men are bewildered by the gorgeous phantasy of Gnostic theosophy
or by the sincere if narrow logic of Marcion, if the canon of New Testament
Scripture is doubtful or if the original documents have been tampered with,
if the allegorising exegesis makes the whole of Scripture of doubtful interpretation,
there is a common-sense remedy for all these evils and one which has been constantly
used. Apply to the men who are in the best position for knowing what the apostles
really taught, what words they used, and what meaning they attached to these
words. “If there arise a dispute about any ordinary question among us, should
we not have recourse to the most ancient churches with whom the apostles held
constant intercourse, and learn from them what is certain and clear with regard
to it it?”Against Heresies, III. iv. 1. This is no new means of arriving at the truth, he
urges. It is what is constantly done. There are believers in Christ who cannot
read, who cannot make use of any written documents which the apostles have
left, but who “have salvation written in their hearts by the Spirit, without
paper or ink,” and who have received orally the ancient tradition, and have
become very wise in doctrine, morals, and tenor of life.Ibid. iv. 2.
Irenaeus proposed to give to this old and much used method of finding out what were the
primary and fixed verities of the Christian faith the sanction of an ecclesiastical
usage. Here we meet for the first time, outside the Roman Church, the thought
of a succession from the apostles in the office-bearers of the local churches; but it is a very different thing from the “gigantic figment” of an Apostolic
Succession which dominates the Anglican and is a law in the Roman Church of
the present day. It is meant to be a simple and clear way to find out what the
real faith of the Church is in a time of more than usual
perplexity. This is evident from the application Irenaeus makes of his principle, and it
is also clear from the manner in which Tertullian, who adopts the principle,
illustrates the use to be made of it. “Run over the apostolic churches, in
which the very chairs (cathedrae) of
the apostles still guard their places (suis locis praesident), where
their own unmutilated (authenticae)
writings
are read, uttering the voice and representing the face of each of them individually.
Achaia is near you; you find Corinth. You are not far from Macedonia; you
have Philippi; you have the Thessalonians. You are able to cross to Asia;
you find Ephesus. You are close upon Italy: you have Rome.”Tertullian, De Praescriptione Haereticorum, xxxvi. In
all these churches apostles once taught; to all these churches they sent epistles
which are to this day read; their voices are still living there, and their very
presence seems still to haunt them. From their days until now, such is the
argument, men with the gifts of leadership and of wisdom had been office-bearers
in these communities and in others founded, if not by apostles, by “apostolic
men”;Ibid. xxxii. each generation had been carefully trained in the apostolic
doctrine by their predecessors, and they were able to judge what the simple
verities of the Christian faith were. What Irenaeus proposes is that the office-bearers
who are in the succession are to be made the judges of what wholesome Christian
teaching is. It is the fact of an uninterrupted succession of responsible men
that is the natural and historical guarantee that the doctrines once transmitted
to the fathers have been retained in the memory of the sons. For some generations
it is probable that individual men had presided at the head of the Christian
communities, and Irenaeus might have simply spoken of a succession of bishops,
but he does not; it is the whole body of elders and bishops that Irenaeus
has in view. This can be seen only when all his allusions to the matter are
read. They will be found in the footnote.‘When we refer them to that tradition which originates from the apostles and which is
preserved by means of the successions of elders in
the Churches,” Irenaeus, Against Heresies, III. ii. 2. “It is therefore
within the power of all, in every Church, who may wish to see the truths to
contemplate the tradition of the apostles manifested throughout the whole world; and we are in a position to reckon up those who, by the apostles, were instituted
bishops in the Churches, and the succession of these men to our own times,” III.
iii. 1. Irenaeus then gives the succession of bishops in Rome, and proceeds: “In this order and by this succession, the ecclesiastical
tradition from the apostles and the preaching of the truth
have come down to us,” III. iii. 3. “Wherefore it is incumbent to obey the elders who are in the Church—those
who, I have shown, possess the succession from the apostles; those who, together
with the succession of the oversight (episcopate) have received the charisma
of truth according to the good pleasure of the Father; but to hold in suspicion
others who depart from the primitive succession and assemble themselves together
in any place whatsoever,” IV. xxvi. 2. “It behoves us to adhere to those, who,
as I have already observed, do hold the doctrine of the apostles, and who, together
with the order of the presbyterate (presbyterii ordine), display sound speech
and blameless conduct for the confirmation and correction of others,” IV. xxvi.
4. “Such elders does the Church nourish, of whom also the prophet says:
‘I will give thy rulers in peace, and thy bishops in righteousness,’
. . . where therefore the gifts of the Lord have been placed, there it behoves
us to learn the truth—from those who possess that succession of the Church
which is from the apostles,” IV. xxvi. 5. “As I have heard from a certain elder,
who had heard it from those who had seen the apostles and from those who had
been their disciples,” IV. xxvii. 1. “Then every word shall also
seem consistent to him, if he for his part read the scriptures diligently in
company with those who are the elders in the Church, among whom is the apostolic
doctrine, as 1 have pointed out,” IV. xxxii. 1. “Agnitio vera est apostolicorum
doctrinae, et antiquus ecclesiae status in universo mundo et character corporis
Christi secundum successiones episcoporum quibus illi eam, quae in unoquoque loco
est, ecclesiam tradiderunt: quae pervenit usque ad nos custoditione sine fictione
scripturarum tractatio plenissima, neque additamentum neque ablationem recipiens,”
IV. xxxiii. 8. Eusebius quotes Irenaeus (Ecclesiastical History, V. xx. 4) addressing
a friend, Florinus, who had lapsed into Valentinianism, “These opinions, those
elders who preceded us, and who were conversant with the apostles did not hand down to thee.”
Tertullian, who is twenty years later than Irenaeus, always speaks of successions of bishops
or chief pastors.Tertullian, De Praescriptione Hacreticorum, 32, 36. In both cases, however, the main thought is that there are
in the various local churches actual successions of men who, because these successions
go back to the actual times of the apostles, can be
said to have known men who knew apostles or apostolic men, and who are therefore
able to know what the apostles really meant to teach. With both writers the
succession they speak of as a guarantee of the correctness of the Church’s creed
and as a pledge of her dogmatic unity, is an historical succession, and the
conception is a matter of fact and not of dogma.
Yet with
both something is added to this purely historical conception of the succession.
There is an addition, the thought somewhat indefinitely formulated that these
men who are office-bearers in the succession have a charisma veritatis because
of their official position.Against Heresies, IV. xxvi. 2:—“certum veritatis
charisma.” In IV. xxvi. 5, Irenaeus speaks of the “gifts” of God bestowed
upon the Church in the apostles, prophets and teachers, i.e. the old prophetic ministry always
believed to have been specially charismatic, and then adds, “where
therefore the ‘gifts of the Lord’ have been placed, there it behoves us
to learn the truth from those who possess that succession of the Church
which is from the apostles”; and in the preface to Book III.
he applies to the apostles, and presumably to those who are in the succession
from them, the words of our Lord in addressing the Seventy, “He that heareth
you, heareth Me; and he that despiseth you, despiseth Me and Him that sent
Me” (Luke x. 16; cf. Matt. x. 40).
At the same time it is very doubtful if
the thought of an official charisma veritatis is definitely
and distinctly before the minds of either Irenaeus or Tertullian in the sense
of something which belongs to the office-bearers exclusively and as something
coming to them from their office. Both writers were too strongly possessed with
the idea that the whole Church is the sphere of the Spirit to limit the action
of the Spirit of Truth to the office-bearers, and the idea that a charisma was something
which was given to the individual and not to the office was powerfully felt
not only in their time but much later. Irenaeus says expressly: “‘For in
the Church,’ it is said, ‘God hath placed apostles, prophets and teachers,’
and all the other means through which the Spirit works; of which all those
are not partakers who do not join themselves to the Church, but defraud themselves
of life through their perverse opinions and infamous behaviour. For where the
Church is there is the Spirit of God; and where the Spirit of God is
there is the Church and every kind of grace; but the
Spirit is truth” (III. xxiv. 1). The Spirit of Truth was in the whole Church and not confined to any
class in it; and it is possible to argue that according to Irenaeus the special
charisma of those in office was the advantage that their position
in the succession gave them of knowing the truth transmitted. Both Irenaeus
and Tertullian asserted that members within the Church might
and did possess the “gift” of true prophecy (Irenaeus, Against Heresies, I. xiii.
4; II. xxxii. 4; xxxiii. 3; III. xi. 9; V. vi. 1), and Tertullian’s
so-called Montanist period is simply his recoil from where he perceived this theory of
an official charisma veritatis was leading him (cf. specially his De Pudicitia). Even in
Cyprian’s days this idea of an official inspiration was not accepted without
some misgivings; and although the bishops at his North African Councils in
recording their votes gave their opinion and that of the Holy Spirit, the idea
that the inspiration was after all personal is evidenced in the part which dreams
and visions play (Epist. lvii. 5). The thought is not very strongly
dwelt on by Irenaeus; but it is present in one or two passages quoted in the note below,
and in the second it is plain that whatever use he makes of it with reference
to office-bearers what he has in his mind is the “gift” which in earlier days
was exclusively associated with the prophetic ministry.This indefinite
thought (for with Irenaeus it is indefinite) that in addition to the natural
means of knowing the true Christian doctrine which comes from being in the regular
succession of office-bearers in places where the apostles themselves taught,
there is a charisma veritatis which is official, is
the germ of the Romanist doctrine of tradition; and although the road may be long between the certum
veritatis charisma and the utterance of Pope Pius IX., “Io sono la tradizione,”
the milestones may be marked. Some Anglicans make much of the thought that there
is a charisma veritatis attached
to the succession of office-bearers (they say bishops), and put a great deal
more into it than Irenaeus ever intended; but it is somewhat dangerous for
their own theories to do so. It is part of the conception of Irenaeus that the
Church which has the surest claim to know what are the verities of the Christian
faith is the Church in Rome, and he insists that every other Church ought to
agree with the Christian society in the capital city. “It
is a matter of necessity,” he says, “that every Church should agree with this
Church propter potiorem principalitatem” (III. iii. 2), and however
the words propter principalitatem be
translated the idea in the mind of Irenaeus is the simple historical one that
the two greatest apostles both taught there and that their teaching had been
remembered by means of the succession of office-bearers; place the dogmatic
instead of the historical idea and you have papal infallibility.
It is evident that this new official task of guaranteeing the true apostolic teaching, which
is laid upon the office-bearers in general, and on the pastors or bishops in
particular, must have had a very restraining effect upon the prophetic ministry,
and on the unlimited freedom of exhortation which characterized the churches
in the first century and in many decades of the second century. The office-bearers who were in the succession
were now made the judges of what ought to be taught to the people in exhortation
and in instruction; and they were therefore set in the position of judging
all who undertook the function which was the peculiar work of the prophetic
ministry. Besides, it was suggested that the peculiar veritatis charisma, the
“gift” which gave them their unique and distinguished position, belonged to
the office-bearers of the churches as well as the “gift” of government. The
indications are that the suggestion of Irenaeus had been acted on long before
he placed it on record. Whenever it came to be the accepted rule in the Church
the revolution became an accomplished fact; and the men who had been supreme
(the prophets), and whom to disobey had been accounted an unpardonable sin,
became the servants of the office-bearers whose superiors they once had been.
The need
for some authority to express the dogmatic unity of the Church, and the idea
that this authority lay in the office-bearers of the churches, must have placed
the prophetic ministry in an inferior position and tended to destroy it altogether.
For though the position assigned to the heads of the churches meant practically
that they were to be the judges of what the proper instruction was, and did
not necessarily mean that they were in every case to take the instruction in
their own hands, still that was bound to come out of the idea in the end. The
office-bearers, and especially the bishops, would inevitably become the instructors
as well as the judges of the instruction that was given.
Another set
of circumstances working for the downfall
of the prophetic ministry. The Rescript of the Emperor Hadrian to Minucius
Fundanus, who was Proconsul of Asia sometime about 124 A.D., was rightly regarded
by the Christians as the beginning of an era of comparative toleration.On this Rescript of Hadrian’s
compare Ramsay, The Church in the Roman Empire (1893), pp. 320 ff.; Lightfoot,
Apostolic Fathers: S. Ignatius, S. Polycarp (1885),
i. pp. 460-4; Mommsen, Der Religionsfrevel nach römischen Recht in the
Histor. Zeitschrift, vol. lxiv. (xxviii.), pt. iii. iii. 389 ff.; Harnack, Die Chronologie der altchristlichen Literatur (1897),
pp. 256, n. 6. These authors all believe in the genuineness
of the Rescript. Keim and others reject it on very superficial grounds. The
Rescript itself is to be found at the end of the First Apology of Justin Martyr. The
character of the great Emperor, his curiosity, half cynical half hopeful, about all kinds
of religious faiths, made them expect great things from him. Christian literature
struck a bolder note. The writings of the apologists began to appear, who demanded
on behalf of their brethren to be treated like their fellow-subjects, free to
live, so long as they did not transgress against the laws of morality, under
the shelter of the wide-spreading pax Romanorum. Christianity
found a voice and demanded to be heard, pleading for the toleration which was
granted to all other religions. The earliest of these writers was probably Quadratus.
Aristides, Justin Martyr, Miltiades, Melito, Tatian, Athenagoras and others
followed in succession. From our modern standpoint these documents are but feeble
expositions of the Christian faith; Tertullian alone, with his lofty elevation
of sentiment and his stern moral enthusiasm, seems to be an apologist for all
time. But if these writings are looked upon, as they ought to be, in the light
of pleas for some way of living quietly and peaceably under the imperial rule,“Grant us the same rights, we ask for nothing more, as those
who persecute us,” Athenagoras, Plea for the Christians, 3.
they are very interesting documents. They almost invariably take the same line
of argument. Christianity, they say, can have no quarrel with good government; its morals are purer than those of paganism, and are therefore a better protection
to the State; Christians cannot pray to the Emperor, but they always pray for
him; they are and they mean to be loyal citizens of the great commonwealth to which they belong. It is strange
to observe an undertone of admiration for the imperial rule under which they
live, and a conviction that all would be well if the emperors could only learn
what Christianity really is,Athenagoras, Plea, etc., 37; Theophilus, To Autolycus, i. 11; Tertullian, Apology, 1;
“If in this case alone you are ashamed or afraid
to exercise your authority in making public inquiry with the
carefulness which becomes justice.”
and to notice how they almost invariably distinguish the imperial ruler from those who persecute
them. Tatian seems even to discern that there is a universal humane aim in the
imperial rule, that it has proclaimed in some shadowy way the brotherhood of
mankind, that there is a measure of resemblance between the empire and Christianity,
and that the two ought to be allies and not foes.The design of Christianity is to put an end to slavery and to
“rescue us from a multiplicity of rulers and from ten thousand tyrants” (Address to the
Greeks, xxix.); “there ought to be one common polity for all” (xxviii.). They all look forward to
a possible accommodation between the imperial government and the Christian societies.
Tertullian indeed pleads that the Christian churches ought to be allowed to
enrol themselves as associations for practising a lawful religion.
But the more thoughtful and politic among the leaders of the Christian societies could not
help seeing that if there was to be any accommodation with the empire there
must be some change on the part of the Christian societies, and that Christians
must to some extent change their habits of life if they were to mingle more freely with their fellow-men
who were not Christians. In the earlier times
Christianity was held to be a “mode of life,” to use the expression
of Tatian;Tatian, Address to the Greeks, xlii. Christians were men and women who had little or nothing to do with this world; who were not to conform
themselves to it in any way, and were not to mingle in its pursuits nor in its
pleasures. They were little separate secluded societies, awaiting on the threshold
the opening of the new heavens and the new earth. The earliest Christians were
content with this, and asked for nothing more.
The middle of the second century, however, witnessed a change which may be best
indicated by saying that the Christian faith was attracting to it multitudes
of people drawn from all classes and ranks in society—imperial officials, merchants,
lawyers, men of culture and leisure. It was gathering round it men from the
camp and from the court, men who were in the midst of the bustle of life and
who meant to remain there. Tertullian might prove that no soldier could be a
Christian, and collections of ecclesiastical canons of a still later date might
corroborate him,De corona militis; Canons of Hippolytus, can. xiv. (Riedel, Die Kirchenrechtsquellen
des Patriarchats Alexandrien, p. 207). but he himself gives evidence that there must have been many
Christians in the army.Apology, 5:—“The letters of Marcus Aurelius, that most grave of Emperors,
in which he bears his testimony that that Germanic drought was
removed by the rains obtained through the prayers of the Christians who
happened to be fighting under him.” He speaks of the way in which the Christians mingled
with their pagan neighbours. “We sojourn with you in the world, abjuring
neither forum, nor shambles, nor bath, nor booth nor workshop, nor inn, nor
weekly market, nor any other place of commerce. We sail with you, we fight with
you, and till the ground with you; and in like manner we unite with you in
your traffickings.”Apology, 42.
A question of the utmost gravity faced the leaders of the Christian societies. Should all
the new classes of converts be permitted to remain in their callings, and—for
this was the question involved—should the Church accept the new condition of
things, and begin to adapt itself to the forms and conditions of the world around
it? Should it, as far as conscience permitted, respect the amenities of life,
or should it remain what it had hitherto been—a communion of persons who hoped
for nothing from existing society, and who lived altogether apart from it?
Much could be said on both sides. On the one hand, it could be urged that Christianity
had a world-wide mission, and that if it could lay hold on the organization
of the empire and use it for the extension of the knowledge of its Lord, it
was only taking the path which Providence had plainly marked out for its progress.
On the other hand, many Christians discerned the temptations which lay in accepting
this view of the Church’s duty.
In the end the leaders of the Christian societies seem to have spontaneously and gradually
come to see that it was their duty to bring their followers into what accommodation
was possible with the conditions of existing society. It was this feeling that
rendered the writings of the apologists possible. The time of enthusiasm had
passed away for the great majority of Christians. Unimpassioned conviction took
the place of the earlier almost unrestrained passion of faith. One can scarcely
fancy Ignatius of Antioch writing in the tone of cool argument which characterises
the apologists.
The change of moral and intellectual atmosphere did not suit the prophetic ministry, which
had been the enthusiastic element from the beginning, and had become the element
of asceticism. It was unavoidable that it should lose its old place and its
ancient power. Pleasant things continued to be said about prophets, provided
only they accepted a position under the office-bearers of the local churches.
Curious regulations appear in some of the ancient canons, enjoining the people
to respect their utterances. In the ancient Syrian collection known as the Testamentum
Jesu Christi, for example,Testamentum Jesu Christi, edited by Rahman (1899), p. 37. Among
the proclamations made by the deacon before the Eucharistic service is: Si quis prophetas despicit,
semet segreget. The Testament also says:—Si
quis autem verba prophetica dicit, mercedem habebit, p. 79. those who despise prophecy are debarred from coming to the Holy Supper, but
the prophets were no longer the superior ministry in the churches.
There is also evidence leading us to believe that the prophetic ministry had been deteriorating.
From the very beginning men had claimed to be included within its ranks who
were not true prophets. Warnings against such persons are to be found within
the New Testament writings,Matt. vii. 15; xxiv. 11, 24;
Mark xiii. 22; Acts xiii. 6;
2 Peter ii. 1; 1 John iv. 1-3;
Rev. ii. 2, 14, 15, 20. and they occur, and with increasing strength, in
writers of the second century. We have
seen them in the Didache.Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho, 82; Irenaeus, Against Heresies, I. xiii.
3; III. xi. 9; Eusebius, Hist. Eccles. V. xvii. 1-4; Apostolic Constitutions, VII. xxxii.;
VIII. ii.; Didache, xi. 1, 2, 8. Justin
Martyr cites their presence in the Church as a proof that Christianity is the
true development of Judaism, because the Christians have among them false prophets as well as true
ones like the ancient Israel.Dialogue with Trypho, lxxxii.:—“For the prophetical gift remains with
us even to the present time. Hence you ought to understand that the gifts formerly
among your nation have been transferred to us. And just as there were false
prophets contemporaneous with your holy prophets, so there are many false teachers
among us, of whom our Lord forewarned us to beware; so that in no respect are
we deficient, since we know that He foreknew all that would happen to us after
His resurrection from the dead and ascension to heaven. For He said that we
would be put to death and hated for His Name sake; and that many false prophets
and false Christs would appear in His name and deceive many; and so it has
come about. For many have taught, too, and even yet are teaching those
things which proceed from the unclean teaching of the devil and which are put into their hearts.” Hermas has
given expressive pictures of the true and the false prophets.Hermas, Pastor, Mandata, xi:—“He
showed me some men sitting on a seat, and one man sitting on a chair. And he
says to me, ‘Do you see the persons sitting on the seat?’ ‘I do,’
I said. ‘These,’ he says, ‘are the faithful, and he who sits on
the chair is a false prophet, ruining the minds of the servants of God. It is
the doubters, not the faithful, he ruins.’ . . . ‘How then,
sir,’ I say, ‘will a man know which of them is the prophet, and which is the
false prophet?’ ‘I will tell you,’ he says, ‘about both prophets,
and then you can test the true and the false prophet according to my directions.
Test the man who has the Spirit of God by his life. For he who has the Divine
Spirit proceeding from above, is meek
and peaceable and humble and refrains from all iniquity and the vain
desire of this world and contents himself with fewer wants than those of other
men, and when asked he makes no reply; nor does he speak privately, nor when
a man wishes the Spirit to speak does the Holy Spirit speak, but it speaks
only when God wishes it to speak. When, then, a man having
the Divine Spirit comes into an assembly of righteous men who have faith in
the Divine Spirit, and this assembly of men offers up prayer to God, then the
angel of the prophetic Spirit, who is destined for him, fills the man; and
the man being filled with the Holy Spirit, speaks to the multitude as the Lord
wishes. Thus then the Spirit of Divinity becomes manifest. Whatever power therefore
comes from the Spirit of Divinity belongs to the Lord. Hear then,’ he says, ‘in regard to the Spirit which
is earthly and empty and foolish and powerless. First the man who seems to have
the Spirit exalts himself, and wishes to have the first seat, and is bold and
impudent and talkative, and lives in the midst of many luxuries and many other
delusions, and takes reward for his prophecy; and if he does not receive rewards
he does not prophesy. Can then the Divine Spirit take rewards and prophesy?
It is not possible that the Spirit of God should do this, but prophets of this
character are possessed of an earthly spirit. Then it never approaches an assembly
of righteous men but shuns them. And it associates with doubters and the vain,
and prophesies to them in a corner and deceives them, speaking to them, according
to their desires, mere empty words. . . . This then is the mode of life of both
the prophets. Try by his life and by la’s deeds the man who says that he is
inspired. But as for you, trust the Spirit which comes from
God, and has power; but the spirit which is empty and earthly trust
not at all, for there in no power in it; it comes from the devil.’” All this was a sign of the times.
These various influences combined to help forward the revolution which excluded the prophetic
ministry from its earlier position of supremacy and installed the local official
ministry in the supreme place of rule. They worked slowly and surely during
the second century, and especially during the first half of the period.
But while this movement was going on, and its effects on the prophetic ministry were gradually
manifesting themselves, protesting voices were raised. This movement fostered
by the official ministry of the local churches was a departure, it seemed to
many, from the traditions of the Church which they had in reverence; and it
was accompanied by a relaxation of the stern rule of Christian life under which
the earlier generations had lived and died. The prophetic ministry had always
been considered as the direct gift of God to the Church. It was the ministry
from above. It had been placed by St. Paul second only to the apostolate. Souls had been won from heathenism
through its ministrations. The lives of believers had been braced by it to endure
the hardships and persecutions which their Master had foretold them would fall
upon them, and which they had been taught to regard as their blessed lot while
this life lasted. They saw that with the neglect of the prophetic ministry
there went hand in hand an attempt at conformity with the world and a relaxation of the
more rigid rules of the Christian life. It was by no means the worst kind of
Christians who called upon the Church to halt in this rapid approach to the
usages of the world, in this relaxation of the severer maxims of the Christian
life, in this neglect or undervaluing of the prophetic ministry, and in this
exaltation of the office-bearers of the local churches. They grew increasingly
alarmed and uneasy in the presence of the silent movement above described. It
was taking from them some of their most precious possessions. They began to
feel that there was no room for them in the Church which had hitherto sheltered
them. All this was felt most strongly, as was to be expected, in the regions
more remote from the great centres of public life, where the pressure of coming
to some terms with the State was lighter. The standard of revolt was raised
in the mountainous region of Phrygia—a land not thoroughly incorporated within
the Roman administration. The movement was headed by a presbyter or elder,
called Montanus, and became known as Montanism. It was natural that the crisis
should emerge in these regions of Asia. No portion of the empire was so peopled
by Christians. Christian prophecy had flourished in the neighbouring regions.
The daughters of Philip had lived in the great city of Hierapolis. The Christian
prophets Quadratus and Ammia had belonged to Philadelphia.Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History, V. xvii. 3. Attalus of Pergamos
had been taught in visions.Ibid. V. iii. 2. Polycarp, the most distinguished Christian
of the whole of Asia, was a prophet. Ignatius had exhibited his prophetic gifts
in Philadelphia.Epistle to the Philadelphians, 7. On the other hand, if the country had produced many Christian
prophets, its churches had been the earliest to organize themselves under the
three-fold ministry. The prophetic and the local ministries confronted each
other there as they did nowhere else.
This Phrygian movement was the centre and exaggeration
of a wide-spreading revolt and separation from the great Church of the second and third centuries. It has been represented as an attempt at
innovation on the old usages and habits of primitive Christianity. This is a
mistaken view. At the same time if we confine our attention to the actions
and claims of Montanus himself and the circle
of Phrygia immediately surrounding him, there was much that was entirely new.
Montanus’ idea seems to have been that he had been commissioned by God to gather
all true Christians into a community, which would be ready by its renunciation
of all the claims that social life presented and by an absolute self-surrender
to the requirements of the higher Christian life, to meet the Lord Who was
about to come and inaugurate His millennial kingdom in the immediate future.
He seems to have believed that the Church had reached its final term of existence
in the world. He and his fellow prophets therefore represented the last stage
of prophecy, and consequently possessed an inspiration such as none of their
predecessors could lay claim to. They in their own persons and with their special
prophetic gifts, were the literal fulfilment of the promise given by our Lord
in the Gospel of St. John, that the Father and the Son would take up their abode
in true believers, and that the Paraclete had come to abide with them.Compare St. John’s Gospel, xiv. 16-26; xv. 7-15.
It ought to be remembered that the most strenuous opponents of the Montanists denied the authenticity
and authority of the Gospel of St. John and also of the Apocalypse. Hence
when they spoke under the influence of the divine afflatus it was not they,
but the Spirit, that uttered the words. So entirely were the prophets separated
from the Spirit, who made use of their organs of speech, that the oracles were
uttered in the first person,Compare the prophetic utterances as collected by Bonwetsch in his Geschichte des Montanismus, pp.
197 ff., Oracles 1, 3, 4, 5, 12, 18, 21. It ought to be remembered however that this applies only to some of the utterances. and the Spirit, speaking through the mouth of
a woman, used the masculine forms of speech.Compare oracle 11; it is from Epiphanius, Heresies, xlviii. 13. All this was new.
On the other hand, if the Phrygian movement be connected; as it must be, with the strenuous
action of Christians in Gaul, North Africa, and indeed throughout most parts
of the empire, these novelties were toned down in such a way that very little
that was new remained. We may mis-read the Montanist utterances which belong
to its earliest period if we interpret them as Tertullian and others did;Harnack, whose view of Montanism is very much his own, insists strongly upon this. Compare
his History of Dogma, ii. 95 n. 2 (Engl. Trans.). On the other hand it must be remembered that the Montanist
sayings recorded have all, save those which have come to us from Tertullian,
been transmitted by their bitter enemies who may have exaggerated.
but there is no misreading the feelings, thoughts and strivings of that great
mass of Christians that welcomed the movement as something which encouraged
them to resist that secularising of the Church which was being pressed forward
by the heads of so many of the more powerful Christian communities.
When Dr. SalmonDictionary of Christian Biography, iii. 943b. says that the bulk of what Tertullian taught as a Montanist he probably
would equally have taught if Montanus had never lived, the statement, thoroughly
correct, shows that Tertullian and the conservative Christians he represented
saw in the Montanist movement something which was no innovation, but a strong
assistance in preserving the old condition of the Church with its prophetic
ministry, its rules for daily life, its separation from the world, and its expectation
of the nearness of the coming of the Lord to found His millennial kingdom.
The real question between these conservative Christians and the majority of
their brethren was not about the government of the local churches. They all
accepted the three-fold ministry, and both parties professed to accept and to
honour prophecy. But the advanced party, which in the end triumphed, would subject
the prophets to the official ministry; while the conservatives insisted that
prophecy should be free as in the old days, and specially free to interfere with and rebuke the
growing desire for conformity with the world and for coming to terms with the State.Compare Ramsay, The Church in the Roman Empire, p. 435.
A conservative reaction can scarcely avoid exaggerating the phases of Church life or organization
for which it contends and perhaps suffers. This was probably true of the reaction
in the second and in the beginning of the third centuries; but the conception
that Montanism in the larger sense of the word (i.e. in the sense which includes
Tertullian) was an innovation, and that the party in the Church which it attacked
were carrying on the old line of Church life and usages, is untenable and in
face of all the facts of history. The distinctive features of Montanism: its
appreciation of the prophetic ministry, its conception of the Gospel as the
new law, its refusal to entrust the office-bearers of the local churches with
the restoration of those who had lapsed into grievous sins unless on the recommendation
of a prophet speaking in the Spirit, and its views about the near approach of
the millennial kingdom of the Lord, were all characteristic of the earlier Christianity.
The question of prophecy may be taken as an example:
It is true that after the
separation between the Montanists and the “great” Church, Christian theologians
vehemently opposed the Montanist theory of the nature of prophecy, and especially
protested against the idea that true prophecy was ecstatic. But this was an
afterthought for the purpose of discrediting the Montanist movement and claims.
This can be shown by a comparison of the statements made about the prophecy
which existed and was honoured within the Christian Church before the Montanist
movement arose and while the earlier stages of the antagonism lasted.For Montanism compare:—Ritschl, Die Entstehung der altkatholischen Kirche (1857), 2nd ed.
pp. 462-554; Bonwetsch, Geschichte des Montanismus (1881); also article
in the Zeitschrift für kirchliche Wissenschaft and kirchliches Leben (1884) on
Die Prophetie im apostolischen and nachapostolischen Zeitalter; Renan, Les Crises du Catholicisme
Naissant, Revue des Deux Mondes (1881), Febr. 15; also in his Marc Aurèle (1882), pp. 208 ff.;
Voigt, Eine verscholl ne Urkunde des antimontanistischen Kampfes (1891);
articles on Montanism in the Dictionary of Christian Biography
by Salmon, in the Encyclopædia Britannica by Harnack,
and in Herzog’s Real-Encyclopædie by Möller; Harnack’s Das Monchthum,
seine Ideale and seine Geschichte (1886), 3rd ed.; and his History of Dogma (1896),
ii. pp. 94-108 of the Engl. Transl. The monograph of Bonwetsch is the most complete.
He has collected in an appendix (p. 197) all the recorded utterances of the
Montanists, and an elaborate statement of all our sources of information appears on pp. 16-55. The nature of the
Christian prophecy remains the same down to the time of Irenaeus, whose descriptions
are not different from those of Justin Martyr. Justin declares that prophetic
gifts existed in the Church in his time. “For one receives the spirit of understanding,
another of counsel, another of healing, another of strength, another of foreknowledge,
another of teaching, and another of the fear of God.”Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho, 39. “The prophetic gifts
remain with us even to the present time,”Dialogue with Trypho, 82. he
says. They abide in fulfilment of the Old Testament promise quoted by St. Peter
on the day of Pentecost.Ibid. 39, 82. Irenaeus declares that prophecy existed in the Church
in his days. “For some (believers) do certainly cast out devils, so that those
who have thus been cleansed from evil spirits do frequently both believe and
join the Church. Others have knowledge of things to come; they see visions
and utter prophetic expressions.”Irenaeus, Against Heresies, II. xxxii. 4, 5. He goes on to say that these things come about not by performing
incantations, but by praying to the Lord in a pure, sincere and straightforward
spirit. Tertullian has given us a vivid picture of what this kind of prophecy
was like. He says:Tertullian, De Anima, 9. “We have now among us a sister whose lot it has been to be favoured with
sundry gifts of revelation, which she experiences in the Spirit by ecstatic
vision amidst the sacred rites on the Lord’s Day in the Church. She converses
with angels and even with the Lord. She both sees and hears mysterious communications
(sacramenta). Some men’s hearts she understands, and to them who are in need
she distributes remedies. Whether it be in the reading of the Scriptures, or in the chanting
of Psalms, or in the preaching of sermons, or in the offering up of prayers—in
all these religious services matter and opportunity are afforded to her of seeing
visions. . . . After the people are dismissed, at the conclusion of the sacred
services she is in the regular habit of reporting to us whatever things she
may have seen in vision—for all her communications are examined with the most
scrupulous care that their truth may be probed.”
Besides, the theory of the nature of prophecy ascribed to the Montanists was the theory
of the second century. Prophecy was described as ecstatic. It is difficult,
perhaps, to understand exactly what was meant by the word. This, however, is
clear, that it meant that what came from the prophet was something given him,
and was not the result of his ordinary powers of intelligence; also that the
prophet could not prophesy at will, but had to wait for the divine afflatus,
which might come quite unexpectedly or in answer to prayer. If this be all that
is meant by ecstasy it is plain that the Church of the second century believed
that its prophecy was ecstatic. Hermas declares that in true prophecy the spirit
“speaks only when God wishes it to speak,” and that the “man filled with the
Spirit of God speaks to the multitude as the Lord wishes.”Compare p. 234 n. The
statements of Irenaeus about true prophecy are exactly the same: He says that
the gift of prophecy comes from the grace of God alone, and “that only those
on whom God sends His grace from above
possess that divinely-bestowed power of prophesying.”
Prophets “speak where and when God pleases.”Irenaeus, Against Heresies, I. xiii. 4. We
have seen how the prophetic afflatus came upon Ignatius when preaching to the
Philadelphians, and how he cried out, speaking things quite unpremeditated which
he felt had been given him to speak.Epistle to the Philiadelphians, 7. Compare pp. 189 n., 129. It was afterwards maintained that the
Montanist theory GI prophecy meant more than this, and the famous
dictum of Montanus is continually quoted to mean more and to be repudiated. Montanus has
said: “Behold the man is as a lyre, and I sweep over him as a plectrum. The
man sleeps, and I wake. Behold it is the Lord who estranges the souls of men
from themselves and gives them souls”; and the metaphor suggests that man
is a merely passive instrument in the hands of God.Bonwetsch, Geschichte des Montanismus, p. 197.
But even if we are to argue from a metaphor (always a dangerous kind of reasoning),
it should be remembered that the same or similar metaphors were used to describe
non-Montanist prophecy. Athenagoras speaks of the Spirit of God moving “the
mouths of the prophets like musical instruments,” and of the Spirit making use
of the prophets as “a flute-player breathes into his flute.”Plea for the Christians, 7, 9. The
author of the Cohortatio ad Gentes uses the
famous metaphor of Montanus and speaks of the “divine plectrum descending from
heaven and using righteous men as an instrument like a harp or lyre,” in order
to reveal to men things divine and heavenly.Pseudo-Justin, Cohortatio ad Gentes, 8. It is impossible to say that Montanist
prophecy was a new thing, and that Montanism in exalting the prophetic ministry
was not thoroughly conservative in its endeavour.It may be said that this second century theory of prophecy abandoned St. Paul’s great
principle that the spirits of the prophets are subject to the prophets, and
perhaps that is so. But the point here is that the Church and Montanism had
to begin with the same theory of prophecy.
The same result is reached when we consider the Montanist discipline. The whole movement
was a protest against that growing conformity with the world which the Church
of the second century had felt constrained to attempt, under the leadership
of the office-bearers of the local churches. Like all conservative reactions,
it exaggerated the characteristics it had arisen to conserve, but that was the only great difference.
It is probable that the movement in Phrygia had continued
for some years before there was any break with the “great” Church: and after
the separation did take place efforts were made to bring the leaders on both
sides together again. The Martyrs of Lyons wrote urging peace, and the Roman
Church had serious thoughts of interfering on the side of unity.Eusebius, Eccles. Hist. V. iii. 4; Tertullian, Adversus Praxean, 1:—“For after
the bishop of Rome had acknowledged the prophetic gifts of Montanus, Prisca
and Maximilla, and, in consequence of the acknowledgment, had bestowed his
peace on the Churches of Asia and Phrygia (i.e. had declared himself in communion
with them), Praxeas, by importunately urging false accusations against the
prophets themselves and their Churches and insisting on the authority of the
bishop’s predecessors in the see, compelled him to recall the pacific letter
which he had issued, as well as from his purpose of acknowledging the said gifts.” Such attempts
would probably have been unsuccessful. The separation came; and in Phrgyia
at least, the great proportion of the Christian people sided with the party
of Montanus. It became the Kataphrygian Church (the Church-according-to-the-Phrygians),
and continued so for long. When the Emperor Constantine recognized the Christian
religion the Marcionite and Montanist Christians did not share in the peace
of the Church. The persecutions against them were rather intensified. The Phrygian
Montanists, however, were not overwhelmed; but according to Sozomen Montanists
disappeared elsewhere.Eccles. Hist. ii. 32; cf. vii. 12. Penal laws of increasing severity were enacted against
them by Christian emperors. Their churches were confiscated; a rigorous search
was made for their religious writings, which were destroyed when discovered; the ordination of their clergy was made a penal offence; the power of disposing
of their property by will was denied them, and their nearest Catholic relatives
were allowed to seize their possessions—and still they remained true to their
church and to the prophetic ministry.Imperial edicts of 398 A.D. and 415 A.D. At last in the sixth century the Emperor
Justinian resolved to stamp them out, and the historian Procopius tells us that
in their despair the Montanists gathered themselves, with their wives and
children, into their churches, and setting fire to the buildings perished in the flamesProcopius, Historia Arcana, 11.
rather than submit to the bishops’
Church which had urged the persecution through all these centuries, and had
forbidden the members to have any communion with Montanists, even when confined
in a common prison for a common faith. All this bitterness and all this bloodshed
because some Christians would insist that the prophetic ministry should be kept
in the position assigned to it by St. Paul, and should not be subject to the
rule of the elders “who are in the Church—those who possess the succession
from the apostles.”
The “Great Church,” as it then began to be called, separated from her daughters, the Marcionite
and the Montanist churches, went forth to her task of subduing the Roman world
under the guidance of a three-fold ministry which ruled in every Christian community
within the Empire. In its efforts to do its work thoroughly the organization
of the great Empire, and especially its religious organization, became, as we
shall afterwards see, a study growing in attractiveness and presenting points
for imitation by the leaders of the society.
In this changed organization of the second and third centuries the old prophetic ministry was
completely abandoned, and the local or congregational ministry had now no superiors
to interfere with them and to supersede them in exhortation, in the dispensing
of the Holy Supper, and in prescribing how Christians ought to live in the fear
of God. The revolt against the changes made had ended in the conservatives,
zealous for that ministry which had come down from apostolic days, and which
St. Paul had placed at the head of the gifts bestowed by God upon His people,
being driven out of the Church, and in their forming separate societies. The
ministry which remained is what represented the “helps” and “pilotings”
which God had placed in the Church. It was the spontaneous creation of the individual
local churches. The ministry “from above” had
disappeared; but what remained was not the less divine because it had been the creation
of the congregation, for it was based on the possession and the
recognition of “gifts” of service and rule
which God had bestowed according to His promise upon His worshipping people.
Pictures of this ministry which ruled in the end of the second and in the earlier part
of the third century, have been preserved for us in early ecclesiastical manuals.
Perhaps the Canons of Hippolytus maybe most fitly selected to furnish them.Texte and Untersuchungen,
VI. iv., Die aeltesten Quellen des orientalischen Kirchenrechts, erstes Buch,
Die canones Hippolyti, Dr. Hans Achelis (1891). Riedel, Die Kirchenrechtsquellen
des Patriarchats Alexandrien (1900), pp. 193-230:—Die Canones Hippolyti. Compare Funk,
Die Apostolischen Constitutionen (1891), pp. 265-80; Wordsworth, The Ministry of Grace (1901), pp. 18-42; de Lagarde in Bunsen’s
Analecta Ante-Nicaena, ii. 37; Sohm, Kirchenrecht, i.
287 n. 20. Achelis gives in parallel columns extracts from Ludolf’s Ethiopic Statutes, from the Coptic
Heptateuch (a new translation made by Steindorf), and from the eighth book of the Apostolic Constitutions. These canons are thoroughly representative.
They were the work of a western ecclesiastic, and they form the basis of almost
all the later ecclesiastical discipline of the Eastern Church. They are also
especially interesting, because they contain the clearest description of Christian
public worship which we have between the Epistle of St. Paul to the Corinthians
and the much later Apostolic Constitutions.
The Christian society consisted of believers and their children; with a fringe of catechumens or
candidates for baptism, and those who were still only inquirers into the truths of the Christian faith. The community was
sharply divided into clergy and laity,The division of the congregation into clergy and laity and the common mode of
making the difference apparent in daily ecclesiastical life were both borrowed
from the usages of the civil society round them. The laity were called
plebs and the clergy the ordo—the
names applied to the commons and the senate of the Italian and provincial towns. As the members
of the senate or the ordo had a special bench, called the consessus,
in the basilica or court-house, so the clergy had special seats in
church. “It is the authority of the Church,” says Tertullian, “that makes the difference between
the ordo and the plebs—this and the honour consecrated by the special bench
of the ordo” (De Exhortatione Castitatis, 7). with a number of persons who stood between
the two
sections, and who were specially honoured for their services or character—the confessors,
the widows (honoured for their abundant prayer and for their nursing the sick),“Viduis propter copiosas orationes, infirmiorum curam et
frequens jejunium praecipuus honor tribuatur,” Can. ix.
and celibates and virgins. The office-bearers included the pastor (now invariably
called the bishop), elders, deacons, readers, and, perhaps, subdeacons. At
the head of all stood the bishop, in whom the whole congregational life centred.
He was chosen by the whole congregation, who assembled in church for the purpose.
The people were taught to recognize that God was with them while they selected
their pastor. When they had made their choice known and had clearly intimated
the man whom they had elected, they were enjoined to say, “Oh God, strengthen
him whom Thou hast prepared for us.”“Episcopus eligatur ex omni populo . . . dicat populus: nos eligimus eum. Deinde
silentio facto in toto grege post exhomologesin omnes pro eo orent dicentes: O Deus, corrobora hunc, quem nobis preparasti,”
Can. ii.
It was the rule, when the bishop was set apart to his office, that the neighbouring bishops
should be present; but this was not essential. The congregation possessed within
itself the power and authority to carry out the ordination of their chief office-bearer.
When all things were ready, and the whole congregation had assembled in Church,
one of the bishops or one
of the elders of the congregation, was selected to perform
the act of ordination, which consisted in laying his hands on the head of the
bishop-elect and praying over him.“Deinde eligatur unus ex episcopis et presbyteris, qui manum capiti ejus imponat,
et oret dicens,” Can. ii. The beautiful prayer of consecration
is given.“O Deus, Pater domini nostri Jesus Christi, Pater misericordiarum
et Deus totius consolationis . . . . Respice super N., servum tuum, tribuens
virtutem tuam et spiritum efficacem, quem tribuisti sanctis
apostolis per dominum nostrum Jesum Christum, filium tuum unicum; illis, qui
fundaverunt ecclesiam in omni loco ad honorem et gloriam nominis tui sancti. Quia
tu cognovisti cor uniuscujusque, concede illi, ut ipse sine
peccato videat populum tuum, ut mereatur pascere gregem tuum magnum sacrum.
Effice etiam, ut mores ejus sint superiores omni populo sine ulla declinatione.
Effice etiam, ut propter praestantiam illi ab omnibus invideatur, et accipe
orationes ejus et oblationes ejus, quas tibi offeret die noctuque, et sint tibi
odor suavis. Tribue etiam illi, O Domine, episcopatum et spiritum clementem
et potestatem ad remittenda peccata; et tribue illi facultatem ad dissolvenda
omnia vincula iniquitatis daemonum, et ad sanandos omnes morbos, et contere
Satanam sub pedibus ejus velociter, per dominum nostrum Jesus Christum, per quem tibi
gloria cum ipso et Spiritu Sancto in saecula saeculorum. Amen.” Can. iii. God was asked
to fill the
bishop with the Spirit possessed by the apostles who founded the churches everywhere; to bless him in permitting him to rule a blameless flock; to make him a pattern
in all holy living; to make him powerful in prayer; to give him grace to declare
the pardon of sins; and to make him able to break the chains in which the evil
spirits held any of his flock. The prayer makes us see what the duties of the
bishop were. He led the public devotions of his people; he presided over the
exercise of discipline; he had the care of the poor and of the sick; he was
to drive out the evil spirits who troubled the bodies and the souls of members
of his flock. The congregation was a Church of Christ because they were endeavouring
to live the life of new obedience to which their Lord had called them, and the
man at their head, their representative, was expected to be the saintliest man
among them. If he had not learning, the reader was there to read and expound
the Scriptures; if he possessed few administrative gifts the elders and the
deacons were beside him to aid him; but a man of prayer and of holy life he
must be—there could be no substitute for that.
Nothing is said about the election of elders, and it is impossible to say whether they
were chosen by the people or nominated by the bishop or co-opted by the session.
But we have two interesting bits of information which show from what classes
of men the elders were often drawn. Martyrs and confessors were to be made elders. The martyr was one who, for
the faith’s sake, had stood before
the civil tribunal and had been punished. He became an elder at once; “his
confession was his ordination.” If a man had made a confession before the court
and had not suffered, he was to be made an elder by the bishop, and the same
was to be done to a Christian slave who had confessed and had suffered. Only,
the bishop in these two cases was to omit the petition for the bestowal of the
Holy Spirit.“Quando quis dignus
est, qui stet coram tribunali et afficiatur poena propter Christum, postea autem indulgentia
liber dimittitur, talis postea meretur gradum presbyteralem coram Deo, non secundum
ordinationem quae fit ab episcopo. Immo, confessio est ordinatio ejus. Quodsi
vero episcopus fit, ordinetur. Si quis oonfessione emissa tormentis laesus non
est, dignus est presbyteratu; attamen ordinetur per episcopum. Si talis, cum
servus alicujus esset, propter Christum cruciatus pertulit, talis similiter
est presbyter gregi. Quamquam enim formam presbyteratus non acceperit, tamen
spiritum presbyteratus adeptus est; episcopus igitur omittat orationis partem,
quae ad spiritum sanctum pertinet,” Can. vi. The other case is even more interesting. Those men who possess
the “gift” of healing are to be ordained presbyters after careful investigation
be made that the “gift” is really possessed and that the cures do really come
from God.“Si quis petitionem porrigit, quae ad ipsius
ordinationem pertinet, quod dicit: Nactus sum charisma sanationis, non prius ordinetur, quam clareseat ea res.
Imprimis inquirendum est, num sanationes, quae per eum fiunt, revera a Deo deriventur,”
Can. viii. We see in this an echo of the verse in the Epistle of James:—“Is any
one among you sick? let him call for the elders of the Church; and let them
pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord; and the prayer
of faith shall save him that is sick, and the Lord shall raise him up; and
if he have committed sins, it shall be forgiven him” (v. 14, 15). The leaders of the churches seem to be anxious to enrol
within the regular ministry of the congregation, and to prevent them overshadowing
its authority, all who are possessed of “gifts,” or whom Christ has honoured
by permitting them to be witnesses for Him. The elder was ordained by the bishop, who used the same prayer of consecration which
was employed in the ordination of bishops, substituting only the word presbyteratum
for episcopatum, for according to the theory
of the Canons the elder was the equal of the bishop in all things save a special seat
in the church and the right to ordain elders and deacons.“Si autem ordinatur presbyter, omnia cum eo similiter agantur ac cum episcopo,
nisi quod cathedrae non insideat. Etiam eadem oratio super eo oretur tota ut
super episcopo, cum sola exceptione nominis episcopatus. Episcopus in omnibus
rebus aequiparetur presbytero excepto nomine cathedrae et ordinatione, quia
potestas ordinandi ipsi non tribuitur,” Can. iv. It should be noted however
that a martyr or one who has confessed the Lord and suffered for his confession
and who ipso facto becomes an elder does not become
a bishop unless by regular ordination; and the equality in theory is not one of fact.
The elder was therefore to be filled
with the spirit of the apostles; to be an example to the flock; to be powerful
in prayer; to care for the sick; to attend to discipline. The elders assisted
the bishop in the conduct of public worship; they placed their hands on the
offerings while the bishop prayed the prayer of thanksgiving; they stood on
either side of the catechumens when they were baptized, and they introduced
them into the congregation.Canon xix. The visitation of the sick, the power to drive
out by means of prayer the evil spirit which was believed to produce disease,
the care of the young and the exercise of discipline, were the peculiar duties
of the elders, as they appear in these Canons.
The deacon, on the other hand, is the official who does the subordinate services. He is told to remember that
he is the servant of God, the servant of the bishop and the servant of the elders.
The deacons visit the congregation, report cases of sickness to the bishop
and to the elders; they have special charge over the poor, especially of the
“secret poor,” widows, orphans and strangers. They undertake the instruction
of the catechumens and report to the bishop when they are ripe for baptism.Canons v., xvii.
Not much is said about the duties
of the “widows” and the “virgins,” but they seem to look after the women
and the girls as the deacons care for the men. The “widows” are the sick-nurses
of the community, and are to be honoured for these loving services and for their
prayers for the whole congregation.
The picture of the Christian community presented in these Canons is that of a single congregation
ruled by a pastor or bishop with his session of elders, who, theoretically of
the same ecclesiastical rank as himself, are in practice his assistants. The
laity are in the position of loving subordination which Ignatius contemplated
and urged. The brotherhood of the members of the community is expressively shown
in the way in which newly baptized catechumens, introduced formally by the elder,
are greeted with the kiss of welcome and received with expressions of joy;“Jam cum toto populo orant, qui eos osculentur
gaudentes cum iis cum jubilatione,” Can. xix.
in the care for the sick and the poor; in the provisions for nursing suffering
women by the “widows” and the “virgins”; and in the thought that it is
the duty of the widows to pray for the whole congregation.
The little society is thoroughly self-governing and independent. It contains within itself
the power to perform all ecclesiastical acts from the selection and ordination of its bishopCanon ii.
to the expulsion of offenders;Canons i. xi.-xvi. but
it nevertheless belongs to a wide society or larger brotherhood, and this is
expressed in the usual but not essential practice of associating neighbouring
bishops with its elders in the ordination of its bishop.Canon ii.
The acts of worship are described with greater detail in these Canons than in any earlier
Christian document save the First Epistle of St. Paul to the Corinthians. St.
Paul has given us more information about the meeting for Exhortation; these
Canons tell us more about the meeting for Thanksgiving—indeed, they present
us with the earliest complete description of this crowning act of Christian
worship. As in apostolic times, we find two separate meetings for public worship—the
meeting for Exhortation and the meeting for Thanksgiving—but the latter is no
longer associated with a common meal. No forms of prayer are given for use at
the former, but there is a set form of service prescribed for the latter. Both are held on the Lord’s
Day—the meeting for Exhortation early in the morning, and the Eucharistic service in
the afternoon.It must have been in the afternoon: for although the rule was that the whole service
must end before sundown, there was often an Agape or Supper afterwards
and it had to be finished before darkness had come. Can. xxxii.
The exercises at the meeting for Exhortation were prayers, singing of psalms and hymns, reading
portions of Scripture and exhortation in sermon and address.“Congregentur quotidie in ecclesia presbyteri et diaconi et anagnostai omnisque populus tempore
gallicinii, vacentque orationi, psalmis, et lectioni scripturarum cum orationibus.
. . . De Clero autem qui convenire negligunt, neque morbo neque itinere impediti,
separentur,” Can. xxi. “Porro autem tempore, quo canit gallus, instituendae
sunt orationes in ecclesiis,” Can. xxvii. No details are
given us about the order of the service save that there was a prayer between
the reading of each portion of the Scripture. The early freedom of worship no
longer existed. The reading, prayers, and exhortation were all in the hands
of the clergy. The people shared in the singing only. It was expected that they
should join heartily in this part of the service, for one of the questions put
to candidates for baptism was whether they had sung heartily in the service
of praise.Catechumenus baptismo initiandus si ab iis, qui eum adducunt, bono testimonio commendatur, eum illo tempore, quo instruebatur,
infirmos visitasse et debiles sustentasse seque ab omni perverso sermone custodisse, laudes cecinisse, numque
oderit vanam gloriam, num contempscrit superbiam, sibique elegerit humilitatem,” Can. xix. This service was held not only on the Lord’s Day, but on every day
of the week. It was the daily worship of the great Christian family. The Canons
order that the elders, deacons, readers and people are to come to church at
cock-crow (quo tempore canit gallus), and to consecrate the day by a service
of prayer, praise, and reading the Word. All the clergy, save the bishop, are
strictly ordered to be present.
Only sickness or absence on a journey are to be taken as excuses. The catechumens,“Quando vero
doctor quotidianum pensum docendi terminavit, orent separati a christianis,” Can. xvii. whose instructions
in the faith by the deacons seems to have been given just before the service began, were
required to be present, and had a special place assigned to them. If any members of the
congregation were unable to be present at this morning worship they are enjoined
to read the Scriptures at home, so that the first thing that the sun sees when
it shines into their windows in the morning may be the long roll of Scripture
unfolded on their knees.“Quocunque die in ecclesia non orant, sumas scripturam, ut legas in ea. Sol conspiciat
matutino tempore scripturam super genua tua,” Can. xxvii. 1.
The Eucharistic service is described at much greater length, and the details have to be collected
from instructions scattered throughout the Canons.The canons have been carefully analyzed and the information they convey on the services
and organization brought together by Dr. Achelis in his admirable edition. I
have made full use of his labour. In one rather important point, however, I
fail to follow his arguments. He believes that the bishop alone was entitled
to conduct the eucharistic service when it took place on a Sunday, and that
the provisions for an elder or a deacon presiding refers only to week-day celebrations.
The statements made in the Canons are not distinct and our conclusions are only inferences. The reasons
for the delegation seem to me to be the necessary absence of the bishop and
the necessary absence of the elders; and apply equally well to the Sunday as
to other celebrations. It was natural that provision should be made where Christian
congregations were scattered and far from each other. It had three parts—an introductory
service, the actual Holy Supper, and the receiving and distributing the thankofferings.
Most of the details are clearly enough stated, but it is impossible to say with
any certainty whether a sermon was part of the introductory service. It was
so in the time of Justin Martyr,Justin’s order of service is:—Prolonged reading of the scriptures; sermon by the pastor
or bishop, prayer, the Bread and Wine brought in. Apology, i. 67. and his account is so like an outline whose
details can be filled in by what is directed in these Canons, that it is improbable
that this very important portion of the service had fallen into disuse. It may
be, however, that the sermon, which must have been given at the morning service
on the Lord’s Day,Compare Canon xii. was considered to suffice, and that
the service described by Justin had been divided into two parts.
The Eucharistic service, held in the evening or in the late afternoon,The whole service had to be over before sundown; and there was frequently a common meal
late in the evening. began by the readers,
placed at an elevated desk, reading portions of Scripture one after another,
the readers taking turns and relieving each other. This went on for some time
while the congregation were gradually assembling.“Etiam anagnostai habebant festiva indumenta, et stent
in loco lectionis et alter alterum excipiat, donec totus populus congregetur,” Can. xxxvii. If there was a sermon by
the bishop it would be delivered after the reading was over and all had taken
their places. A prayer including confession of sins followed. The bishop stood
behind a table, called the “Table of the Body and Blood of the Lord,” the elders
on his right hand and on his left. The elements, bread and wine, which had been
furnished by intending communicants, were then brought in by the deacons,Canons iii. xix.
and were placed on the Table before the bishop. The elders, deacons and readers
were all dressed in white—the colour of festival times.“Quotiescunque episcopus mysteriis frui vult,
congregentur diaconi et presbyteri
apud eum, induti vestiment is albis pulchioribus toto populo potissimum
autem splendidis. Bona autem opera omnibus vestimentis praestant,” Can. xxxvii.
Then the bishop and the elders placed their hands on the bread and on the cup,
and the bishop began the responsive prayers:—
The bishop |
The Lord be with you all. |
The congregation |
And with Thy spirit. |
The bishop |
Lift up your hearts. |
The congregation |
We have, to the Lord. |
The bishop |
Let us give thanks to the Lord. |
The congregation |
Worthy and righteous.Canon iii. |
The bishop
then prayed over the elements (no form of prayer being given).It is probable that this prayer was extempore; no form is prescribed
in the Canons, and many forms for other parts of the service are given in the text; the prayer
of consecration was extempore in the time of Justin Martyr (Apology, i. 67:—“The
president offers prayers and thanksgivings according to his ability”). The bishop himself
distributed. He stood by
the “Table of the Body and Blood of the Lord.” The people came one by one to the bishop,
who first gave the Bread, saying,
“This is the Body of the Lord,” and then
the Cup, saying, “This is the Blood of the Lord,” and the people answered “Amen.”“Communicat populum stans ad mensam corporis et sanguinis Domini . . . Deinde porrigat illis episcopus de corpore Christi dicens: Hoc est corpus Christi; illi vero dicant: Amen; et ei, quibus ille calicem porrigit dicens: Hic
est sanguis Christi, dicant: Amen,” Can. xix.
At the celebration at which the newly baptized communicants partook,
the elders who stood beside the bishop had cups of milk and honey in their hands,
and the communicants partook of these also from the hands of the elders to
show that they had become as little children and fed on the food of infants;Canon xix.:—“Et presbyteri portant alios calices lactis et mellis ut doceant eos, qui
communicant, iterum eos natos esse ut parvuli, quia parvuli communicant lac et mel.”
but whether this ceremony accompanied every celebration of the Holy Supper
is uncertain. The deacons who brought in the elements were required to sing
a psalm as they entered, and the sound of the singing is compared to the tinkle
of the bells on the robes of Aaron.Canon xxix.:—“Et sint illis psalmi pro tintinabulis,
quae erant in tunica Aaronis.”
After the celebration the faithful, who all remained in the church, came forward to the
“Table” and presented their offerings, the firstfruits. These consisted of
all kinds of useful things—oil, wine, milk, honey, eatables of all kinds, the
fruit of trees and the fruit of the ground (apples and cucumbers being specially
mentioned), wool, cloth and money. They were all placed at or on the table.This offertory or collection in kind, which
the records of the early centuries bring vividly before us, can be seen in village
churches in India at present. The offerings there include many things not mentioned
in the text. Great baskets are deposited in which the people place small
parcels of all kind of grain, the produce of their fields, fruits, cooked food. eggs, flasks of oil and live poultry. I once saw a portion of the offertory running away
with the beadle! It was a lively young sheep, and when the beadle tried to
hold it, it pulled him round the corner of the church. Missionaries from Ceylon
have assured me that the Christian matrons are accustomed to put aside every
tenth handful of the rice or other things to be cooked and thus collect during
the week what is given on Sunday. They say that when the people were heathen
they did the same in order to present offerings to their priests; and they carry
the practice over into Christianity. It was probably the same in heathen antiquity,
and this is no doubt the reason why in the Canons the bishop is called “priest”
in connexion with receiving these offerings and not
in connexion with his presiding at the Holy Supper (Canon xxxvi.). The title “priest” (sacerdos)
is given to the bishop alone and that only when he performs the two functions of
exorcising the sick (Canon xxiv.), and of receiving and blessing the offerings
(Canon xxxvi.); both actions done by the heathen priests with which the early
converts from paganism were quite familiar. The bishop prayed the prayer of
thanksgiving over the gifts and the givers—a special thanksgiving being said over the oil,
probably because it was so much used in ecclesiastical services. The bishop
then pronounced the Benediction, and the people responded with the Doxology: Glory to Thee, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, for ever
and ever.Canon iii.
This did not end the service, however. The offerings had to be distributed before the
going down of the sun. The poor, the widows and the orphans rose from their places, and came to the
bishop, who distributed to them the offerings which had been
received, and also the bread and wine which had remained after the Communion.Canon xxxii.
Portions were no doubt reserved for those in prison, for strangers who might
arrive during the week, and for the sick who were unable to come to church.Canon v., cf. also Justin, Apology, i. 65, 67.
The Canons forbid any of these offerings being reserved for the clergy, as was
the custom in later times, and those of them who required assistance were reckoned
among the poor.Compare above, p. 201.
It was the custom for one of the wealthier members of the congregation to give a supper
on the evening of Sunday to the poor of the congregation. Members who had come
from a distance, as Justin Martyr tells us they did, were doubtless included.Apology, i. 67.
The bishop presided, and the clergy (one deacon at least) were present. The bishop prayed
for the host and for the guests, and the prayer of thanksgiving which was said
during the Communion service was repeated. When it became dark the deacon had
the charge of lighting the lamps, but the supper came to an end before it got
very dark. The president generally gave the guests a short address, which he
delivered sitting, and which was “for their benefit and for his own.” The people
were told to eat their fill, but not to drink to excess; not to speak too much; not to shout; and above all not to bring disgrace on their host by indulging
in mischievous gossip.Canons xxxii.-xxxv.
It is pleasant to learn that occasional suppers were given to the widows of the congregation.
The poor bodies, who are elsewhere praised for their fasting,Canons xxxii. ix. seemed to have
enjoyed a good supper, where they could eat and drink ad satietatem neque vero ad ebrietatem,
and to have been inclined to prolong the feast as much as possible, for they need
to be warned thrice over within four short sentences that they are to end their
supper by the going down of the sun.“Si quis viduis coenam parare vult, curet, ut habeant coenam et ut dimittantur,
antequam sol occidat. Si vero sunt multae, caveatur, ne fiat confusio neve impediantur, quominus
ante vesperam dimittantur. Unicuique autem earum sufficiens cibus potusque.
Sed abeant antequam nox advesperascat,” Can. xxxv. These suppers are called Agapae by Dr. Achelis.
Dr. Riedel, on the other hand, refuses to translate the word in this way.Compare Riedel, Die Kirchenrechtsquellen des Patriarchats
Alenandrien (1900), p. 221 n. He thinks that they correspond with feasts which are still
the custom among the Christians of the Levant, and quotes Wansleben:—“Ils ont encore la coûtume de faire des Agapes ou des repas de charité après
les Bâtêmes, et les enterremens, pour tous ceux qui veulent s’y trouver; donnant
à un chacun un plat de bouillie, avec un morceau de viande dedans, et du pain
autant qu’il en peut manger; et ces repas se font ou dans 1’église même ou sur le toit de
1’église, qui est, selon la coûtume des Levantins, toujours plat, et capable de contenir un grand
nombre d’hommes.” This is to be said, however, in justification of Dr. Achelis’ translation that
the entertainments
have all a religious significance, that there seems to have been a symbolical breaking
of bread at all of them, that one of them, which was a memorial feast in honour
of a martyr, was preceded by the celebration of the Holy Supper, and that at
all of them the prayer of thanksgiving which was included in the Eucharistic
service was recited.These memorial feasts were called Anamneseis; the custom of celebrating the birthday of an honoured martyr with a memorial
feast was one of the usages of primitive Christianity which gave the early Christian societies
a superficial resemblance to the pagan collegia; compare above p. 126. The Lord’s Day supper, at any rate, has all the appearance
of the older Agape, separated from the Holy Supper, and coming after it instead of preceding it.
It is very interesting to observe that there is nothing in the Canons which implies that
the Holy Supper has any special and unique sacrificial conceptions attached
to it. Such ideas are markedly absent. The word altar occurs in
the Canons; but in those portions which refer to the act of celebrating the
Lord’s Supper, the phrase used is “Table of the Body and Blood of the Lord.”Altar occurs in the Canon which tells the clergy to keep the vessels
clean, etc. (Canon xxix.); mensa is used when the act of communicating is described (Canon xix.).
The term offering is certainly used of the Bread and the Wine in the Holy Supper, but it is equally employed
to denote the firstfruits given to the bishop by the people.Canons xvii. xxxii. xix. The term priest is
never found in connexion with ordination or with the celebration of the Holy
Supper. It occurs in two references only, and is used of the bishop when he
is described as receiving the firstfruits and as exorcising the sick; and since
both of these acts were performed by the pagan priesthood it is easy to conjecture
why the word is applied to the bishop in these acts.Canons xxxvi. xxiv.
Reverence in all the actions of public worship is carefully inculcated. The Church is
the house of God and the place of prayer with fear; women are not to come there in gaudy apparel,
and they are not to laugh nor chatter there. A worthy matron was made an “inspectress,”
to see that the women and girls behaved themselves properly.“Mulier libera ne veniat veste variegata . . . neve crines demittat solutos,
habeat potius capillos complexos in domo Dei, neve faciat cirros frontales in
capite quando vult participare in mysteriis sacris (Canon xvii.). It is one of
the marks of a good woman that if she excels male beings in knowledge she does
not let any one see that she does! The clergy are
to see that the communion elements are kept with care from all impurity, and
specially that flies do not get into the wine of the sacrament. Great care
is also to be taken that no drop of the wine nor crumb of bread falls to the
ground while the elements are partaken of by the communicants. In short, the
Canons contain many a little suggestion, familiar to all missionaries, for the
purpose of teaching that reverence in worship which is almost always lacking
in heathen religious rites.
These early Christians were men of their generation, however. They believed that the air
around them was full of evil spirits bent on their discomfiture, whose malignity
had to be guarded against;The fear of demons appears most strongly
in the exorcisms at baptism, in exorcising the bread at the feasts, and in the
reason given why no drop of wine or crumb of bread was to be allowed to fall
to the ground: the demons might get hold of it. Compare Canons xix. xxix. xxxiv. but while
the traces of such superstitions appear, one cannot fail to see how the attempt
is continually made to wean the Christians from pagan superstitions which they
have brought over with them into Christianity. To take only one example, sick
persons are prohibited from continuing beyond the hours of prayer in the Church
or from sleeping there.Canon xxiv. When it is remembered that sick folk were taken to
the heathen temples in order that the dwelling in a sacred place might cure
them, it is easy to see what the meaning of the prohibition is. One can perceive
the doors by which pagan ideas might enter into Christian worship, but the sorry
mixture of paganism and Christianity which was to follow Cyprian’s conceptions
of priesthood and sacrifice were still in the future.
Such were the ordinary services, and such the organization of a Christian Church in the
earlier decades of the third century, before accommodation to imperial points
of view and imitation of pagan organization had invaded the Church of Christ.
Perhaps a brief comparison of this organization of the ministry with modern types may
bring it more distinctly before us. It had some relation with all modern types
of ecclesiastical organization, and was identical with none.
The organization had a certain resemblance to modern Congregationalism, for the vast majority
of communities called churches were simply self-governing and independent congregations.
The bishop was the pastor of the congregation, and in him, as in a modern congregationalist
Church, all the ecclesiastical life centred. On the other hand, this does not
apply to all these primitive churches; for the independent unity was the community
large or small, and before the close of the second century the larger communities
must have included several congregations, and all were served on the collegiate
principle by the one bishop and his body of elders and deacons—the one pastor
or bishop representing the unity of the community. These primitive independent
churches all cherished the essential idea that they belonged to, and were portions
of, a common visible Church—the Great Church it was called, to distinguish it
from the Marcionite and Montanist Churches; but they had not yet discovered
the way to express this idea of a visible catholicity in a definite political
organization. We have the beginnings of the polity in the common though not
universal custom that all the neighbouring bishops assisted at the ordination
of a bishop.
The organization had a much greater resemblance to what is commonly called the Presbyterian,
and ought properly to be called the Conciliar, system of Church government.
The points of agreement are very many. There is common to both the conception
of the three-fold ministry of pastor or bishop, eider or presbyter, and deacon,
and both have the theoretical equivalence
of the offices of bishop and elder (save only a special seat in the Church and the right
to ordain elders and deacons), while in practice the bishop or pastor is the real
head of the whole of the ecclesiastical life. In both there is the idea that the
unit of organization is the Christian community of the place, and the conception
that the unity can be preserved by a collegiate administration.This characteristic has almost faded out of most English-speaking portions of the great Presbyterian
Church, but it remains in the Dutch-speaking parts. The traces remaining in Scotland
are the almost forgotten, but still existing, “General Kirk-Sessions” of the larger towns. Both have the thought
that the whole congregational activity centres in the bishop or pastor, who is
the leader in public worship and who celebrates the sacraments. Both believe strongly
that each congregation is a portion of the visible Catholic Church, that catholicity
can best be reduced to a polity by means of representative councils with gradually
widening areas of control, and that the ordination of a bishop or pastor is to be
performed by the pastors or bishops of the bounds as representatives of the Church
Catholic.Dr. Sanday has said (Expositor, Jan.-June, 1887, p. 113) that in the earlier centuries “every town of any size had its bishop; and if there were several churches, they were served by the
clergy whom the bishop kept about him: they were in fact like our (Church of England) present ‘chapels
of ease,’ and the whole position of the bishop was very similar to that of the incumbent of
the parish church in one of our smaller towns. The tendency at first, as Ignatius
shows, was towards complete centralization: the whole serving of the paroikia
was directly
in the hands of the bishop. The parish system in the later sense, with an extended
diocese, and a number of more or less independent clergy circling round the bishop,
did not grow up until the 6th-9th centuries, when it took shape mainly in France
under the Merovingian and Carolingian kings. In some respects the Nonconformist
communities of our own time furnish a closer parallel to the primitive state of
things than an Established Church can possibly do.” This is all true so far as it goes; but it takes no account of the three-fold ministry. which is not exhibited
in an English parish. The primitive three-fold ministry appears however as soon
as the Border is crossed into Scotland or over into Holland. The two great differences are: that the modern system of organization
insists that the bishop or pastor cannot, of his own authority, delegate to a presbyter
or to a deacon the right to celebrate
the sacraments, and that the bishop or pastor of the early centuries had almost unlimited control
over the ecclesiastical finances and property of the congregation. This characteristic
of primitive Christian organization arose from the fact that at first the sole property
was the firstfruits given to the bishop at the close of the Holy Supper and distributed
afterwards by him, and it was strengthened when the churches were able to hold buildings
and burial places by the Roman laws regulating the property of corporations.Compare Ramsay,The Church in the Roman Empire, p. 431. Many illustrations of the legal principles and their effects
on the tenure of Church property laid down by Professor Ramsay may be found not only within the Turkish
Empire, but in the Tributary Indian States, such as the Nizam’s Territories, where the Mohammedan law rules.
The modern episcopal
system, apart from the retention of the name “bishop,” has fewest points of resemblance
to what we find in the ancient ecclesiastical manuals we have been studying; but
the germs of the mediaeval and modern episcopacy are there in the power which the
primitive bishop possessed of delegating functions which were peculiarly his, such
as baptizing and celebrating the Holy Communion, to his elders and even to his deacons.
CHAPTER VII.
MINISTRY CHANGING TO PRIESTHOOD
During the third century, it may be said during the middle
third of that century, there are clear traces of a general change insinuating itself
into men’s minds and finding expression in language, in the way of thinking of the
Church and of the relation of the ministry to the Church. This is commonly spoken
of as the change of the ministry into a mediating priesthood, standing between the
people and God. But this manner of regarding the whole silent movement gives a very
inadequate and one-sided representation of the real meaning of the change, and of
the conceptions which it embodied. The idea that the ministry is a priesthood was
there, but the main thought was much more the power of the priest than his
mediation. The power and the authority of the ministry and especially of the chiefs of the
ministry over the Christian people was the central conception. It finds expression
in Cyprian’s repeated quotation of the Old Testament text: “And the man that doeth
presumptuously, in not hearkening to the priest that standeth to minister there
before the Lord thy God, or unto the judge, even that man shall die; and thou shalt
put away the evil from Israel. And all the people shall hear and fear, and do no
more presumptuously.”Deut. xvii. 12, 13; Cyprian, Epist. iii. 1 (lxiv.); iv. 4 (lxi.); xliii. 7
(xxxix.); lix. 4 (liv.); lxvi. 3 (lxviii.). It is this change and what it implies that concerns us
now.
It may be briefly expressed by saying that the two separate
conceptions of local “Church” and of “Church universal” became
more precise, and that precision of thought was given by new ideas about the relation
in which the office-bearers stood to the community. The Church was defined by the
ministry in a way that it had not been in earlier times.
So far as the local
“church” is concerned the Christian thought, which in earlier times had dwelt
upon the picture of saints and brethren living together the Christian life, now
dwelt upon the controlling power of those who governed. The Church, which was in
earlier days a “brotherhood of saints,” became a community over whom a bishop presided.
It was defined, not so much by the manner of life led by its members, as by the
government which ruled over them. The train of thought was reversed. It was no longer—people
worshipping and some of them leading the common devotions, saints believing and
some among them instructing and admonishing; it became—teachers who imparted and
pupils who received, priests who interceded and sinners who were pardoned through
the intercession, rulers who commanded and subjects who were bound to obey.
The thought of the
universal visible Church underwent an analogous transformation. It was no longer
the wide brotherhood of all who professed the name of Jesus, and lived the life
of new obedience demanded from His disciples. It became a federation of local churches,
who believed in the same verities, the truth of which was guaranteed by legitimate
rulers, and whose members yielded an implicit obedience to the bishop at the head
of every local “church.” It was the federation of churches which excluded heretics
and rebels.
In the earlier days
the local Christian communities were companies of men and women who called themselves
the brethren and the saints or holy persons, and these words expressed the relations
in which they stood to each other and to the world around them. Fellowship as with
brothers, and a fellowship united in holiness, were the main thoughts present to
the minds of the earliest Christians when the word Church was used to
denote either the individual community or the wide brotherhood of
believers.
The idea in the minds of Christians
united together in a local community was that they were called upon to live a new
and a holy life. They had marked out for themselves what was meant by this holy
life, with its duties to be lovingly fulfilled and sins to be resolutely shunned; and this chart of the Christian life is to be found in manuals like the
Didache
with its two ways, all of which treat of the private as well as of the communal
life. There was also a feeling throughout the churches that, while for the ordinary
and lesser sins to which men are prone, there must be confession, sorrow, and certain
external signs of sorrow, and while for others there was to be suspension for longer
or shorter time from the Holy Supper, some sins were so very heinous that those
who committed them had placed themselves outside the communion of the brethren
so long as life lasted. No limits were placed on the forgiveness of God, but Christians
believed that if any of their number fell into sins of more than ordinary gravity,
no amount of penitence, however sincere, entitled the Church to permit these fallen
brethren to return to the inner fellowship of the Christian brotherhood. Such sinners
had to manifest a life-long repentance, and could never hope to be more than catechumens.
Tertullian has given a list of these deadliest sins, but it is not likely that such
lists were always the same, for there is no trace of any settled rule or theory.
Only, each Christian community felt that it must keep itself pure and merit its
title of “the saints.”Compare Tertullian, Against Marcion, iv. 9. The Canons of Basil, though very much later than the period now
described, retain ideas which may enable us to conceive the attitude of the early
Christian society. They declare that a murderer must be excluded from the society
for twenty years; a homicide for ten years, which are to be spent in the following
way—two years in mourning, three years admitted to the meeting for exhortation,
and five years admitted among the faithful but not allowed to come forward and
partake of the Holy Communion. For one who has been baptized and has lapsed from
the faith, the penitence must be life long, and the penitent is to be allowed to communicate only when he
is on his deathbed. Compare Riedel’s Kirchenrechtsquellen des Patriarchats der Alexandrien (1900), pp.
243, 244. The sins named by Tertullian are:—Idolatry, blasphemy, murder, adultery,
fornication, false-witness and fraud. Ordinarily
those who were guilty of such heinous sins had to remain for life
in the condition of catechumens, and could never hope to be re-admitted to the inner
circle of believers. If, however, a brother, believed to have the prophetic gift,
spoke on behalf of a penitent, and announced that it was the will of God that he
should be pardoned, then, and then only, an exception was made.Hermas, Mandata, iv.
3; Visiones, iii. 7; Tertullian, De Pudicitia, 21.
All the Christian communities, although
they felt that they belonged to one great Church, were not linked together by any
distinctive polity, however indefinite. All the churches of Christ, Tertullian tells
us, were one great Church, because they gave each other the salutation of peace,
because they regarded each other as brethren, and because they practised the interchange
of familiar hospitality.Tertullian, De Praescriptione Haereticorum, 20:—“They then (the apostles) in like manner founded Churches in
every city, from which all the other Churches, one after another, derived the tradition
of the faith and the seeds of doctrine, and are every day deriving them, that they
may become Churches. Indeed it is on this account only that they will be able to
account themselves apostolic, as being the offspring of apostolic Churches. . . . Therefore
the Churches, although they are so many and so great, comprise but the one primitive
Church founded by the apostles from which they all spring. In this way all are primitive,
and all are apostolic, whilst they are all proved to be one, in unity, by their
salutation of peace (communicatio pacis), and title of brotherhood, and bond of
hospitality (contesseratio hospitalitatis)—rights which no other rule directs than
the one tradition of the self-same mystery.” That was what bound them together, and made them feel
and be one; not any external polity, however slight. They maintained a close fellowship
by means of intercommunication, by the interchange of letters and messengers, and
by their hospitality towards all Christian travellers who passed their way. This
constant intercourse no doubt led to a similarity in the rules for holy living and
in modes of dealing with backsliders; but there was nothing of
a common polity to unite them as the various parts of civil society
are united within one state. No doubt the advice of one Church was frequently asked,
and acted upon by another in matters of difficulty and in times of trial. We have
an example of such a thing in the letter of the Roman Church to the Corinthian,
which goes by the name of the First Epistle of Clement. No doubt such advice was
received and attended to in proportion as the Church, offering its advice or appealed
to for its counsel, had showed itself worthy of deference by its brotherly conduct
and by its eminence. No Church in those early centuries showed such generosity to
its poorer brethren as the Roman Church; besides it inhabited the world’s capital; it was believed to inherit the traditions of the two greatest of the
apostles—St. Paul and St. Peter. It held the position of the wise and generous elder brother
in the brotherhood of churches, but there was no acknowledged ecclesiastical pre-eminence.Clement, 1 Epist. v. 4-6; Ignatius,
Epistle to the Romans, preface; Eusebius, Hist. Eccles. II. xxv. 8;
IV. xxiii. 10; V. xxiii., xxiv.; VII. v. 2; Irenaeus, Against Heresies, III.
i. iii.; Tertullian, De Praescript. 24; Scorpiace, 15; Against Marcion, IV. 5.
The situation, therefore, may be thus expressed: there were thousands
of churches, most of them single congregations, which nevertheless were one Church,
not because they had agreed in any formal way to become one, not because there was
any polity linking them together in one great whole, but because they had the unmistakeable
feeling that they belonged to one brotherhood:
They lived in the immediate presence of eternity, on the threshold
of the blessed and real life which awaited them, when the period of their probation
in this world was ended; and every Christian community had the feeling that it
was its business by a strict discipline to preserve, in the pure life of the members
of the little brotherhood, a foreshadowing of the life which awaited them when the
Father should call them home to Himself. Meanwhile they were in the presence of
a hostile and evil world-power,
which was under the dominion of sin, and which manifested
itself to them in the persecuting pagan state. That was the first stage. Doctrine
could scarcely be said to exist, and doctrinal divisions were therefore almost impossible.
No doubt their teachers and leaders occasionally warned them against strange teachings,
but these were limited to individuals or to small companies, and hardly impressed
the imagination.
When the Gnostic teachers
gathered their followers into companies large enough to attract attention, and above
all when Marcion, with his organizing genius, had established Marcionite Christian
communities almost everywhere, the situation became changed. The Christians were
now divided among themselves. The Christian brotherhood was set over against, not
simply the pagan state, but also against false brethren who did not accept the traditions
of the apostles nor the common simple verities of the faith. Christianity now implied
more than a life lived in the presence of God and Christ; it meant a doctrine to
be protected by a creed or a form, more or less fixed, of intellectual beliefs.
The possession of a common form of creed in which the simple verities of the faith
were stated could not fail to give the “great” Church accepting it something more
of an outward polity, The succession of office-bearers in the churches was the guarantee
for the correctness of the tradition suggested by Irenaeus, urged by Tertullian,
and apparently accepted by all who were neither Gnostics nor Marcionites, nor any
of the smaller separate bodies of Christians. Tertullian in the De Praescriptione,
as may be seen in the quotation given in the note,See above, p. 268. links the common tradition,
its guarantee in the succession of office-bearers, the name of brethren, the salutation
of peace, and the bond of hospitality all together, and there are, though in a
very indefinite kind of way, the beginnings of a polity.
Still the existence of the creed did not give the churches which accepted it an homogenous external polity
in any thing like the modern sense. The creed was the law for the individual
local church, and the local church was not joined to the other churches
in a definite federation, still less in a corporate union. The old thought of St.
PaulCompare above, p. 24.—fellowship (κοινωνία)—still prevailed. The churches refused to have fellowship
with professing Christians and with communities of professing Christians who did
not accept the same verities that they did, and they had fellowship and intercommunion
with societies who accepted these verities. The increased powers given to office-bearers,
when they were made the guarantee of the orthodox faith, were powers to be exercised
within the communities over which they presided, and did not give them any rule
outside the local churches they governed, whether these were large or small. Still
the fact that it was recognized that all Christians had a common set of convictions,
which could be expressed in a more or less definite way in propositions, gave the
whole brotherhood of churches something of a polity; and the thought that in times
of doubt or difficulty guidance could be got from what Tertullian called “apostolic” churches,
or churches where the original
apostles had actually taught,Compare Tertullian, De Praescriptione,
xx., xxxii. and especially xxxvi. gave these
churches and their office-bearers a certain pre-eminence which claimed and received
the deference of all the rest.
The separation and secession of the
Montanists, in the wider meaning of the term,That is the Montanism which included men like Tertullian. Compare above p. 238. still further altered and made more
precise the conception of the Church. It must always be remembered that the Montanists
were not driven out, but separated themselves from the main body of Christians.
They claimed to represent the apostolic Church; and their claim was based quite
as much on the persuasion that they had preserved the prophetic ministry in the
position within the churches in which it had been placed by the apostles, as on
their belief that they were preserving the character of the true church by their strictness
of discipline. To the succession of office-bearers, descended from
the secondary ministry of apostolic times, they opposed the succession of prophets
representing the superior ministry of the apostolic days. The Montanist movement
had this result that men who professed to live according to the commandments of
Jesus, who adhered to the traditional teaching of the churches, who had the three-fold
ministry, were nevertheless found outside. They had separated on the question of
the power of the office-bearers at the head of the local churches; they had insisted
that the time-honoured prophetic ministry should retain its old supremacy; they
had especially declared that in the case of heinous sins it belonged to the prophetic
ministry, and not to the bishops, to declare whether such sins could receive the
churches’ pardon.Tertullian, De Pudicitia, 21:—“The
power of loosing and binding committed to Peter had nothing to do with the capital
sins of believers; and if the Lord had given him a precept that he must grant pardon
to a brother sinning against him even seventy times seven-fold, of course He would
have commanded him to ‘bind’—that is to retain—nothing subsequently, unless perchance
such sins as one may have committed against the Lord and not against a brother.
For the forgiveness of sins committed in the case of a man is a prejudgment against
the remission of sins against God. What now about the Church—your psychic Church? For in accordance with the person of Peter, it is to spiritual men that this power
will correspondingly appertain, either to an apostle or else to a prophet. For the
Church itself is, properly and principally the Spirit Himself. . . . And accordingly
the ‘Church,’ it is true, will forgive sins; but the Church of the Spirit, by
a spiritual man; not the Church which consists of a number of bishops. For the
right and arbitrament is the Lord’s, not the servant’s; God’s Himself and not the
priest’s.” Tertullian’s argument is that the power was given to Peter because he
was inspired of the Father to confess Christ. He was a spiritual man. Cf. Döllinger,
Hippolytus and Callistus (Eng. Trans.), pp. 116 f. Their opponents had joined issue with them on these two points.
They asserted that a true prophet would submit himself to the “elders who were
in the succession,” and that, while the Montanist prophets had positively refused
to admit of the church’s pardon being extended to heinous sinners,Tertullian tells us (De Pudicitia, 21), that the new prophecy, speaking in the name
of the Spirit had said “The church has the power to forgive sins; but I will not do it lest they commit others.” yet these sinners
might be pardoned on confession
and signs of sincere repentance. The great majority of the members
of the churches had followed the office-bearers, and the Montanist movement had
failed to arrest the course of the local ministry on the path they had chosen to
pursue. It was only natural that an unsuccessful revolt would strengthen the position
of the ministry which it had conspired against. All these things combined to place
the office-bearers in a position of authority they had never before occupied, and
to give peculiar powers to the bishops who were the chief office-bearers. The tendency
was to think that the churches were summed up in their bishops, and these
officials thus acquired a new position with reference to the whole Church.
The most potent cause producing this
change of sentiment with regard to the character of the ministry and its relation
to the Church was the attempt to come to some accommodation with the world lying
round the Christian communities in order to justify the plea that Christians were
entitled to the toleration extended to all other religions. This consideration was
always accompanied by the other that the Church wished to keep hold on crowds of
adherents, who in the years of peace from persecutionThat is in the years between the persecution under Severus and that under Decius. were flocking to join it,
and who could not be retained if the old hard conditions or, perhaps one ought to
say, the earlier high standard of Christian life, were insisted upon. These two
motives invariably acted together, and are to be found working in such churches
as those of Rome and Corinth in the beginning of the third century.Earlier in the Corinthian Church, if we are to believe Eusebius. Compare his
Hist. Eccl. IV. xxiii. 6. The first practical
consequence of these ideas was to alter the thought and conditions of penitence.
In the earlier times, as has been said, when a Christian fell into such grievous
sins as idolatry, murder, adultery, fornication and some others, he could never be received again into full
communion, but had to remain in the position of a catechumen, permitted
to wait in the ante-chamber but never admitted within the family abode until death
was at hand. Gradually the practice was softened to the extent that, on due manifestation
of sorrow, a second trial of the full Christian life was allowed, but a second fall
was not to be forgiven.This statement appears to be borne out by what Tertullian says in his tract on
Repentance:—“In the vestibule God has stationed repentance the second to open to such as
knock; but now once for all, because now for a second time; but never more, for
the last time it had been in vain” (7). In all probability this remained the general rule till
the third decade of the third century, when Calixtus, the bishop of Rome, introduced
a change which met with the fierce opposition of Tertullian and Hippolytus.Tertullian’s attack is to be found in his work on Modesty (De Pudicitia), and Hippolytus’ in his
work against Heresies (Philosophumena), ix. 6, 7. It has been commonly said that
the bishop of Rome attacked by Tertullian was Zephyrinus; compare Langen, Geschichte
der röm. Kirche, i. 217 ff., and Döllinger, Hippolytus and Callistus (1876), Eng.
Trans., p. 117; but see Harnack, Herzog’s Real-Encyclopaedie, x. 656, and in the
Zeitschrift für Kirchengeschichte (1876-77), p. 582. He,
or rather the Roman Church of which he was the head, entered on a policy of relaxation.There is no doubt
that as Döllinger says (Hippolytus and Callistus (Eng. Trans.), p. 117) the power
of a bishop in the beginning of the third century was anything but absolute, being
limited by both the elders and the laity. “No one who knows the life of the Church
at that time will believe that Callistus introduced a practice previously unknown
in Rome against the will of his presbytery (session).”
It was asserted that the church, through its office-bearers, was entitled to proclaim
God’s pardon for any sins, however heinous, due signs of sorrow being accepted by
the office-bearers as sufficient.Calixtus openly claimed
this power to pardon, because he was the successor of St. Peter, to whom Christ
had given power to remit sins (Tertullian, De Pudicitia, 21). It was announced by an edict posted up in the
church, that pardon would be bestowed on these terms for all sins of the flesh,
and that penitents would be restored to Church communion. It appears to be almost
certain that this innovation contained
two things; the first being the general statement of the power of
the Church exercised through its office-bearers to restore all persons to Church
communion, no matter how heinous the sin had been into which they had fallen, and
the second being the resolution on the part of the Roman Church to make use of this
general power in respect to sins of the flesh. Of course there was no attempt to
coerce other churches to follow the example of the Roman Church, and many churches
did not.As late as the beginning of the fourth century the Spanish Church insisted on visiting
certain sins with perpetual excommunication, while the council of Ancyra held about
the same time in the east set a limited penalty on the very sins for which the council
of Elvira had decreed a perpetual excommunication—so impossible is it to make general
statements about ecclesiastical usages in the early centuries. Some North African churches kept to the old practice on to the time of
Cyprian,Cyprian, Epistle, lv. 21 (li.). but it is undoubted that the Roman example was largely followed. The statements
in Hippolytus and Tertullian seem to warrant the conclusion that this relaxation
from the older sternness was made because without it large numbers of Christians
could not be restrained from going back to heathenism.Compare Tertullian’s phrases in the
De Pudicitia:—“A profitable fickleness . . .”; “easier to err with the majority” (1);
his statement of sins for which it is proper to provide repentance (7),
etc. Compare Hippolytus on Heresies, ix. 7. Although the account of Hippolytus
must be taken with some caution as the statements of a bitter opponent, yet it seems
clear that Calixtus expected to detach many from the churches of his opponents in
Rome by this policy of relaxation from the old strictness; and that his policy
was successful. There must have been four or five different bodies of Christians
in Rome at this time, each esteeming itself to be the Church of Christ.
There was no doubt a thoroughly evangelical element in this manifesto of the Roman Church.An interesting parallel might be
drawn between the evangelical root in the sixteenth-century doctrine of indulgence
and the evangelical basis of this manifesto. Compare my Luther, p. 62. It was
based on the evangelical truth that God has commanded to his ministering servants
to proclaim that He is not willing that any should perish, that
His promises in Christ can be trusted in by the most heinous sinners
and backsliders. But in all the circumstances of the times and of the case, it took
a very unevangelical shape, and was worked out by Cyprian into the beginnings of
the mediaeval doctrine of penance. In the shape it took it inevitably led the people
to regard the office-bearers of the Church, and especially the bishops, as if they
were in God’s place, and it ascribed to the bishops the power of actually pardoning
and not simply of proclaiming the pardon of God.The proclamation of Calixtus,
as quoted by Tertullian, was: I remit to such as have discharged repentance, the
sins of adultery and fornication (De Pudiatia, 1) On the other hand, the Church
lost her old idea that she was the company of the saints or the actively holy people; and the new feeling grew that the Church was the institution within which God
had placed the means of acquiring holiness, and that these means were at the disposal
of the bishops or the heads of the Christian communities, and could be reached only
through them. Hence the office-bearers, and more especially the bishops—the men
who had already been declared to be the guardians of the essential Christian verities—now
came to be regarded also as the keepers or guardians of that peace of God which
comes from the pardon of sin. They were the persons to whom it was necessary to
go in order to know with certainty the truths of the Christian religion, and only
through them could be acquired that saintly character which was desirable, but which
was no longer a necessary condition of membership within the Christian Church.
So the beginnings of a wide gulf were dug between the clergy and the laity, and
the conception began to grow that the one duty of the laity in the presence of the
clergy was that of simple obedience. Add to this the ever-present expectation that
the day was approaching when the Church was to enter into an affiance with the hitherto
persecuting state and to find a peaceful shelter under its protection; the growing
conviction that the action of all the various Christian Churches ought to be as harmonious
as possible, and that whatever step was taken by one ought to be taken
by all; and the feeling that the Christian Churches ought to be divisions of a
well-drilled army marching in step towards the earthly paradise of an affiance with,
and therefore of a conquest over, the hitherto persecuting power, and it is possible
to have some estimate of the changes which the conception of the Church and of
the ministry were undergoing in the middle of this third century. At the same time
it is easy to make too much of the power exercised by the bishops of the first half
of the third century. The bishops of these days were not the great potentates that
one is apt to imagine them to be from the language and phrases used by many modern
historians. They, all of them, had to carry their people, and, above all, their
elders or presbyters with them, in any change they suggested.
Canons which belong to the
early part of the third century, like the Canons of Hippolytus, may say little about
the rights and much about the duties of the laity. They may concern themselves with
the layman’s duty to pray in private, to come to Church regularly, to offer the
firstfruits, and may enjoin his wife to be careful to prepare the oblations. They
may prohibit him from taking any part in public worship or from presiding even
at an agape. They may appear to leave him no rights in the Church whatsoever save
that of choosing his pastor. But we know that long after this few things were done
in any local church without their being approved by a council of the whole people
and clergy, plebs and ordo; and that this congregational meeting existed and exercised
its powers from the days of St. Paul to those of Cyprian. The modern associations
connected with the word “bishop” impose upon us, and the misleading phrase “monarchical
bishop” adds to our illusions. The fact was that this “monarch” was in the vast
majority of cases the pastor of a congregation of a few score of families, that
no imperial legislation had as yet compelled the payment of tithes by law, nor had
conferred a high social position upon
any pastor or bishop who happened to be at the head of the Christian
societies in cities which had been the provincial centres of the imperial cult.Compare below, p. 352 ff.
When Christianity became the recognized religion of the Roman Empire; when imperial
edicts confirmed ecclesiastical legislation; when imperial troops were employed
to hunt down Marcionite, Montanist or Donatist nonconformists, the state of things
became different. But until we get to the middle of the fourth century the Christian
pastors were too dependent on their people to be great potentates and irresponsible
rulers. It was the theory that was changing—that is the important thing to be remembered.
This new theory of the position and authority of the office-bearers
in the Christian churches was so novel, and so opposed to the old traditions of
primitive Christianity, that an extra-ordinary sanction was needed to support it,
and in the nature of things the sanction had to come down from the earliest days.
It is here that the idea of an “Apostolic Succession,” in the modern Roman and
Anglican sense, first makes its appearance. It is a conception which had its origin
in the brains of leaders of the Roman Church, and although it was adopted and defended
by Cyprian, it has never ceased to be associated with Roman claims and to fit most
naturally into Roman theories. To understand it one must remember, what is continually
forgotten, that the great men who built up the Western Church were almost all trained
Roman lawyers. Tertullian, Cyprian, Augustine, to say nothing of many of the most
distinguished Roman bishops, were all men whose early training had been that of
a Roman lawyer—a training which moulded and shaped all their thinking, whether theological
or ecclesiastical. The framework of Roman law supported their thoughts about Christian
organization and about Christian doctrines. They instinctively regarded all questions
as a great Roman lawyer would. They had the lawyer’s craving for regular precedents,
for elaborate legal fictions to bridge time and connect the present
with the past. They had the lawyer’s idea that the primary duty laid
upon them was to enforce obedience to authority, and especially to that authority
which expressed itself in external institutions. Apostolic succession, in the dogmatic
sense of that ambiguous term, is the legal fiction required by the legal mind to
connect the growing conceptions of the authority of the clergy with the earlier
days of Christianity. It served the Christian lawyer in much the same way that another
curious legal fiction assisted the pagan civilian. The latter insisted that the
government of the Emperors from Augustus to Diocletian was the prolongation of
the old republican constitution; the former imagined that the rule of bishops was
the prolongation through the generations of the inspired guidance of the original
apostles who were the planters of the Church.
A legal fiction has generally some
historical basis to start from, The basis of the fiction in civil law was the fact
that the emperors, while wielding almost absolute personal authority, did so in
accordance with republican forms inasmuch as they were invested by the senate with
almost all the offices which under the republic had been distributed among a number
of persons. The fiction in ecclesiastical government had also its basis of fact.
The apostles had founded many of the churches, and their first converts or others
suitable had become the first office-bearers. There had been a succession of leaders,
the characteristics of leadership, as has been explained, undergoing some striking
changes in the course of the second century. All these successions of office-bearers
could be traced back to the foundation of the churches in which they existed, and
therefore to the missionaries, whether apostles or apostolic men, who had founded
them. This was the historical thread on which, in the end, was strung the gigantic
figment called apostolic succession—a strange compound of minimum of fact and maximum
of theory.
The beginnings of the theory are easily discernible, and have been
already explained. Irenaeus seized upon the undoubted fact of successive generations
of office-bearers going back to the
apostolic founders of certain churches in order to find a guarantee
for the true Christian doctrine. To make assurance doubly sure, he added a theory
to his fact—this, namely, that these office-bearers who were in the succession had
a charisma veritatis. According to the ideas of the time there was a minimum of
fact in the added theory, for many of the pastors of these primitive churches were
prophets and had the charisma. This made it easier to suppose that what belonged
to some pastors personally was the property of all officially. The result was that
Christian leaders had a short and easy method of dealing with Gnostics and others.Compare
above, p. 224 ff. Moreover, when the leaders became the guardians of sound teaching they acquired
additional magisterial powers within the communities over which they presided. But
neither Irenaeus, nor Tertullian who adopted and extended his theory, ever claimed
that the leaders of the churches who were in the succession stood in the same position
to the churches of the end of the second and beginning of the third centuries as
that held by the apostles in the middle of the first. If they believed that the
apostles were the mediators between Jesus and the Church they were also firmly convinced
that the Holy Spirit was imparted to the whole membership, and was not the peculiar
possession of the leaders of the communities because they were in the succession
from the apostles. The idea appeared earliest in the Roman Church. So far as I
am aware, the earliest claim of this kind was made by Hippolytus in his struggle
with Calixtus in Rome; and Calixtus, the head of one of the rival factions, was
not slow to adopt the same arrogant position. The former made use of the idea of
an apostolic succession to strengthen his position when he tried to show that his
rival was a heretic; and the latter used it to warrant him in issuing decrees which
relaxed the ancient discipline in the hope of attracting to his own congregation
men who felt the rules of Christian living laid down by Hippolytus too hard for
their weakness. These were the edifying surroundings from amidst
which came the first full statement of the claim to apostolic succession.“But none will refute these (heretics), save the Holy Spirit bequeathed unto
the Church, which the apostles having in the first instance received, have transmitted
to those who rightly believed. But we, as being their successors, and as participators
in this grace, high-priesthood, and office of teaching, as well as being reputed
guardians of the Church, will not be found deficient in vigilance, or disposed to
suppress correct doctrine,” Refutation of all Heresies (Philosophumena), I., proemium.
Hippolytus attacks Calixtus in IX. vi. vii. He says of his discipline:—“For he
is in the habit of attending the congregation of any one else, who is called a Christian; should a man commit any transgression, the sin, they say, is not reckoned to him,
provided only he hurries off to the school of Calixtus,” IX. vii. Calixtus is the
bishop of Rome whom Tertullian attacks in his De Pudicitia, and whose proclamation
he quotes:—“I remit, to such as have discharged repentance, the sins of adultery
and fornication” (1). The theory may be older in the Roman Church than this its first distinct statement.Harnack, whose careful chronological
investigations have led him to believe that the Roman list of bishops or pastors
may be trusted from Anicetus (about 155 A.D.) or from Soter (about 166), while no
Oriental list can be trusted before the third century, regards this as an indication
that the theory of apostolic succession in its beginnings at least had become established
in Rome at a comparatively early date. Compare Die Chronologie der altchristlichen
Literatur, pp. 144-230; and his History of Dogma, Eng. Trans. (1894-99). ii. 70 n.
From the time that this doctrine of apostolic succession comes into being in the
West on to its full statement by Cyprian, its use is the same. It is appealed to
as the ground for the assumption of powers of command on the part of the bishops
or pastors. It is interesting to notice that while the idea of a succession is to
be found in the East, it took an altogether different shape from the formal legal
Roman dogma. There is no mention of an apostolic succession of chief pastors in
the first six books of the Apostolic Constitutions. It does not appear in the definition
or description of the Church which is given in the first book.Apostolic Constitutions, I. i. Yet the office of
bishop or pastor is dwelt upon at length. He is always looked upon as the minister
of a congregation, and frequently of a very small congregation,Ibid. II. i. but that does not
prevent the authors heaping up phrases to
describe his importance and the respect which is due to him from his
people.The bishop is told to sustain the character of God among men, “as being set over
all men, over priests, kings, rulers, fathers, children, teachers, and in general
over all who are subject” to him; Apostolic Constitutions, II. xi.; “It is thy
privilege (O bishop), to govern those under thee, but not to be governed by them”
(II. xiv.); the laic is to “honour him, love him, reverence him as his lord, as
his master, as the high-priest of God, as a teacher of piety; for he that heareth
him heareth Christ; and he that rejecteth him rejecteth Christ” (II. xx.); “the bishop, he is the minister of the word, the keeper of knowledge, the mediator
between God and you in the several parts of your divine worship; he is your ruler
and governor; he is your king and potentate; he is, next after God, your earthly
god, who has a right to be honoured by you” (II. xxvi.); and so on in Oriental
luxuriance of phrases. It is not that there was no sense of the continuity of office
in the East:—“It is also thy duty, O, bishop, to have before thine eyes the examples
of those who have gone before, and to apply them skilfully to the cases of those
who want words of severity or of consolation” (II. xxii.). The elders, “the counsellors of the bishop”—his Kirk-Session—“sustain
the place” of the apostles of the Lord.“Let also a double portion (of the firstfruits) be set apart
for the elders, as for such as labour continually in the word and doctrine, upon
the account of the apostles of our Lord, whose place they sustain, as the counsellors
of the bishop and the crown of the Church (II. xxviii.). The formal legal Roman mind needed a precedent,
in the shape of this legal fiction, for the unwonted domination which the chief
pastors were beginning to claim. The Oriental, accustomed to arbitrary government,
did not feel that usurpation of power required to be cloaked under legal fictions.
Yet in the East we find a trace of a succession. Clement of Alexandria conceives
the number of the apostles continually recruited from age to age by the enrolment
of men who have attained to a “gnostical perfection,”Speaking of those who attain to
“gnostical perfection,” Clement says (Stromata, VI. xiii.):—“Luminous already,
and like the sun shining in the exercise of beneficence, he speeds by righteous
knowledge through the love of God to the sacred abode, like as the apostles. . . .
Those then also, who have exercised themselves in the Lord’s commandments, and
lived perfectly and gnostically according to the Gospel may be now enrolled in the
chosen body of the apostles. Such an one is in reality an elder of the Church, and
a true deacon of the will of God if he do and teach what is the Lord’s; not as
being chosen by men, nor regarded as righteous because a presbyter, but enrolled
in the eldership because righteous. And although here upon earth he be not honoured
with the chief seat, he will sit down on the four-and-twenty thrones, judging the
people, as St. John says in the Apocalypse. For in truth the covenant of salvation,
reaching down to us from the foundation of the world, through different generations
and times, is one, though conceived as different in respect of gifts.” and who are, therefore, the true
teachers of the Church, for the Christian Neo-Platonist of Alexandria
was as familiar with the thought of a succession of inspired teachers,The Neo-Platonists
believed that the true philosophy was preserved to the world through a succession
of divinely inspired teachers. as the minds
of the Roman lawyers who built up the Church in the West were saturated with legal
precedents and the need for the visible continuity of government even though a legal
fiction had to be invented to show it. The great Alexandrian conceives the continuity
of the Church to exist in the succession of Christian generations, and to be made
evident by the appearance among them from time to time of saintly men of apostolic
character who are known to God, and whose supreme importance in preserving the true
character of Christianity will be revealed in the future. This he deems to be a
much better guarantee than a succession of office-bearers, chosen and ordained by
fallible men.
Although the conception that the heads of the Christian churches
were the successors of the apostles, in the sense that they possessed the gifts
and the powers of the original apostles (now thought of as Twelve only), was really
the creation of the Roman Church, it is intimately connected with Cyprian of Carthage,The best edition of Cyprian’s works
is that of J. Hartel (1868-71) in the Vienna Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum
Latinorum, where the letters are to be found in the second volume. The numbering
of the letters in this edition is the same as in the Oxford edition of 1682; Migne’s
edition has a different numbering. In our quotations Migne’s numbering is given
in brackets. A very suggestive account of Cyprian’s work in constructing the polity
of the Church is given by Albrecht Ritschl in his Die Entstehung der altkatholischen
Kirche, 2nd ed. (1857), pp. 555-73. Otto Ritschl, his son, has written Cyprian von Karthago and die Verfassung der Kirche (1885)—a careful and elaborate work. Other
monographs on Cyprian are:—Rettberg, Thascius Caecilius Cyprianus, Bischof von Carthago, dargestellt
nach seinen Leben und Wirken (1831). Fechtrup (Roman Catholic), Der Heilige Cyprian;
sein Leben und seine Lehre (1878). Pearson’s Annales Cyprianici are valuable; they
are published in Fell’s (Oxford) edition of Cyprian’s works (1682), and have been
republished in Pearson’s Minor Theological Works (1884). The latest book on Cyprian
is from the pen of Dr. Benson, the late archbishop of Canterbury, who was the author
of the article on Cyprian in the Dictionary of Christian Biography. The book is
entitled Cyprian, his Life, his Times, his Work (1897). From one point of view it
is impossible to praise this book too highly; but it has very grave defects. It
displays fine scholarship, unwearied research, and an historical imagination which
enables the author to reconstruct the secular society of the times when Cyprian
lived. The framing is excellent; but the portrait framed is scarcely so good. The
author exhibits to us a pious, suave, courteous, far-seeing ecclesiastical statesman,
whose letters and speeches were seasoned with a sarcastic humour; but the real
Cyprian had other characteristics which are either hidden out of sight or relegated
to an obscure background. We see nothing whatever of the prophet whom the Spirit
inspired in dreams and visions when moments of difficulty in life or in ecclesiastical
policy arose, and whose dread of demons changed spiritual sacraments into magical
rites; little of the canonist who measured the deep promptings of the heart’s repentance
by stereotyped expressions, and paved the way for the degradation of sorrow into
the mechanism of penance; little of the fiery Roman African who launched envenomed
phrases at ecclesiastical opponents; and nothing of the ruthless Roman lawyer who
condemned a Christian martyr, who had survived the tortures which had covered her
poor body with blood, to eternal perdition (for this he thought he could do as a
successor of the apostles), when she crossed the path of his ecclesiastical policy.
Then a curious colour blindness or perhaps an amiable propensity to see all things
ecclesiastical through the coloured glass of the modern institutions of the communion
over which he so worthily presided, prevents the author from seeing the ecclesiastical
situation which existed in the middle of the third century. Dr. Benson had evidently
great difficulty in stating an opponent’s argument fairly, and seldom succeeds in
doing so. He had no acquaintance with the organization of any branch of the Protestant
Church save his own, and yet makes continual allusion to other organizations. We
have such phrases as “Presbyterian Teutonism” (this is applied to the greatest
living authority in early Church history; Dr. Harnack of Berlin); “heavy pages,”
“laborious pages” (phrases which mean that an opinion Dr. Benson does not like
is supported by a plentiful supply of quotations from Cyprian’s writings), “Calvinism” (used at random, for Calvinists agree with Cyprian and Augustine on the matter
discussed); and many others of the same kind. They are useful to warn the unwary
reader of the bias in the book. who gave it definiteness as a dogmatic idea. This
great ecclesiastical statesman, like Gregory I., has left behind him
a collection of letters which reveal the working of his mind,
and enable us to see how his thoughts took sharper outline in a controversy
which he had to maintain with his own office-bearers in Carthage, and how he aimed
at and partly succeeded in giving the Christian Church a polity which enabled it
to be one in practical activity as it was one in devotional conception.
Thascius Cyprianus
was the most eminent of the many distinguished converts whom Christianity was drawing
from the learned and wealthy classes during the second third of the third century,
during that long period of “peace” which preceded the outbreak of the Decian
persecution in 250 A.D. He was a Roman whose ancestors had settled in Africa. Such
men were called Roman Africans. They belonged to a race which had given the capital
some of its most distinguished lawyers, and which furnished to the Church such men
as Tertullian, Minutius Felix, Cyprian, Lactantius and Augustine. By training and
profession he was a pleader, and therefore of the highest social standing.“Far from any shade
of unreality resting on them, the teachers of oratory were courted leaders in society.
The publicity in life, the majesty of national audiences, the familiarity of the
cultivated classes with the teaching of the schools, required the orator to be not
only perfect in the graces of life, but to be versed in ethical science; to be
armed with solid arguments as well as to be facile of invention; not less convincing
than attractive; in short to be a wit and a student, a politician and an eclectic
philosopher. At the age of nearly thirty Cicero was still placing himself under
the tuition of the Rhodian Molon. Augustine’s fourth book on Christian doctrine
shews us that five centuries and a changed religion did not abate the value placed
on technical perfection. No statesman’s name had for generations commanded such
reverence as was paid in Cyprian’s times to the life and memory of Timesitheus the
Rhetorician, whose daughter the young African Emperor had espoused, and whose honour
and universal cultivation had for a brief interval restored purity to the Court,
dignity to the senate, and discipline to the camps of Rome”; Benson, Cyprian,
his Life, his Times, his Work, pp. 2, 3. His
wealth was great; his house, with its “gilded ceilings” and “mosaics of costly
marble,”Cyprian, Ad Donatum,
15:—“Auro distincta aquearia of pretiosi marmoris crustis vestita domicilia.” and his gardens, were
famous in the city of palaces. He became a Christian in middle life, drawn by the persuasion of the intellect
as well as by the pleadings of the heart. We may see the path
he trod towards conversion in his Treatise to Donatus and in the Book of Testimonies
he wrote for a friend. After a brief space of time he probably became a deacon;
he was certainly an elder when Donatus, the Bishop of Carthage, died. The Christians
at Carthage resolved that the most distinguished Christian in the city, although
two years had scarcely passed since his baptism, should be their bishop. His reluctance
only increased their ardour. “A crowded brotherhood besieged the doors of his house,
and throughout all the avenues of access an anxious love was circulating.”Pontius, Life and
Passion of Cyprian, Bishop and Martyr, 5. Cyprian
yielded and was ordained, the bishop, the Papa, the spiritual Father of the Christian
community in Carthage. We must forget many of the associations which the word “bishop” inevitably brings with it to understand his position. He was simply the
chief pastor of the Christian congregation at Carthage and of its outlying mission
districts. He had no diocese and never exercised diocesan rule. He had no cathedral,
not even a church. His congregation met in the audience hall of a wealthy Carthaginian
burgher.Benson, Cyprian,
his Life, his Times, his Work, p. 41 and note. It was the man who made the position he occupied one of such commanding
importance as it soon attained to.It may be useful to give the principal dates known proximately
about Cyprian. He was baptized probably in the spring of 246 A.D.; became a member
of the Session of Carthage in 247 A.D.; and was consecrated bishop some time after
June in 248 A.D. It is not quite certain that he was a deacon; the evidence lies
in the phrase used by his biographer Pontius, who was a deacon:—“Erat sane illi
etiam de nobis contubernium viri justi et laudabilis memoriae Caeciliani” (Life,
4); and in the sentence in sect. 3:—“quis enim non omnes honoris gradus crederet
tali mente credente.” The outbreak of the Decian persecution being imminent, Cyprian
retired from Carthage to his unknown hiding-place in January 250 A.D.; the persecution
began in April of the same year. It raged fiercely until November, and was then
relaxed; but it was not considered safe for Cyprian to return. He came back to
Carthage in 251 A.D., some time after Easter. Then followed a series of councils
at Carthage where the African bishops met under the presidency
of Cyprian;—the first in April 251 A.D.; the second in May 252 A.D., the third
in September 253 A.D., the fourth in the autumn of 254 A.D., the fifth in 255, and
the sixth and seventh in 256; in 257 Cyprian was banished to Curubis; he returned
to Carthage in 258 and was martyred there in September 258.
Eighteen months of quiet rule were vouchsafed him. During this
period he had conciliated the few who had been opposed to the choice of so recently
baptized a Christian for the important place of chief pastor. They became, says
Pontius, his biographer, “his closest and most intimate friends.”It is commonly said and has been repeated
by Dr. Benson that the five presbyters who were at variance with Cyprian in the
question of the influence of confessors and martyrs on the discipline of the Church
were among those persons who disliked his elevation to the episcopate and that they
continued to bear a grudge against him. This idea seems to me to have no basis in
fact. Dr. Benson adduces as his only proof the sentence: “retaining that ancient
venom against my episcopate, that is against your suffrage and God’s judgment, they
renew their old attack upon me” (Ep. xliii. 1 [xxxix.]); but the “ancient venom”
and “old attack” it is clear from section three and other epistles, was their first
siding with the confessors against Cyprian’s judgment not to accept the certificates
of the confessors; while the word “suffrage” means here as elsewhere that Cyprian
held that all his acts as bishop were to be justified by the fact that he had been
validly called to office. There is no trace of any difficulties between Cyprian
and his presbyters until the dispute about what was due to the wishes of the martyrs
and the confessors in the matter of the lapsed.
Decius was one of those stern upright emperors who believed that
Christianity was a source of menace to the empire, and that it had to be stamped
out. His edict against it was published early in the year 250 A.D. It had been expected
by the heathen population of Carthage, and threats against the wealthy and well-known
head of the Christian community were freely uttered by the mob. Cyprian, thinking
less of his own safety than of the welfare of his people, believed it to be his
duty to go into retirement, and a large part of his correspondence deals with the
management of his congregation from his place of safety. We find three distinct
questions of ecclesiastical organization raised and in the end settled-the right
of men supposed to be specially possessed by the Spirit to interfere in the discipline of the local
church, the seat of the one supreme authority in the local church,
and the best means of giving a practical expression to the unity of the whole Church
of Christ. The occasion which demanded solution of all three questions was the fact
that many Christians had lapsed and were asking to be restored to the communion
of the Church at Carthage. The ecclesiastical questions are so connected with the
course of events that these last must be briefly noted.
The persecution resolved upon by the Emperor Decius was begun
in swift ruthless Roman fashion. It attacked the Christian Church everywhere simultaneously—in
Rome, Egypt, Syria, Armenia, Spain, and North Africa. It aimed at breaking up the
Christian communities by destroying their leaders and then coercing their followers.
Cyprian speaks of bishops proscribed, imprisoned, banished, and slain.Cyprian, Epist. lxvi. 7 (lxviii.). Persecution
had been almost unknown in Africa for thirty-eight years, during which time of “peace” the Christian communities had been growing rapidly in numbers and in influence; the results of its renewal seemed at first sight to be disastrous to the Christian
faith. Multitudes relapsed into heathenism.Cyprian, De Lapsis, 8. The larger half of the Christian community
in Carthage and at least one presbyter had been unable to face the terrible risks
in which the profession of Christianity had involved them. They relapsed. They
appeared before the imperial commissioners, five of whom, called The Commissioners
of the Sacrifices, were appointed to act along with the magistrates of the district.
They made a declaration that they worshipped the gods and in the presence of the
commissioners they took part in the pagan worship, either joining in a sacrifice,
tasting the wine and eating of the sacrificial victim (the sacrificati) or throwing
incense on the altar of the emperor (the thurificati). This done they received a
certificate (libellus), certifying that they had done so. This was registered, and
then a copy was posted up in the market place or forum. Some found a way of appearing
to comply and yet of escaping from
actual participation in the pagan rites. They bribed officials to
give them certificates declaring that they had taken part in sacrifices which they
had not done (the libellatici).Two of these libelli were actually discovered in 1893 and 1894, brought
from Egypt among bundles of papyri dug out of Egyptian sands. They show us how thorough
this persecution of Decius was, how systematically arranged, how minute in its searching
out Christians—little villages being included and the women peasants as well as
the men interrogated. The first runs:—“To the Commissioners of sacrifices of the
village of Alexander’s Island from Aurelius Diogenes (son of) Satabus. About 72.
Scar on right eyebrow. I was both constant in ever sacrificing to the gods and now
in your presence according to the commands I sacrificed and drank and tasted of
the victims, and I beseech you to attach your signature. May you ever prosper. I
Aurelius Diogenes have presented this.” (Then follow the signatures of the magistrate
and witness. “I Aurelius saw him sacrificing. I Mys(thes, son of) . . . non
have signed. (First) year of the Emperor Caesar Gaius Messius Quintus Trajanus Decius,
Pius Felix Augustus. 2nd day of Ephiphi.” The second, in every way similar, bears
the name of Aurelius Syrus, his brother Pasbeius, and Demetria and Serapias their
wives. They were unable to write and the scribe Isidorus appended his name. The
signatures of the magistrates have been torn off. Thus poor Etecusa,Etecusa belonged to a Carthaginian family which had suffered
much. Her grandmother Celerina had been martyred in an earlier persecution; so
had her uncles, the son and son-in-law of Celerina, both in the army. Her brother
Celerinus was a noted confessor, who had come forth alive out of the severest tortures
without denying his faith. Her sister Candida had faltered and had sacrificed. We
see the confessor, the sacrificata and the libellatica, in one family. The two sisters
were overwhelmed with remorse and endeavoured to make atonement for their fall by
waiting on the arrivals of travellers at Rome and at Portus, and when they found
any Christian refugees from Carthage they took them home, hid them, and tended them.
They had no less than sixty-five of these refugees in their house at Rome. Compare
Cyprian, Epistles, xxi. (xx.), and xxxi. 3 (xxxiii.). a Roman Christian, while she
sadly and fearfully was climbing the ascent to the Capitol, where she had to make
her declaration and take part in the sacrifices, found an official near the small
temple to the Three Fates, who sold her a certificate and she went home again without
sacrificing. Many sought safety in flight, hoping to find freedom from persecutions
in cities where they were unknown.
Those Christians who were of sterner stuff were imprisoned, awaiting
torture and probably death. The torture was repeated over and over again. Even if
it produced recantation a second torture was applied. If the confessor stood firm
it might be applied time after time until the sufferer expired under it. Such men
and women were called confessors before they had suffered, and martyrs after they
had been done to death, or had suffered tortures without expiring. The martyrs and
confessors were carefully tended while they were in prison by their fellow-Christians; and many of the
lapsed, repenting of their weakness, thronged the prisons in Carthage
and lavished all manner of attentions on the heroic confessors. These lapsed Christians,
especially those of them who had purchased exemption from suffering by means of
false certificates, were anxious to be reconciled with the Church, and besought
the good offices of the confessors and martyrs to intercede on their behalf with
the office-bearers, and beg them to restore them again to communion. The result
was that many of the confessors, from the prison where they lay, gave letters (which
were also called libelli) to the elders of the Church, the bishop being absent in
hiding, asking that the bearers might be restored to the Church which they had abandoned
in a moment of weakness. This Decian persecution differed from all preceding ones
to this extent, that it had fallen on the whole Church of Christ, and was not confined
to any one portion. The question of what was to be done in the case of lapsed members
who wished to return to the faith they had abjured was one which was forced upon
the whole Church everywhere and at the same time.Cyprian, Epistle, xix. 2 (xiii.). It was a question of discipline
which had to be inevitably faced by every church.
So far as our information goes, the
leaders of the Roman Church were the first to see the importance and the urgency
of the question. The Bishop Fabian had been one of the first martyrs; to meet and
appoint a successor would have been to
offer new victims to the persecuting government. The elders of the
church took the burden of leadership on their own shoulders; they saw the universal
situation and the need for an immediate understanding with sister churches about
what it was possible to do at once. They put aside matters that could wait until
their church had again its lawful head; but the one matter which pressed for an
immediate decision was what ought to be done in the case of lapsed Christians who
earnestly desired reconciliation with the Church, and who were on the point of death.
They accordingly wrote to the elders in Carthage, advising them to follow a definite
rule with regard to the lapsed who were repentant—that if any were taken with sickness,
and repented of what they had done and desired communion, it should be granted to
them. In the same letter these Roman elders speak not obscurely of Cyprian as the
hireling shepherd who deserts his sheep when peril draws near. They in Rome and
the elders in Carthage are both deprived of their chief; persecution makes all
work difficult, but it must be done. This letter reached Cyprian, who treated it
in a very lofty way, and sent it back to the writers with a few grimly sarcastic
remarks; but it had a marked effect on him nevertheless.Harnack and Ritschl think that Crumentius carried this letter
to the office-bearers in Carthage for whom it was certainly intended, and that they
manifested their loyalty to Cyprian by making Crumentius take it on to their bishop.
Benson asserts that the elders in Carthage never saw the letter; that it was put
into Cyprian’s hands and that he sent it back to Rome without permitting it to reach
its destination. Benson may be right. Cyprian suppressed a more important letter
on a more important occasion and he might have suppressed this one also. The archbishop
justifies the one suppression by calling Cyprian a “benevolent despot”; and the
other by praising his sense of humour! Otto Ritschl, Cyprian von Karthago (1835),
p. 9; Benson, Cyprian, his Life, his Times, his Work (1897), p. 149. It does not
matter which view is the correct one; the important thing is the effect of the
letter on the mind of Cyprian, not its effect on the elders of Carthage. It altered his attitude
towards his own elders. Before he had read it he had sent a letter to his elders
and deacons, in which he had said: “I beg you by your faith and your religion
to discharge
both your own office and mine, that there be nothing wanting
either to discipline or diligence.”Cyprian, Epist.
v. 1 (iv.); compare Epist. xx. 1 (xiv.). He left the whole work unreservedly in
their hands—all his work as well as theirs. The two words used, disciplina and
diligentia, are employed by Cyprian to denote the two great divisions of a
bishop's work—the term disciplina including everything which belonged to the
office of judging and punishing, and diligentia including all that belonged to
his work as the head of the religious administration of the congregation, the
care of the poor and such matters. In a letter following, however, he distinctly
limited the work of his elders and deacons to the diligentia or to the religious
administration.Dr. Benson rather vehemently declares that there is no change
of attitude in Cyprian’s two letters. He gives an abstract of Ritschl’s arguments
and says that his “abstract will be as just as he can make it”; and yet he omits
entirely the strongest argument Ritschl has adduced! Compare Benson, Cyprian, etc.
pp. 148-50; Otto Ritschi, Cyprian von Karthago, pp. 9-13. 216, 217. “I exhort and command you, that those of you whose presence
there is least suspicious and least perilous, should in my stead discharge my
duty in respect of doing those things which are required for the religious
administration.”Cyprian’s Epist. xiv. 2 (v.). In the same letter he refuses to answer a question sent him
by four presbyters, which evidently concerned matters of discipline on the
ground that in such matters he did nothing on his own private opinion without
the advice of his elders, deacons, and people.Epist. xiv. 4 (v.). From this time onwards Cyprian
shows himself more and more irritated with his elders. He wrote to the martyrs
and the confessors complaining that some of his elders had admitted some of the
lapsed to communion;Epist. xv. 1 (x.). he wrote to his elders and deacons complaining
that some of the elders, “remembering neither the Gospel nor their own place, and,
moreover, considering neither the Lord’s future judgment nor the bishop now placed
over them, claim to themselves entire
authority (a thing which was never done in anywise under our predecessors)
with discredit and contempt of the bishop.” Their fault was that the elders blamed
had communicated with some of the lapsed, and offered and given them the eucharist,
“disregarding the honour which the blessed martyrs, with the confessors, maintain
for me, despising the law of the Lord, and that observance which the same martyrs
and confessors order to be maintained.”Epist. xvi. 1, 3 (ix.). He wrote to the people complaining of the
action of the elders in almost the same terms, and promised that when he could return
a meeting of bishops would be convened and that in the presence of the confessors,
and with their opinion, the letters and wishes of the “blessed martyrs” with reference
to the lapsed would be carefully considered.Epist. xvii. 2, 3 (xi.).
We do not know whether
Cyprian got any answer to these letters; but the probability is that he received
none, and that people and clergy felt sore that the bishop would neither return
and act himself nor allow his elders to do anything in the pressing question of
the lapsed. He wrote again to the elders and deacons and for the first time suggested
some immediate action. If any of the lapsed had a certificate from one of the martyrs
and were in sore sickness they were to be allowed to communicate.Epist. xviii. (xii.). This letter brought
an answer, which assured him that the elders and deacons had hitherto done their
best to follow his instructions, and to restrain the people and especially the lapsed; and Cyprian reiterates the command that if any of the penitent lapsed had a certificate
from one of the martyrs, and were at the point of death, they were to be received
back into the communion of the Church.Epist. xix. 1, 2 (xiii.).
Then comes a curious
letter.Epist. xx. (xiv.). Cyprian, whose last dealings with Rome had been to send back the letter
of advice which the Roman elders had addressed to their brethren at Carthage, now
wrote to these Roman elders; justified to them his actions in Carthage; complained
bitterly of the way in which the
libellatici had pestered the martyrs for certificates; bemoaned
the weakness of some of his clergy in admitting some of the lapsed to communion; and declared that he had followed the advice given in the letter from Rome which
he had treated so scornfully when it reached him. His letter, however, contains
one interesting fact. Cyprian says distinctly that although some of his presbyters
had acted rashly in communicating with the lapsed, they had refrained as soon as
he had remonstrated with them.Epist. xx. 2 (xiv.). Rome, however, had not forgotten his earlier action,
and he had to write four times ere he got an answer. When it came it was practically
a repetition of what had been written to the elders of Carthage, at least so far
as immediate action was concerned: If the lapsed are in severe sickness and are
penitent, admit them to communion, whether they have certificates from martyrs or
not. But as regards the larger, statesmanlike policy, which belonged to the immediate
future, the Roman elders adopted the proposals laid before them by Cyprian, and
by intercourse and correspondence they obtained the adhesion of many bishops in
Sicily and in some parts of Italy.Epist. xxx. 5, 8 (xxx.); xliii. 3 (xxxix.). Cyprian himself had meanwhile gained the adoption
of his policy by a large number of bishops in Africa, with whom he had been in correspondence.Epist. xxv. (xix.); xxvi. (xvii.).
Having thus secured the support of
the Roman elders and of so many bishops throughout the West for his conception of
arriving at a common mode of dealing with the lapsed, Cyprian at once took measures
to subdue all resistance in Carthage. He superseded his elders by a commission of
five, three bishops and two elders, to whom he entrusted not merely the discipline,
but also the relief of the deserving poor. They were to be his vicars. It was this
action that produced the subsequent schism in the Church at Carthage,Epist. xl. 1 (xxxvii.); xlii. (xxxviii.). a result
scarcely to be wondered at. Why such an arbitrary step should have been taken it is difficult
to say. Cyprian himself testifies that his clergy were at one with
him; they had with his approval excommunicated Gaius of Didda, a presbyter who
had insisted on communicating with the lapsed. However it is to be accounted for
it remains a witness to what Cyprian believed to be the power of the chief pastor; and it also seems to imply that at this juncture Cyprian stood very much alone,
separated in sympathy both from his clergy and his people.
Such was the situation in Carthage immediately before Cyprian
was able to return, and to hold the successive councils of African bishops which
exhibited his ecclesiastical statesmanship. Through the whole course of these events
one question thrusts itself into prominence—the possibility of the restoration to
Church communion of Christians who had lapsed during the persecution, and who penitently
begged to be allowed to return. Cyprian had one opinion on this matter and some
of his elders had another.
If the earlier usages of the Church be kept in mind, there was
much to be said on both sides. Idolatry had always been considered one of the worst
sins into which the baptized Christian could fall. It was one of those heinous sins
against God which, it was believed, the Church could never pardon. No limits were
set to the mercy of God; He might pardon and in the end receive; but the Church
could only accept such repentant sinners as catechumens, who could never again approach
the Lord’s Table. On the other hand, it had been held that such sins could be pardoned
in the Church if a revelation was received from God authorizing the restoration
in any particular case. So long as the prophetic ministry lasted, it was believed
that a prophet might receive such a revelation.Tertullian, De Pudicitia, 21. The opinion which silently spread
through the Church that deadly sins might receive forgiveness once but not on a
second lapse, can be traced back to a prophetic utterance.Hermas, Pastor, Mandata, iv. It was also believed
that, besides the prophets, the martyrs were the very men to whom it was
likely that God would vouchsafe such a revelation of His mind and
will.The Holy Spirit had entered the prison
along with them, Tertullian declared (Ad Martyras, 1). It was the constant belief
that the Lord had taken up His abode in His martyr, speaking in him and suffering
with him; compare the collection of evidence in Sohm, Kirchenrecht, i. 32 n. 9. They too had the right to speak the word of pardon which the office-bearers
of the Church dared not do. To speak such pardons, then, was the prerogative of
prophets and martyrs;Eusebius, Hist. Eccles. V. xviii. 7. and it was theirs because the Spirit of God dwelt in them
in larger measure than in any other Christians, whether office-bearers or not. Martyrs
had used this prerogative of theirs in the past. The martyrs of Lyons had pronounced
the pardon of the penitent lapsed around them;Eusebius, Hist. Eccles. V. ii. 5,
6:—“They loosed all, they bound none. . . . They did not arrogate any superiority
over the lapsed; but in those things wherein they themselves abounded, in this
they supplied those that were deficient, exercising the compassion of mothers, and
pouring forth prayers to the Father on their account.” Cf. Eusebius, Hist. Eccles. xlii. 5. and we can see from Tertullian,Tertullian, Ad Martyras, 1:—“ You
know that some not able to find this peace in the Church, have been used to seek
it from the imprisoned martyrs.” In his tract De Pudicitia he denounces the practice
in the case of those who had been guilty of sins of the flesh (22). The martyr,
he says, is no sooner in prison than sinners beset and gain access to him; “instantly
prayers echo round him; instantly pools of tears of all the polluted surround him; nor are any more diligent in purchasing entrance into prison than those who have
lost the Church.” how common a practice it was for men who, by reason of some great sin, were “outside
the peace of the Church,” to supplicate the martyrs to procure this peace for them.
Hence the elders of Carthage might well plead that they were acting according to
the ancient traditions of the Church when they were induced to give communion to
those who came with the letters of the martyrs in their hands.
On the other hand,
Cyprian felt that the Decian persecution was a crisis which might make or mar the
Church of God. The long rest from persecution had made conversion a comparatively
easy thing, and the persecution, with the wholesale defections
it had produced, had shown how bad these easy conversions had been
for the stability of the Church. To make restoration an easy matter might do more
harm to Christianity than the persecution itself. He was unwearied in urging, in
his earliest letters, that lapsing into idolatry was a heinous sin against God,
which must be bitterly repented in protracted sorrow. Hasty restoration was a profanity
in his sight, and the demand for it did not seem to him to be a sign of the depth
of sorrow that should exist. He knew that the churches had relaxed their former
rigid attitude with regard to sins specially heinous; he had no word of disapproval
for the practice; he believed that the churches had authority to forgive even the
sin of idolatry—at least he must have come to believe that they had;In his Testimonies (iii. 28), Cyprian
says distinctly that “remission cannot be granted in the Church to him who has
sinned against God”; but he does not say whether this “sin against God” is idolatry
or not. but with
that strong view of authority which was his characteristic and with his ideas of
orderly Church procedure, he was determined that the whole question of the lapsed
ought to be gone into with the greatest deliberation. The dominant idea in his earliest
epistles is that after the persecution had ceased the bishop, elders, deacons, confessors
and people ought to meet together, and the question of the lapsed, their repentance
and their pardon be deliberately dealt with.Epistles, xi. 8 (vii.); xiv. 4 (v.); xv. 1 (x.); xvi. 4 (ix.). The scene suggested by his words
is what we know was the mode of discipline in the Roman Church after Calixtus’
proclamation that the office-bearers at Rome were prepared to grant pardon for sins
of the flesh on due signs of sorrow. Tertullian’s description of the scene, although
a caricature by a bitter opponent, conveys a not unfair impression of what must
have frequently taken place.De Pudicitia, 13:—“You introduce into the Church the penitent
adulterer for the purpose of melting the brotherhood by his supplications. You lead
him into the midst clad in sackcloth, covered with ashes, a compound of disgrace
and horror. He prostrates himself before the widows, before the elders,
suing for the tears of all; he seizes the edges of their garments, he clasps their
knees, he kisses the prints of their feet. Meanwhile you harangue the people and
excite their pity for the sad lot of the penitent. Good pastor, blessed father that
you are, you describe the coming back of your goat in recounting the parable of
the lost sheep. And in case your ewe lamb may take another leap out of the fold—as
if that were not lawful for the future which was not really lawful in the past—you
fill all the rest of the flock with apprehension at the very moment of granting
indulgence.” Cyprian’s later declaration that he meant to ask the
assistance of bishops in the determination of so grave a matter
is not incompatible with his earlier promises.Epistle, xvii. 3 (xi.).
Suddenly he was brought face to face
with a question of authority. To the grave Roman lawyer who had become a Christian
bishop, the question of authority was the question of questions. Another authority
suddenly confronted him within his own congregation. He could afford to be sarcastic
in a dignified manner when the elders of the Church of Rome compared him to a hireling
shepherd and then proceeded to give advice to his own office-bearers. That was from
without; but this was from within; and had moreover some sanction from ancient
usage. He felt bound to resist, and he did with all his powers.
Thus this struggle successfully maintained
by Cyprian against the right of the martyrs or confessors to pronounce pardon of
one who had lapsed, may be looked upon as the last stage of the long contest waged
by the office-bearers of the local churches against the ancient supremacy of the
prophetic ministry. His success established the complete supremacy of the local
office-bearers; it was never again questioned. Carthage had therefore a peculiar
place in the development of the idea of the centre of authority in the Church of
Christ in addition to the prominence given to it by the genius of its bishop. The
martyrs and confessors do not seem to have contested the supremacy of the bishop
or office-bearers anywhere else. At Rome,Cyprian, Epistle, xxxi. 6, 7 (xxv.). at Alexandria and at Corinth, they all
supported the ordinary ecclesiastical
authorities.Compare the account given by Eusebius
of the way in which Dionysius of Corinth persuaded his people to admit the lapsed
there to communion (Hist. Eccles. VI. xlii. 5, 6);—“But these same martyrs, who
are now sitting with Christ and are the sharers of His kingdom, and the partners
in His judgment, and who are now judging with Him, received those of the brethren
that fell away and had been convicted of sacrificing, and when they saw their conversion
and repentance, and having proved them as sincere, they received them and assembled
with them. They also communicated with them in prayer and at their feasts. What
then, brethren, do ye advise concerning these? What should we do? Let us join
in our sentiments with them, and let us observe their judgment and their charity; and let us kindly receive those who were treated with such compassion by them.
Or should we rather pronounce their judgment unjust, and set ourselves up as judges
of their opinions, and thus grieve the spirit of mildness, and overturn established
order?” In Carthage alone the confessors and martyrs
strove to exert their power against that of the bishop, and found some of the office-bearers
ready, at first at least, to accept their decisions as the commands of God.
Felicissimus could say: “God speaks through His martyrs as He
spoke in the old days through His prophets, and where God speaks there is His Church”; and the lapsed could send letters to Cyprian written in the name of the Church,
because they were written by martyrs; while Cyprian could reply: “God speaks
through the bishop as he formerly spoke through His apostles, and the Church is
founded on the bishops, and every act of the Church is controlled by these same
rulers.”Compare the whole
of Epistle xxxiii. (xxvi.). Thus the two authorities faced each other in Carthage—at first within
the one community—then, when the tension became too strong, in two separate congregations,
in one of which Felicissimus and the five elders represented the old idea of authoritative
divine utterance in the midst of the congregation; while in the other Cyprian
insisted on the new thought, first proclaimed by Hippolytus and Calixtus in their
mutual quarrels, that the bishops speak the divine decisions as the apostles had
done.Otto Ritschl seems to think that Cyprian, if he did not during
the course of the Decian persecution
alter his conception of what the Church was, held it in a more rudimentary form
before the persecution arose, and that it took shape during his experiences while
the persecution lasted. He is therefore of opinion that he sees these more rudimentary
ideas in the letter lxiii. (lxii.), which he accordingly places at the head of the
list. The argument from the expressions in the letter does not appear to be very
conclusive. Cyprian is there speaking of the cup in the Holy Supper. He says that
the water in the mixed chalice represents the baptized people and the wine is the
symbol of Christ; and that when the cup is given the Church becomes united with
Christ. He calls the Church which is thus united to Christ in communicating “the
people established in the Church faithfully and firmly persevering in what they
have believed.” He is not speaking about what makes a Church, but about how the
people who are in the Church are united to Christ in partaking of the cup in the
communion. It is true that Cyprian tells us that the Church is in episcopo et clero
et in omnibus stantibus constituta; but this definition does not prevent him
asserting in the previous sentence that the Church is founded on the bishops (Epist.
xxxiii. 1 (xxvi.). Cyprian held from the beginning that the bishop is the keystone
of the arch; without him nothing remains but a heap of ruins. At the same time,
his theory grew more and more distinct as he had to accept consequences which followed
from his premises in the discussions which the controversies about the lapsed evoked.
Compare Ritschl, Cyprian, etc. pp. 86 f. and 241; Benson, Cyprian, pp. 39, 186 f.
Cyprian took this position from the first:—No one can be
received back into the communion of the Church until penance has been
performed, confession made, and the hands of the bishop and clergy are laid upon
their heads. This cannot be done in the absence of the bishop, and therefore there
can be no restitution of the lapsed until the “peace” comes and the bishop is
able to return. But he was too great a man to be a doctrinaire theorist. When he
found the strength of the martyrs’ position in Carthage, when his humanity was touched
with the thought of really penitent lapsed dying without the reconciliation they
longed for, he permitted his elders to communicate with those invalids who had martyrs’
certificates, although he could not be present himself to receive them formally,Epistle, xviii. (xii.); xx.
3 (xiv.); lvii. 1 (liii.). Cyprian, like his master, Tertullian, evidently thought
that it ought to “suffice to the martyr to have purged his own sins; it is part
of ingratitude or of pride to lavish upon others what one has obtained at a high
price. Who has redeemed another’s death by his own, but the Son of God alone?”
He also knew that beneath the noble constancy which endured tortures there was a
nervous excitement on the part of some at least which was leading them to practise unnatural
tests of continence—tests which should never have been used, which might prove dangerous
and which in some cases did prove dangerous in the end. Compare Epistles, xi. 1
(vii.); xiii. 5 (vi.); De Unitate Ecclesiae, 20. and by nominating
a distinguished martyr to be one of his commission of five, he
managed to show the people that the whole strength of the martyrs was not on the
side opposed to him.Epistles, xl. (xxxiv.); xli. (xxxvii.); xxiii. (xxxviii.). Never from beginning to end did he acknowledge an
authority in the local church superior or even equal to that of the bishop. He went the length
of superseding his elders, the ancient counsellors of the bishop, when he thought
that the influence of the martyrs over them was likely to weaken his. He was the
despot, generally a benevolent despot, of the local church. His position might
be due to his people, but he never imagined that his authority came from them;
it came from God directly. That was his idea from first to last. The old theory
that the bishop did not differ from the elders save in having a special seat of
honour in the Church and in having the power to ordain, was not his. He was a Roman
lawyer, and the analogies of imperial government were always before him. The governors
of the imperial provinces, large or small, were nominated by the emperor and were
responsible to him alone. It was their duty to govern for the benefit of the people
over whom they were set, to take counsel with them and their leaders on the affairs
of the province, but they were responsible to the emperor alone from whom their
authority came. The Church had begun to copy the imperial organization in many things,
as we shall see hereafter, and the analogy of the imperial government was never
absent from the thoughts of the leaders during the second half of the third century.
The bishops were the dispensatores Dei et Christi, as the governors were the deputies
of the emperor. They were in God’s place, set there by His authority, and responsible
to Him alone. If their authority was recognized then they might take their people
and their subordinate office-bearers into their confidence and
into their counsels, but if it was in any way questioned, then they
were alone with God against all gainsayers.Epistles, iii. (lxiv.); lxviii. (lxvi.).
According to Cyprian’s idea, the bishop entered upon the rights
and duties of his office through ordination, which was the indispensable gate to
all office in the Church.Epist. lxix. 3 (lxxv.):—“Habere namque aut tenere ecclesiam
nullo modo potest qui ordinatus in ecclesia non est.” His selection was commonly the act of the people, but
neighbouring bishops might select him and present him to his people, whose assent
must always be obtained before installation.Cyprian describes the appointment of a bishop thrice—the one being his
own, the others that of a bishop in Spain and of Cornelius of Rome. Of his own he
says:—“When a bishop is appointed into the place of one deceased, when he is chosen
in time of peace by the suffrage of an entire people, when he is protected by God
in persecution, faithfully linked with his colleagues, approved to his people by
now four years’ experience in his episcopate; observant of discipline in time of
peace; in time of persecution, proscribed with the name of his episcopate applied
and attached to him; so often asked for in the circus, ‘for the lions’ in the
amphitheatre; honoured with the testimony of the divine condescension,” Epist.
lix. 6 (liv.). “You must diligently observe and keep the practice delivered from
divine tradition and apostolic observance, which is also maintained among us and
almost throughout the provinces; that for the proper celebration of ordinations
all the bishops of the same province should assemble with that congregation for
which a prelate is ordained; and the bishop should be chosen in the presence of
the people, who have most fully known the life of each one and have looked into
the doings of each one as respects his habitual conduct. And this also, we see,
was done by you in the ordination of our colleague Sabinus; so that by the suffrage
of the whole brotherhood, and by the sentence of the bishops who had assembled in
their presence, and who had written letters to you concerning him, the episcopate
was conferred upon him,” Epist. lxvii. 5 (lxvii.). “Cornelius was made bishop by
the judgment of God and of His Christ, by the testimony of almost all the clergy,
by the suffrage of the people who were there present, and by the assembly of ancient
priests and good men,” Epist. lv. 8 (li.); see also lix. 5 (liv.); lxvii. 4 (lxvii.).
Compare Hatch, art. Ordination in the Dictionary of Christian Antiquities, p. 1518b.
The mode of appointing the bishop or pastor in the third century as described in
Cyprian’s letters was essentially the same as the mode of appointing the pastor
or bishop in Presbyterian Churches at the present time. Whatever the mode of selection and
of consecration, Cyprian saw in these acts the hand of God. It was God and God alone who made bishops,
while it was the bishops who made the subordinate office-bearers.Epist. iii. 3 (lxiv.); xlviii. 4 (xliv.); lv. 8 (li.); lix. 4, 5 (liv.); lxvi. 1, 9 (lxviii.).
His reason for his strong and reiterated assertions that bishops were made by God
appears to have been that the appointment of a bishop, who is, “for the time, judge
in Christ’s stead,” is such an important thing, that God who cares even for sparrows,
must control the selection of bishops.“‘Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and one of them does not fall to the ground without
the will of your Father.’ When He says that not even the least things are done without
God’s will, does anyone think that the highest and greatest things are done in God’s
Church without God’s knowledge or permission, and that priests—that is. His
stewards—are not ordained by His decree?” Epist. lix. 5 (liv.); lxvi. 1 (lxviii.).
Once appointed, the bishop possessed the “sublime power of governing the Church,” and was responsible
to God alone for his deeds.Epist. lix. 2 (liv.); lv. (li.). He was the autocrat within his own Church, and every
act and office culminated in his person, just as the emperor absorbed in one man
all the legal powers which under the earlier republican government had been distributed
among several officials.
The bishop had entire
charge of the discipline of the congregation. It was his care to see that the brethren
kept the divine precepts. It was his duty to instruct the people about what the
discipline of the Church required, and to promote their growth in holiness.Epist. iv. 2 (lxi.); xiv. 2 (v.);
cf. xv. 2 (x.); xvi. 3 (ix.). To
this end God might vouchsafe to grant him visions which he was bound to communicate
to his people for their edification.Epist. xi. 3-7 (vii.). In all this the elders and deacons might assist,
but always under the control of the bishop.Epist. xv. 1 (x.); xvii. 2 (xi).; xviii.
(xii.); xix. (xiii.), etc. To him and to him alone belonged the
right of “binding and loosing”—a right which had been given, he maintained, to
St. Peter, and then to the other apostles, and which now belonged to the bishops
who were for each generation what the apostles had been for
the first.Epist. lxviii. 7 (lxxii.). No restoration of sinners was possible until
the bishop had heard their confessions, until he had approved of their signs of
sorrow, or until he, along with the presbyters and deacons, had placed his hands
on their head in token of forgiveness.Epist. xvi. 2 (ix.); xviii. (xiii.); xx. 3 (xiv.); lvii. 1 (liii.). He could institute new laws of discipline,
but always in accordance with the Scriptural rules, and more suitably after consultation
with other bishops.Epist. xx. 3 (xiv.):—disponere singula vel reformare. Cf. lxiii. 10, 11 (lxii.):—“ab evangelicis autem praeceptis omnino
recedendum ease . . . cum ergo neque ipse
apostolus neque angelus de caelo adnuntiare possit aliter aut docere praeterquam
quod semel Christus docuit et apostoli ejus adnuntiaverunt.” To him belonged the power to prescribe the signs of sorrow,
and to say what were sufficient in the way of prayers and of good works such as
almsgiving.Epist. xvi. 2 (ix.):—“They who truly repenting might satisfy God
with their prayers and works.” Epist. lv. 22 (li.) mentions
alms-giving and fasting. De Opere et Eleemosynis, 1:—“ut sordes postmodum quascumque
contrahimus eleemosynis abluamus.”
He was also the head of the whole religious
administration (diligentia). He was the almoner of the poor and the paymaster of
the subordinate clergy.Epist. vii. (xxxv.); xiv. 2 (v.); lxii. (lix.); xli. 2 (xxxvii):—“ut cum ecclesia matre
remanerent et stipendia ejus episcopo dispensante perciperent”; xxxiv. 4 (xxvii. 3):—“interea se a
divisione mensurna tantum contineant non
quasi a ministerio ecclesiastico privati esse videantur.” For Cyprian seems to have been the first to make payments
to the clergy, a first charge on the tenths and free-will offerings of the congregation.Compare Achelis,
Die Canones Hippolyti (Texte und Untersuchungen, VI. iv. 193 n.).
He could give or withhold the monthly payments; and this of itself, when the elders
and deacons were dependent on the Church for their livelihood, sufficed to make
the bishop an autocrat over the clergy.
The bishop was, therefore, according
to Cyprian, the overseer of the brotherhood, the provost of the people, the pastor
of the flock and the governor of the Church, and all these terms expressed the
relations in which he, as supreme ruler, stood towards
them. But he was more. He was also the representative of Christ and
the priest of God.Epist. lxvi. 5 (lxviii.); “Ecce jam
sex annis nec fraternitas habuerit episcopum, nec plebs praepositum, nec
grex pastorem,
nec ecclesia gubernatorem, nec Christus antistitem, nec Deus sacerdotem.” Praepositus generally signified
a military commander in the later times of the Republic; it was afterwards used
of a magistrate; the military association of command was probably in Cyprian’s
mind. It is the word from which comes the French prévôt and the Scotch provost.
In early mediaeval Latin it means the chief magistrate of a town—burg-graf, comes urbis.
According to Cyprian the bishop was
the representative (antistes) of Christ in the community over which he ruled, and
therefore he had the authority over that single congregation or church which our
Lord possessed over the universal Church. He was the lord or viceroy over that portion
of God’s heritage. But Christ had this position of authority over His people because
He represented His people in the presence of God; because He was their High Priest; because He had offered for them His own Body and Blood. The bishop, therefore,
as the representative of Christ, is the priest of God,Cyprian’s views about the bishop as priest of God and about the sacrifice in the
Eucharist are most clearly expressed in Epistle lxiii. (lxii.). He says that in
the Eucharist the bishop does “that which Jesus Christ, our Lord and God, the founder
and teacher of this sacrifice did and taught” (1); he calls the Holy Supper the
sacrament of the sacrifice of the Lord; (4), and “the sacrifice of God the Father
and of Christ “ (9); he says that in the Eucharist we ought to “do in remembrance
of the Lord the same thing which the Lord also did” (10); “that priest truly
discharges the office of Christ, who imitates what Christ did, and he offers a true
and full sacrifice in the Church of God the Father when he proceeds to offer it
according to what he sees Christ Himself offered” (14); “the Lord’s passion is
the sacrifice which we offer” (17). The Eucharist is the dominica hostia (De Unitate
Ecclesiae, 17). Cyprian’s ideas about Christian priests and sacrifices, occupying
as they do the borderland between the purer and more primitive ideas and the conceptions
of the fourth and fifth centuries which were corrupted by so many pagan associations,
deserve a much more elaborate treatment than can be given here. who in the Eucharist offers
to God the “Lord’s Passion,” and “truly discharges the office of Christ” when
he imitates that which Christ did. “He offers a true and perfect sacrifice in the
Church to God the Father, when he proceeds to offer it according to what he sees Christ
Himself to have offered.” The bishop brings the people into actual
communion with Christ in the Eucharist, and they are united to Him in drinking the
wine which is His Blood; whilst to God the Father is again presented the offering
once made to Him by Christ. The bishop was also the representative of Christ because
he received those who were introduced into the Church by baptism.Tertullian tells us that it was the bishop who baptized in his De Baptismo, 17:—“The
summus sacerdos, who is the bishop, has the right of giving it (baptism); and
in the next place, the elders and deacons, yet not without the bishop’s authority
on account of the honour of the Church.” This is also Cyprian’s idea; compare
Epistles, lxxiii. 7 (lxxii.); lxxv. 7 (lxxiv. ). He was believed
to bestow the Holy Spirit upon them in baptism and in the laying-on-of-hands. “They who are baptized in the Church,” says Cyprian, “are brought to the
praepositi of the Church, and by our prayers and by the imposition of hands obtain the Holy
Spirit.”Epist. lxxiii. 9 (lxxii.). Thus the Church is built up around him. He creates it in baptism; he
brings the members into continual contact with their Lord in the Eucharist, now
become a sacrifice in which the communicants, as in pagan rites, were united to
the deity by partaking of the flesh of the victim and drinking the wine of the libation.
So that, to quote Cyprian: “they are the Church who are a people united to the
priest and the flock which adheres to their pastor . . . the bishop is in the Church,
and the Church is in the bishop.”Epist. lxvi. 8 (lxviii.). Above all, the bishop is the representative
of Christ because he is the judge to whom belongs the power of punishing or remitting
sins. This idea is continually before Cyprian. “They only who are set over the
Church . . . can remit sins.”Epist. lxxiii. 7 (lxxii.). He quotes again and again Deut. xvii. 12:
“The man that doeth presumptuously in not hearkening unto the priest that standeth to
minister there before the Lord thy God, or to the judge, that man shall die.”Epist. iii. 1 (lxiv.); iv. 4 (lxi.); xliii. 7 (xxxix.); lix.
4 (liv.); lxvi. 3 (lxii.). He discourses on the sin of Israel in
refusing obedience to the Priest Samuel.Epist. iii. 1 (lxiv.), where the rebellion of Korah, Dathan and Abiram is also quoted
to point the same moral. It is the authority of the
priest that he has always in view.
But while the thought of implicit obedience
to the bishop is foremost in his mind, the sacerdotal conception was not absent.
He conceived that the bishops were a special priest-hood and had a special sacrifice
to offer. This was a new thought in the Church of Christ. It was really introduced
by Cyprian, and it requires a little explanation.
In Christianity we find from the beginning
the thoughts of priest and of sacrifice. The two conceptions always go together,
and whatever meaning is attached to the one determines that of the other. The idea
of a sacrifice offered in the Christian congregation was continually present, and
from the beginning it was intimately connected with the Eucharist. But the thoughts
suggested by the words were always evangelical. It was believed that all Christians
were priests before God, and that all had to do the priestly work of sacrificing.
The sacrifices of the Church, the bloodless sacrifices predicted by the prophet
Malachi,Malachi i. 11; iii. 3, 4. were the prayers, the praises, and the worship of the believers. The Holy
Supper, which was the supreme part of the Christian worship, was a sacrifice because
it was an act of worship, and because it combined, as no other act did, the prayers
of all the worshippers and the gifts or oblations of bread and wine which were given
by the worshippers and were used partly in the Holy Supper and partly to distribute
among the poor. The idea of the priesthood of all believers was firmly rooted in
the thoughts of the early Christians, even although the constant use of the Old
Testament naturally led them from a very early period to draw some comparisons between
the leaders of their public devotions and the priests and Levites of the Jewish
Church.Clement, 1 Ep. xl. 5; Didache, xiii. 3. When they began to explain to themselves and to others what the sacraments
of baptism and the
Holy Supper were, it was almost inevitable that thoughts connected
with those portions of pagan worship most nearly related to sacraments should come
into their minds. Hence the pagan mysteries formed the outline of the picture which
presented itself to their imaginations when they tried to describe what the sacraments
meant.This is seen earlier than Tertullian but it appears most clearly in his writings. In
De Baptismo, 5 he says:—“Well, but nations who are strangers to all understanding of spiritual powers
ascribe to their idols the imbuing of waters with the self-same efficacy; but they
cheat themselves with waters which are widowed. For washing is the channel through
which they are initiated into some sacred rites of some notorious Isis or Mithras; the gods themselves they likewise honour by washings. Moreover by carrying water
around, and sprinkling it, they everywhere ceremonially purify country-houses, habitations,
temples and whole cities. They are certainly baptized at the Apollinarian and at
the Eleusinian games; and they presume that regeneration and the remission of penalties
due for their perjuries is the effect of that. Among the ancients, whoever had defiled
himself with murder, was accustomed to go in search of purifying waters.” In the
De Praescriptione Haereticorum, 40, he says:—“The devil . . . by the mystic rites
of his idols vies even with the essential things of the sacrament of God. He, too,
baptizes some, even his own believers and faithful followers; he promises the putting
away (expositionem) of sins by a laver; and if I do not forget, Mithras there sets
his marks on the foreheads of his soldiers, celebrates the oblation of bread, introduces
an image of the resurrection. and under the sword wreathes the crown. What shall
we say to insisting on the chief priest being the husband of one wife; and he (the
devil) has virgins who live under the profession of chastity.” This inevitable habit could not fail to bring many superstitious conceptions
round the sacraments, and many such did connect themselves with them. Notwithstanding
this, the evangelical thought that the sacrifices of the New Covenant are the worship
of the people, and that the priesthood is the whole worshipping congregation was
always the ruling idea. The sacrifice in the Holy Supper was a sacrifice
of prayer and thanksgiving, and the sacrificial act was the prayers and the thanksgivings
of the worshippers. ApologistsCompare Athenagoras, Apology (Plea), 13; Minucius Felix, Apology, 22. defended the lack of material sacrifices in the
Christian religion, and Justin Martyr could say that “prayers and giving of thanks
(eucharistia), when offered by worthy
men, are the only perfect and well-pleasing sacrifices to God.”Justin, Dialogue, 117; compare Apology, i. 13, 65-7; Dialogue, 28, 29, 116-8.
But if the whole people were the priests, and if the main thought
in priesthood was authority and supremacy in judging in all matters of rule and
discipline, then the people, the congregation, were the rulers in the last resort.
But this primitive conception did not suit the ideas which Cyprian, the Roman lawyer,
had about the special omnipotence of the bishop, the representative of Christ in
Heaven, as the local governor was of the Emperor in Rome. His thought was that the
bishop was the priest, and that the people were not priests but those whom the priest
introduced into the presence of God. The whole conception of Christian thought began
to change, and the change dates from Cyprian and his influence.
The changes made by Cyprian in the
early Christian ideas of sacrifice and priest can be best seen by comparing his
language with that of Tertullian, his “master” in theology. In Tertullian we
have the old ideas that the prayers of the Christian, public and private, are his
sacrifices, and that all Christians are priests because they can offer sacrifices
of prayer and thanks-giving well-pleasing to God. He calls the Holy Supper a sacrifice—which
it is, a sacrifice of prayer and thanksgiving—but he never thinks of it as
a sacrifice of a distinct and special kind to be carefully discriminated from the
prayers of the people. On the other hand, Cyprian is very careful to distinguish
between prayer and the Holy Supper in the sense that he never calls the one a sacrifice,
while he invariably gives that name to the other. He never thinks of all the worshippers
sacrificing; on the contrary, he is careful to distinguish between what the people
and what the priests do in the sacrament—the people offer oblations, but the priest
offers a sacrifice. There is, according to his idea, a specific sacrifice offered
by a specific (not simply a ministering) priesthood in the Holy Supper. The
sacrifice which is offered, is, as we have seen, the “Passion of
the Lord, the Blood of Christ,” the “Divine Victim.” He was the first to suggest,
for his language goes no further than suggestion, that the Holy Supper is a repetition
of the agony and death of our Lord on the Cross—a thought never present to the mind
of an earlier generation. The ministry has become, in his eyes, or is becoming,
a mediating priesthood with power to offer for the people the great sacrifice of
Jesus Christ.
His thought of priesthood also leads
him to externalize, if the expression may be allowed, the whole thought of sorrow
and repentance. In early times if Christians fell into sin, they were required to
confess their sins publicly and to exhibit manifest signs of sorrow. These signs
were not always stereotyped:—prayers accompanied by tears and groanings, fasting
and giving the food thus saved to the poor, setting free a slave or slaves, abundant
almsgiving. The penitents were required to perform some open act of self-denial
to show that their sorrow was a real thing. Of course the tendency was to connect
these signs of sorrow directly with the pardon which
followed, and even Tertullian was accustomed to speak of such signs of sorrow as something well-pleasing
to God, in the sense that God accepted them as meritorious and forgave on their
account. Cyprian was the first to lay hold on this familiar practice of penitence,
and use it as a means to establish the power of the bishop. His thought seems to
have been that some special “good works” were needed to secure the pardon of God
for sins committed after baptism,In his De Opere et Eleemosynis, Cyprian
declares that sins will come after baptism and that God has provided a remedy for
us “so that by almsgiving we may wash away whatever foulness we subsequently contract” (1); “The remedies for propitiating God are given in the words of
God Himself. . . . He shows that our prayers and fastings are of less avail unless they are aided
by almsgiving” (5); he quotes the case of the raising of Tabitha to show how “effectual were the
merits of mercy” (6). The same ideas occur in the De Lapsis,
and are to be found throughout the Epistles. and that the good works must commend themselves
to the bishop, who was the “priest of God” and the “representative
of our Lord”—for with Cyprian priest and bishop are synonymous
terms.
Thus the earlier
idea of a Christian ministry was changed into the conception of a mediating priesthood.
Behind the change of thought was the new conception of the authority of the clergy
over the laity and of the bishop over all. In respect of their historical origin
the ideas of the omnipotence of the bishop, of a succession from the apostles, and
of a special and mediating priesthood, all hang together, and what made for the
one made for the others. No sooner had they found entrance into the Christian Church
than they were followed by a large influx of other allied ideas taken over from
the paganism which lay around them.
This thought of
apostolic succession which is to be found in Cyprian was very different from what
is seen both in Irenaeus and in Tertullian. It was not a succession from the apostles
but a succession of apostles. The historical matter-of-fact succession disappeared,
and the conception became a creation of dogmatic imagination. The thought of succession
from the apostles, in a line of office-bearers creating a vital connexion between
the generations as they passed, was scarcely in Cyprian’s mind. Unless memory fails
me, Cyprian only once alludes to it: “All chief rulers who by vicarious ordination
succeed to the apostles.”Epist. lxvi. 4 (lxviii.).
Firmilian of Caesarea in Cappadocia uses a similar phrase:—“Therefore the power
of remitting sins was given to the apostles, and to the Churches which, they, sent
by Christ, established, and to the bishops who succeeded them by vicarious ordination,”
Epist. lxxv. 16 (lxxiv. ). And Clarus of Mascula, in delivering his opinion at the
seventh council meeting at Carthage under the presidency of Cyprian, declared that
bishops “have succeeded them (the apostles), governing the Lord’s Church with the
same powers,” Sententiae episcoporum, 79.
Hatch remarks that it is not necessary
to take this phrase, nor the term successio nor the corresponding Greek which occurs
in Eusebius, διαδοχή, in any other sense than the ordinary one, viz. to express
the fact that one officer was appointed in another’s place, as governor succeeded
governor in the Roman provinces. (The Organization of the Early Christian Church
[1881], p. 105 and note.) Dr. Benson (p. 183) in his résumé of the De Unitate
(§ 10) makes Cyprian say that the essential
characteristic of the episcopal prerogative is that it is a given, that is a transmitted
power. Cyprian undoubtedly held that it was a power given; but to say that given
means transmitted is a very palpable case of begging the question. A comparison
of passages plainly shows that Cyprian believed that the power was given directly
and not by transmission; of course Cyprian presupposes regular ordination (ordinationis
lex), but he also presupposes the plebis sulfragium , which may be a means of transmission
as secure as the imposition of hands. The power with Cyprian is always a direct gift.
For Cyprian’s thought is that the bishops do
really represent, not the apostles, but Christ. As the apostles were
the representatives of Christ to the first generation and received from Him power
to forgive sins, so each succeeding generation possesses representatives of Christ,
who have the same power to forgive sins. Hence the thought on which he lays so much
stress, that bishops are directly appointed by God and not by man; the want of
any deeper idea of ordination than a mere installation or orderly appointment to
office; the belief that the gifts which bishops possess of government and power
to forgive sins are more personal than official—all combine to make his
conception that bishops are apostles endued with the very same powers that the
twelve possessed directly from Jesus, something very different from what is
commonly meant by apostolic succession in modern Christendom. He founds the
divine appointment of bishops on the argument that since God cares even for
sparrows much more must He directly control a matter of such importance as the
appointments of bishops!This statement is not a mere pious
reflection; it is repeated twice, with all solemnity, when vindicating the bishop’s
power to forgive sins and to condemn, and when insisting on the dignity of the episcopal
office; compare Epistles lix. 5 (liv.); lxvi. 1 (lxviii.). He holds that bishops
who are guilty of any heinous sin are ipso facto bishops no longer, and that their
congregations ought to separate themselves from them and acknowledge neither their
office nor their authority.Compare the letters about the Spanish
bishops Basilides and Martial (Epistle lxvii. (lxvii.); and about Fortunatianus,
bishop of Assurae in Africa, who had lapsed as a sacrificatus (Epistle lxv. (lxiii.).
Cyprian says: “A people obedient to God’s precepts, and fearing God, ought to
separate themselves from a sinful praepositus, and not to associate themselves with
the sacrifices of a sacrilegious
priest, especially since they themselves have the power either of choosing worthy
priests or of rejecting unworthy ones,” lxvii. 3. The bishops in North Africa
arrived at their decisions in the case of the lapsed “by the suggestion
of the Holy Spirit and the admonition of the Lord, conveyed by many and manifest
visions”—an inspiration which was personal and not official.Epistle lvii. 5 (liii.). Cyprian frequently had visions and
believed them to be communications by the Holy Spirit; compare Epistles lxvi, 10
(lxviii.); xi. 3, 4 (vii.); he was a prophet in the old sense of the word. He
also recognized the prophetic gift in others as well as bishops; compare Epistle
xvi. 4 (ix.); xxxix. 1 (xxxiii.), but only in those subordinate to the bishop. All these things
give a certain uniqueness to Cyprian’s theory of apostolic succession which is often
forgotten. But whatever his theory was, his conviction remained, that the bishop
was the autocrat over his congregation, and that where he was, there was the Church.
The real statesmanship of Cyprian was
shown, not so much in his conception, theoretical and practical, of the episcopal
office, as in his making use of the opportunity of the widespread crisis provoked
by the question of the lapsed to sketch a polity which would give the thought of
one universal Church of Christ a visible and tangible shape. His idea was not a
new one. The conceptions of statesmen seldom are novelties. Councils had been held
on ecclesiastical matters before Cyprian’s days. They were first held in Asia Minor
in the times of the early Montanist movement, and had become somewhat common in
Greece as early as the days of Tertullian.Eusebius, Hist. Eccles. V. xvi. 10; Tertullian, On Fasting, 13. They were called to deliberate and settle
not only the deeper questions of faith, but the ecclesiastical usages to be observed
by the churches represented. The habit of holding these deliberative assemblies
which did in some measure represent the churches of a district or province was widespread,
and enabled churches lying within convenient distance from each other to become
a confederation, having the same ecclesiastical usages and rules of Christian life.
What Cyprian did was to seize upon what he believed to be
the principles underlying this practice and formulate them in such
a way as to make visible and tangible the unity of the Catholic Church which was
universally held to exist. The thought of the visible unity of the Church of Christ
was as old as Christianity. St. Paul had dwelt on it in his epistles to the Ephesians
and to the Colossians. Cyprian repeated it in his famous passage, felicitously rendered
by Dr. Benson: “There is one Church which outspreads itself into a multitude (of
churches), wider and wider in ever increasing fruitfulness, just as the sun has
many rays but only one light, and a tree many branches yet only one heart, based
in the clinging root; and, while many rills flow from one fountain-head, although
a multiplicity of waters is seen streaming away in diverse directions from the
bounty of its abundant overflow, yet unity is preserved in the head-spring.”Cyprian, De Unitate Ecclesiae, 5; compare Benson, Cyprian, p. 182. That
was the old old thought. Cyprian’s statesmanship was seen in the method he formulated
for making this ideal unity something which could take visible shape in a polity
which would produce an harmonious activity throughout all the parts. His practical
thought was, that as each bishop sums up in himself the church over which he presides,
the whole Church of Christ practically exists in the whole of the bishops, and the
harmonious action of the whole Church can be expressed through the common action
and agreement of all the bishops. This did not mean to him that every bishop was
to think in the same way, or to pursue the same policy, or that there might not
be very grave differences on very important, almost fundamental, matters; but
it did mean that if they differed they were to agree to differ, and perhaps this
last thought was the most important one practically. It is easy to be in accord
when there are no differences to separate. Cyprian’s thought was that there could
be and ought to be agreement amidst differences. He preserved intact the independence
of every bishop. The man who stood forth as the eloquent spokesman of the unity
of the one Church of Christ was the champion of the independence
of the most insignificant bishop whose congregation might be the church
of a hamlet. He was as magnanimous in his own conduct as in his thought. In the
two great controversies in which he was engaged he showed himself able to subordinate
his own feelings and cherished opinions to the wishes of others. The African bishops
did not adopt Cyprian’s scheme for receiving back the repentant lapsed; they were
much more lenient than he would have been if his opinion had prevailed.Compare Benson, Cyprian, pp. 156, 157. He felt
strongly and spoke warmly on the question of the baptism of heretics, and carried
his African colleagues with him; but when the majority of the Church was plainly
against him he respected the decision, however he might dislike it. The case of
Therapius shows how far he was prepared to go in respecting the independence of
a colleague.Epistle lxiv. 1 (lviii.); Therapius had admitted to communion
a presbyter who had lapsed on much more lenient terms than the council of African
bishops had agreed upon. He insisted again and again that one bishop cannot judge another,
and that no one can judge a bishop but God, so strongly does he vindicate the independence
of bishops and by implication of the churches over which they rule.Sententiae Episcoporum, preface:—“Every bishop has his own
right of judgment according to the allowance of his liberty and power, and can be
no more judged by another than he himself can judge another. But let us all wait
for the judgment of our Lord Jesus Christ, who is the only one that has the power
both of preferring us in the government of his Church and of judging us in our conduct
there.” Compare Epistles lv. 2, 4 (li.); lix. 14, 17 (liv.); lxxiii.
26 (lxxii.); lvii. 5 (liii.); lxiii. 3 (lxxi.); lxix. 17 (lxxv.). The unanimity
which he pleaded for among bishops was not one to be produced by force but by brotherly
persuasion, it being always understood that Holy Scripture and the apostolic tradition
were their guides.Epistle lv. 6 (li.); lxxiv. 10 (lxxiii.).
If we may judge from some scattered allusions it is possible to
see how Cyprian conceived that his scheme might work so as to produce a harmony
not merely of bishops but of the whole Christian community throughout the world. If anything
requiring deliberation arose, the first care of the bishop was to
consult his elders and deacons, the deacons being the “eyes and ears of the bishop,”
to let him know what the people thought. If there was any doubt about the opinion
of the people then the question might be referred to a congregational meetingEpistle xiv. 4 (v.).
and deliberated upon by bishop, elders, deacons and people.Epistle xv. 1 (x.). Cyprian always shows
the strongest desire to carry the people along with him.Albrecht Ritschl thinks that Cyprian,
like many another autocrat, destroyed the aristocracy of the elders and deacons
by persuading the people that the monarch’s interests and theirs were identical;
Entstehung der altkatholischen Kirche (1857), p. 558. It is not certain whether
their opinions were taken in any formal way at the councils held under the presidency
of Cyprian at Carthage, but the Christian people of Carthage were always present
at the councils.Dr. Benson calls Cyprian’s councils “representative” assemblies,
and is of opinion that they included “a not silent laity”; compare Cyprian, pp.
191, 430 ff. The presence of the laity at the councils which discussed the question
of the lapsed is shown in Epistles xvi. 4 (ix.); xvii. 1 (xi.); xix. 2 (xiii);
xxx. 5 (xxx.); xxxi. 6 (xxv.); xliii. 7 (xxxix.); lv. 6 (li.); lix. 15 (liv.);
lxiv. 1 (lviii.). On the other hand the most natural construction of the following
passages gives the idea that none but bishops deliberated and voted:—xliv. (xl.); xlv. 2, 4 (xli.); lix. 13 (liv.); lxiv. 1 (lviii.); lxx.
1 (lxix.); lxvii. 1; lxxiii. 1 (1xxii.); lxxii. 1 (lxxi.). These meetings can hardly be called “representative,” as Dr.
Benson calls them. An autocrat may do his best to consult the people and to carry
them along with him. Yet he can scarcely be called their representative.
In fact Cyprian’s conception of the
bishop as the direct representative, not of his congregation, but of Christ, endued
with powers coming directly from God and in no sense from the Christian people,
was precisely the reason why his conception of a polity to embody the whole Church
has never proved a workable theory; and soon after Cyprian’s time it fell before
another and very different conception with which Cyprian had no sympathy, and yet
to which his own led when his thought of the autocracy of the bishop was applied
to a wider field. We can see how his theory failed himself at his sorest need. He
desired to carry his office-bearers with him. His first idea was to
consult with the office-bearers, as was evidently the custom. When he began to doubt
whether they would support him he turned to the laity. When he began to doubt whether
the laity did not support the presbyters rather than himself, he not obscurely threatened
them with the decisions of the neighbouring bishops;Epistles xv. 1 (x.); xliii. 7 (xxxix.). and in the end the consultation
was not with his elders and deacons, and not with his people, but with the neighbouring
bishops, in what was called the first council of Carthage, where the people of Carthage
were undoubtedly present, though probably only as overawed assistants.
Another conception of how the universal and visible Church could
make its ideal universality apparent to the eyes of men had been introduced before
Cyprian’s days; it confronted himself during the second great controversy which
he had to wage, and it triumphed in the West after his death. More than one bishop
of Rome had put forward the idea that the unity of the Christian Church could only
be made truly visible when all the Christian churches grouped themselves round the
bishop who sat, it was said, in the chair of St. Peter, and whose congregation had
its abode in the capital of the civilized world.Victor did so in the days of the
Easter controversy and was denounced for so doing by Irenaeus (Eusebius, Hist. Eccles.
V. xxiii., xxiv.); Calixtus evidently made the same claims and was attacked with
bitter sarcasm by Tertullian in his De Pudicitia; Stephen did so in the controversy
about the baptism by heretics, and the assumption of the bishop of Rome to force
his opinion on the rest of the Church is no doubt alluded to by the phrases Episcopus
episcoporum and tyrannico terrore found in the preface to the opinions of the African
bishops. They justified this claim ecclesiastically
by quoting our Lord’s words to St. Peter, recorded in Matt. xvi., but its practical
strength lay in the fact that they presided over the church in the city of Rome.
So strong was Cyprian’s influence in the centuries after his death that Roman Catholic
canonists felt the need of quoting him as the supporter of their claims for the
primacy of the Roman See, and accordingly they have interpolated his De Unitate Ecclesiae
in a manner almost beyond belief.The extraordinary history of the interpolations
is told by Dr. Benson on pp. 200-21 in his Cyprian, his Life, his Times, his Work; and in Hartel,
S. Thasci Caecili Cypriani Opera Omnia, pp. lii. ff. Cyprian was the determined opponent
of this theory of a primacy in Rome, and constituted himself, as has been said,
the champion of the ecclesiastical parity of all bishops, however insignificant
their positions might be, nor would he allow any distinction to be drawn between
churches founded by actual apostles and those which had come into being in later
times.Compare Epistle lxxi. 3, where the
reference to novellis et posteris indicates that Stephen had claimed a primacy over
ecclesias novellas et posteras. Dr. Benson has given a very full analysis of the
passages in which Cyprian refers to the Roman See; compare his Cyprian, pp. 193-99.
It is worth noticing that Firmilian of Cesarea in Cappadocia concedes less to Rome
than Cyprian does. He scoffs at Stephen’s claim to hold the Successio Petri
(Epistle lxxv. 17 (lxxiv.); but then he holds that the power to forgive sins was given to
churches as well as to bishops, which is not Cyprian’s position (lxxv. 16 [lxxiv.]); “Therefore the power of remitting sins was given to the apostles, and to the
churches which they, sent by Christ, established and to bishops who succeeded them
by vicarious ordination.” Otto Ritschl has carefully analysed Cyprian’s letters
in the dispute with Stephen of Rome in which a good deal of strong language was
exchanged between the two bishops; compare Cyprian von Karthago, pp. 110-41. He did concede a certain pre-eminence to Rome, partly on ecclesiastical
grounds, and partly because of the greatness of the city.Epistle lii. 2 (xlviii.):—pro magnitudine sua debeat Carthaginem Roma praecedere. But he held that all
bishops had equal ecclesiastical rights, and that the unity of the Church found
expression in a united episcopate and not in the primacy of an episcopus episcoporum.
At the same time
it was almost inevitable that Cyprian’s idea that the local church was constituted
in the local bishop to such an extent that without obedience to him men could not
belong to the Church at all, should lead to the conception that a united episcopate
could only be truly united if all the bishops owed obedience to one bishop
of bishops. A one-man theory of the local church could hardly fail to suggest or to support a one-man
theory of the Church universal. The theory that the bishop owed his
power, not to the influence of the Spirit of God working in and through the Christian
community, but to something either given by God directly or transmitted in such
a way as to be independent of the spiritual life of the membership and above it,
could scarcely fail to suggest a transmission of unique prerogatives to the bishop
who was supposed to occupy the chair of St. Peter. Men who insist on an episcopal
gift of grace, “specific, exclusive, efficient,” coming from a source higher than
the Holy Spirit working in and through the membership of the Church, may protest
against the thought that their theories lead to the conception of a “bishop of
bishops,” but the unsparing logic of history sweeps their protests aside.
CHAPTER VIII
THE ROMAN STATE RELIGION AND ITS EFFECTS ON THE ORGANIZATION OF THE CHURCH
The Decian persecution,
instead of stamping out Christianity, strengthened it. When it was over the Christian
churches, pruned of their weaker members, felt stronger than ever, and pressed forward
more earnestly in the path of organization and consolidation. The grouping of churches
round definite centres became more conspicuous, the gradations of rank among bishops
began to assume a more distinct form, a large number of bishops began to be more
than simple pastors of congregations, and the lower classes of office-bearers were
multiplied. The “great” Church, in short, assumed more than before the appearance
of an organized whole.
The apostle Paul had taught his mission churches the secret of mutual support which
might come from building up groups of churches arranged according to the provinces
of the Roman Empire; and two churches, in the two chief centres of the Empire,
Rome and Alexandria, early manifested a genius for attracting within their respective
spheres of influence the weaker churches around them. Both were eminently fitted
to be the protectors and guides of their fellow Christian communities. They both
occupied commanding positions; they were wealthy and could assist
poorer churches; and they were generally models
of Christian generosity to their weaker brethren. The early pre-eminence of Alexandria
and of Rome can be accounted for in the most natural ways. When the local church came to be
almost identified with the personality of its chief pastor, the pre-eminence of the church was
merged in the wide influence—almost rule—of its bishop. Perhaps the chief pastor
of the Church in Alexandria was the first to stand forth as the undoubted leader
of the great majority of Christians and of all the confederated churches of
the vast and wealthy province of Egypt and the surrounding lands. In the fourth
century and in the beginning of the fifth Athanasius and his successors wielded
a personal power and were called Popes, long before the bishop of Rome had attained
equal influence in the West. But if the growth of the influence of Rome was
slower everything combined to make it surer, more lasting, and of much wider
extent. The Church in Rome belonged to the capital of the civilized world. The
Roman Empire, down to the time of Diocletian, was, in legal fiction at any rate,
the rule of a town-council over the world, and this naturally suggested the
commanding influence of a single kirk-session over all the other churches. This
suggestion, never wholly realized, loomed before the Roman Church from a very
early time; but its partial realization was much later than our period. What
presents itself from the middle of the third century onwards to the time of
Constantine is the increasing tendency in the churches to form groups more or
less compact round central churches occupying commanding positions in the Empire,
and the churches of Rome and Alexandria are distinguished examples of such great
centres of groups of churches.
The instrument
in effecting this grouping was the council or synod. Nothing could be more natural
than that the leaders of Christian churches should meet to talk over the affairs
of the communities under their charge, and the earliest known instance of this
was the journey of Polycarp to visit Anicetus at Rome in 154 A.D.Eusebius, Hist. Eccles. V. xxiv. 16.
This, however, could scarcely be called the beginning of councils. They, i.e., the councils,
are frequently traced back to the meeting at Jerusalem, when the apostles,
the elders, and the whole Church assembled to consider the question of receiving into “fellowship” the uncircumcised Gentile converts of Paul and Barnabas. But since,
so far as we know, more than one hundred years elapsed without the example of the Church in Jerusalem being imitated, it can scarcely be urged
that this meeting was regarded as the precedent which was
followed. Most historians see the real beginnings of the councils in meetings
“of the faithful,” held frequently and in many places in Asia Minor, when the
difficulties created by the Montanist movement (160-180 A.D.) demanded consultation; and the anticipations of councils may be found in that frequent intercourse
by means of letters and special messengers which was such a marked feature of
the early life of the Christian communities.
It is not
easy to know what these earliest councils were like or who formed their members.
They were most probably informal meetings of the pastors, elders, deacons and
people, and it is likely that all present were permitted to take part in the
conference and have a voice in its decisions. The prevailing troubles were talked
over and the best way of meeting them. Whatever resolutions were come to had
no legal force, but they naturally led to common action within the communities
represented. Eusebius gives a graphic account of these earliest gatherings.
An elder who had strong views on the Montanist movement
found himself in Ancyra where Montanist sympathizers abounded, and where some
active partisans had exerted considerable influence on the people. He
and a fellow-elder had conferences
with the people in the church, which lasted for days. The whole question was
debated with earnestness in presence of the people, who were intensely interested
in the matter. At length, after long discussions, the Montanist champions
were driven away and their sympathizers silenced:
The elders of Ancyra begged the visitor to write down his arguments for their
use in case the question should be brought up again. It is added that the
faithful in many places had frequent conferences which doubtless
resembled those at Ancyra.Compare Eusebius, Hist. Eccles. V. xvi. 4, 10; xix. 2. The
technical words used, “brother-hood,” “faithful,”
imply that all Christians, lay and clerical, took part in the discussion
and settlement of the matter discussed. Such were these earliest synods.
We next hear of them in the Easter controversy (about 190 A.D.).
Eusebius, writing more than a hundred years later, calls them “Synods and Conferences
of bishops,” but when he quotes contemporary evidence, such as that of Irenaeus,
the technical terms used mean that the opinion of the whole Christian “brotherhood” was expressed. Letters were written in the name of the
παροικίαι
and of the brethren of Gaul;Eusebius, Hist. Eccles. V. xxiii. 2; xix. 2. and
“brethren” or the “brotherhood” is the word which even in Cyprian denoted
the laity,Cyprian, Epistles, xvi. 2 (ix.); xviii. 1, 2 (xii.); xx. 2
(xiv.); xlvi. 2 (xliii. ). while παροικία in
these early days “was neither a parish nor a diocese, but the community of
Christians living within a city or a district, regarded in relation to the
non-Christian population which surrounded it.”Hatch, The Organization of the Early Christian Churches (1881), p. 190.
Tertullian,
writing about 210 A.D., speaks as if it were a common practice to hold councils
regularly throughout Greece, and praises the double advantage that accrued from
such meetings—the handling of the deeper questions of Christian life for the
common benefit and the bringing vividly before the minds of the people the fact
of the universality of Christianity.Tertullian, De Jejunio, 13:—“Aguntur praeterea per Graecias
illa certis in locis concilia ex universis ecclesiis per quae et altiora quaeque in commune tractantur,
et ipsa repraesentatio totius nominis christiani magna veneratione
celebratur.” Afterwards synods were held in Africa,
the earliest recorded being about 220 A.D.,The synod at which Agrippinus presided and which declared that baptism administered
by heretics was void; compare Cyprian, Epistles, lxxi. 4 (lxx.); lxxiii. 3 (lxxii.). and gradually
they spread over the Christian world.
These synods or councils were the
means whereby the grouping of local churches,
great and. small, around great centres, was effected. They formed such a very
important part of the organization of the Church in the third and fourth centuries
that it is important to understand what they were and what they became. Dr.
Rudolf Sohm,Sohm, Kirchenrecht, i. 247-343. whose life-work has been the study of ecclesiastical law and whose
acquaintance with its manifestations in the early centuries is excelled by
none, has collected and pieced together all the information that can be gathered
from the allusions of earliest Christian literature to this subject, and has
worked out something like the following theory of the origin and primitive meaning
of the synod. Briefly stated, it is that a synod, in the second and third centuries,
was, to begin with, a means whereby a congregation or local church received
in any time of perplexity or anxiety the aid of the Church universal represented
by esteemed Christians not belonging to the congregation. He combines, and rightly
combines, the accounts of such synods as are mentioned above with the accounts
transmitted about the way in which the pastors or bishops were chosen and appointed
to their congregations or local churches, for it is plain that one of the uses
of a synod in the third century was seen in the choice and appointment of the bishop over his flock.
So far as ecclesiastical regulations go, the need which a small and weak congregation
had for assistance from without was first recognized when it was made a regulation
that a Christian community of less than twelve families, which was required
to organize itself under a bishop, was to seek the help of the nearest
“well-established” churches. The weak congregation was ordered to ask for
the assistance of three selected men, and with them,
as assessors, the choice and appointment of the bishop was to be made. These
three men associated with the congregation formed a synod of the earliest and simplest
type. The regulation dates from the middle of the second century.Texte und Untersuchungen, II. v. 7. 8; found in English in The Sources of the Apostolic
Canons (1895), p. 8.
When this central thought has once been grasped illustrations are abundant. In the conference
at Jerusalem about the admission of uncircumcised converts into the Christian
Church, a conference in which delegates from Antioch sought the advice of a
“well-established” Church, the congregational meeting of the Jerusalem Church
appointed delegates to carry down its advice to the congregation or local church
at Antioch and to assist the brethren there in coming to a proper decision upon
so important a matter. The real synod was held at Antioch,Acts xv. 27, 30-34. and its members
were the delegates from Jerusalem and the community at Antioch. At the close
of the first century disturbances arose in the Church at Corinth, and the Roman
Church, a well-established Church, which may or may not have been appealed to,
sent a letter of advice and along with it three men
selected because of their age, repute and experience.Clement, 1 Epistle, lxv. 1. These, with
the congregation at Corinth, formed a synod at Corinth of the primitive type,
and no doubt helped the community there out of their difficulties. So with
the early synods in Asia Minor. In the perplexity caused by the Montanist
movement the congregation
at Ancyra sought the aid of Zoticus Otrenus and others;Eusebius, Hist. Eccles. V. xvi. they, together with the
members of the congregation at Ancyra, formed the council there and doubtless
aided in the other councils which they wrote about to Avircius Marcellus. Judas
and Silas, the deputies from Jerusalem to Antioch, were prophets;Acts xv. 32. the Roman deputies who
went to Corinth, Claudius Ephebus, Valerius Bito and Fortunatus, do not seem
to have been office-bearers; Zoticus Otrenus and his fellows were elders. There
is no mention of bishops with regard to any of these earliest councils, but it is easily conceivable
that when “well-established” churches were asked to send delegates, “select men,”
to advise and assist, no men could be more suitable than were the bishops of
the churches appealed to, and that bishops always formed a portion, if not the
whole, of the advising deputies or assessors. The point to be observed however
is that in the earliest councils or synods, whether assembled
for the purpose of the appointment of a pastor or bishop or for the purpose of giving counsel in times of trouble or anxiety,
the main part of the synod is the congregational meeting of the church to which
the delegates come. It is also pre-supposed in the earliest times that “well-established” congregations did not need the assistance of a synod in the appointment of
their chief pastor, and that everything from selection to ordination could
be done within the congregation.
When the third
century was reached it soon became the custom,
though we do not find any ecclesiastical regulation on the subject until much
later,The earliest appearance of this usage as a fixed ecclesiastical law is to be
found in the twentieth canon of the council of Arles (314 A.D.):—“De
his qui usurpant sibi, quod soli debeant episcopos ordinare, placuit ut nullus
hoc sibi praesumat nisi assumptis secum aliis septem
episcopis. Si tamen non potuerit septem, infra tres non audeat ordinare.”
This twentieth canon of Arles reappeared in the fourth canon of Nicea (325 A.D.),
then almost continually (Council of Laodicea, canon 13; Council of Antioch,
canon 19; Council of Toledo [4th] canon 19) until the regulation became incorporated
in canon law. It appears in the Apostolic Constitutions, iii. 20. that the choice and ordination of the chief pastor was performed through
a synod in all local churches,
whether “well-established” or not, and that the neighbouring bishops were
called in to be assessors to assist the congregational meeting. The desire to
make the unity of the whole Church visibly manifest doubtless inspired the demand
that a synod, i.e., at least three bishops or pastors from the neighbouring
churches should assist at the selection of the chief pastor in a vacant congregation
and confirm the choice of the people by their ordination. Still through the
whole of the third century the primitive idea prevailed that the congregational meeting
was an integral part of the synod. In the case of a vacant pastorate the new
pastor was chosen both by the neighbouring bishops and by the Christian people
with the elders at their head, and, even when the selection came to be mainly
in the hands of the assembled bishops, the assent of the people was always necessary.
The ordination, which, in the course of the third century, was placed exclusively in the hands of the assembled
bishops, was the sign of the visible unity of the Church, extending far beyond the bounds
of the local church, and made the ordained pastor not only the minister of the
Church over which he was ordained, but also a minister of the Church universal.It is impossible to avoid seeing how the mode of appointment and ordination of
the chief pastor now practised in the great Presbyterian Church in its many
branches corresponds both in essentials and even in some unessentials with the
mode in use in the third century as that is described in the letters of Cyprian
and in the canons of Hippolytus. It is to be premised that the bishop of the
third century was in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred the chief pastor of
a single congregation and in the hundredth was at the head of a collegiate Church
such as we see in the Dutch and in some German branches of the Presbyterian
Church; and that bishop and pastor are interchangeable terms (Cyprian,
Epist. lxvi. 5; compare also Eusebius, Hist. Eccl. VII. xxviii.
1, where certain bishops are called “pastors of the communities in Pontus”). We have
the following picture common to both. When the office of chief pastor becomes
vacant there is a natural anxiety among the people and especially among the elders
to secure a good successor. They correspond with neighbouring ministers (Cyprian,
Epist. lxvii. 5; lv. 8) and receive testimonies in favour of one or of another. When they are
ready for an appointment, the ministers of the bounds (the bishops of the province)
meet formally in the presence of the elders and of the people of the church
(the brotherhood, Cyprian calls them, lxvii. 5); an examination is made of
the state of feeling in the congregation, of the unanimity of choice (“the
suffrage of the whole brotherhood,” Cyprian, lxvii. 5; lix. 6),
and objections are called for, if there be any, against the life or doctrine of the person
nominated (Cyprian, lxvii. 5); then follows the solemn ordination in presence
of the assembled congregation. He who has been chosen kneels before the president
or moderator who places his hands on his head; all the ministers present join
with the president in laying their hands on the head of the bishop or pastor-elect; the president prays over him the prayer of consecration in which God, Who
gave the Holy Spirit in the early times to His apostles, prophets, pastors and
teachers, is asked to bestow the same Spirit on the pastor-elect, who is named in the prayer (Directory
for the Ordination of Ministers, sec. 8; Canons of Hippolytus, iii.
11-19). In both cases the presence of the ministers of the bounds (bishops of
the province) implies that the act done within the individual congregation is
an act of the Catholic Church and that the chief pastor in the local church
is also a minister of the universal Church of Christ.
Synods assembled for other purposes than the selection and ordination of chief pastors
exhibit the same fact that the congregational meeting was an integral part
of the synod. Thus in Carthage, Cyprian insisted that the neighbouring bishops
were to be asked to assist at the determination of what was to be done in the
case of the lapsed, because it was a matter which concerned “not a few, nor
of one church,” or it could have been decided in the congregational meeting,
“nor of one province, but of the whole world.”Cyprian, Epistle xix. 2 (xiii.). It had to be settled by the
presence of the African bishops at Carthage and by correspondence with Rome.
But in any case the presence of the congregation of Carthage was presupposed,
and the African bishops were an addition for the time being to the ordinary
meeting of the elders and the brotherhood.Compare the phrases—“secundum arbitrium vestrum et omnium nostrum commune consilium,” Epist. xliii. 7 (xxxix.);
“Cum episcopis, presbyteris, diaconis, confessoribus pariter ac stantibus laicis,”
Epist. lv. 5 (li.); and so on in many passages. But compare above, p. 316 n.
The same thought is seen working at Rome. The Roman elders
(there being no bishop) dealing with the same question of the lapsed, called
to their aid some of the bishops who were near them and within reach, and some
whom, placed afar off, the heat of persecution had driven from their congregations.Cyprian, Epistle xxx. 8 (xxx.).
When the conduct of Novatian was causing great anxiety, Cornelius, the bishop,
called together his elders and invited five bishops
to assist them in their deliberations. When they had settled what was to be
done they called together a great meeting of the congregation, and there the decisive resolution was
brought forward and accepted.Cyprian, Epistle xlix. 2 (xlv.). So with other Roman synods on the
same questions; the elders, deacons and the congregation at Rome were always present, and
the whole meeting was one of the Roman congregation with several (once sixty) bishops added
to assist them in their deliberations.Eusebius, Hist. Eccles. VI. xliii. 2. The same conception of the synod existed
in the East. The celebrated synod held at Bostra in Arabia (244 A.D.) at which
a large number of bishops were present, and where Origen held a distinguished
place is a case in point. The question was the orthodoxy of the pastor of Bostra,
Beryllus by name. The discussions, in the course of which Beryllus renounced
his errors, took place επὶ τῆς παροικίας,Ibid. VI. xxxiii. 3.
from which we may conclude that the synod included the congregational meeting,
for paroichia always means in early ecclesiastical
usage the brotherhood or congregation, and not parish or diocese in the modern
sense of these terms. Indications of the same usage are to be found in the account
of the celebrated synods held at Antioch about Paul of Samosata,
the pastor of the church there. A great number of bishops, elders and deacons were present, and took part in the discussions
which must have included the congregational meeting, as the bishop was deposed,
and Domnus was ordained in his place at the last Synod. Here we have the interesting
fact that the chief discussion was between Malchion, one of the elders of the
Church at Antioch, and his bishop, and that the assembled bishops who came from
a distance took the side of the elder against his pastor. The whole aspect of
the matter presents the appearance of a congregational meeting enlarged by the
presence of a number of bishops from without; the theological
differences between the pastor and the elder, which had no doubt been frequently discussed before a smaller audience, were brought
before the assembled bishops and congregation. Malchion,
who led the charge against his pastor, signed the decisions of the synod along with others.The Synods held about Paul of Samosata are described in Eusebius Hist. Eccles.
VII. xxvii.-xxx. ). The case is a curious one. Complaints against
his orthodoxy, and many other things, seem to have been brought forward by members
of his congregation, or at least by a section of them headed by Malchion, one
of the elders and the head of a high school in Antioch. It was an instance of
an orthodox elder and a portion of the congregation accusing their pastor of
heresy. These men called to their aid a number of bishops. These bishops assembled
at Antioch, apparently in Paul’s church, and Paul presided at the meetings.
At the first synod no conclusion was come to; so at the second; at the third,
Paul was deposed and Domnus was ordained in his place (probably in 268 A.D.).
At this third synod the chief discussion was between Paul and his elder, Malchion; their speeches were taken down in shorthand, and copies were in existence
in the sixth century. The result of the decision of the synod was a division
in the congregation at Antioch, the larger portion evidently siding with their
pastor Paul, who retained possession of the Church buildings and of all the
property. It is more than likely that political feeling lay behind this prosecution.
The Romans, under the Emperor Aurelian, wished to
gain posession of Antioch, which then belonged to Queen Zenobia. There was
a Roman party in Antioch; and Paul was a resolute partizan of Zenobia. Six
years later, when the queen was conquered by Aurelian, and Antioch came within
the Roman Empire, the Church property was taken from Paul and given to the portion
of the congregation which had opposed him. As all Christians were still outlaws
in the eyes of Roman law, it is scarcely probable that this decision followed
from the supposed heresy of Paul. It is more easy to believe that it was meant
to be a punishment dealt to the anti-Roman faction. Compare Harnack, History of
Dogma, Eng. Trans., iii. 38 f.
Dr. Sohm completes his theory by these additional suggestions.
He holds that the power of a synod was always proportional to the power of the
local meeting it incorporated. If the bishops came to the assistance of the
body of elders in a church, their decision had only the force of a regulation
issued by a session of elders. It had to be submitted to the congregational
meeting before it became authoritative. If, on the other hand, the meeting
of bishops incorporated a congregational meeting, then its decisions were authoritative at once, for the final decision always
lay with the congregational meeting.Cyprian, Epistle xlix. 2 (x1v). He also believes that any synod, even
if only the minimum of three bishops was present with the congregation, was
believed to represent and ideally was the whole Catholic Church of Christ,Tertullian, De Jejunio, 13. taking into its embrace
the congregation or local church which required aid, and that in
consequence its decisions were believed to express the utterances of the Spirit of God promised
to the Church of Christ.
We may accept
or reject Dr. Sohm’s interesting theory, It appears to me to be too ideal to
be an exact representation of all the facts of the case. But it seems to be
made plain from the evidence he marshals, that there was a close connexion between
the congregational meeting and the synods which played such an important part
in the federation of the churches in the third and following centuries. The
congregational meeting was the primitive type of the later synod. These congregational
meetings had taken an important place in the churches from the beginning.Compare above, p. 54 ff. We
have seen how they formed the centre and source of authority in the apostolic
period; how they had the supreme power in their hands in the churches to which
Ignatius sent his letters, and how even Cyprian deferred to them.Compare above, p. 200 f. They were
the authority in the churches in their primitive democratic stage.
If left to itself the democratic genius of Christianity might have evolved an organization
which, starting from the unit of the congregational meeting, and rising through
a series of synods with widening areas of jurisdiction, might have culminated
in a really representative oecumenical council or synod which would have given
a visible unity of organization to the whole Christian Church, and at the same
time would have preserved its primitive democratic organization.
Cyprian’s unscriptural and non-primitive conception of the pastor or bishop as an autocrat,
claiming a personal obedience so entire that any act of disobedience was to
be punished by spiritual death or expulsion from the Church, contradicted the
democratic ideal which the congregational meeting embodied. His principle that
the bishop was an autocrat deriving his power from God directly by a species
of divine right which owed nothing to the
power of the Spirit working in and through the Christian people, might be based
on a misapplication of Old Testament
texts and on an intrusion of the Old Testament priesthood into
the New Testament Church, but in reality it was the introduction into the Christian
Church of the Roman ideas of authority and imperial rule. These early centuries
were times of imperial government, and democratic rule, save within limited
areas and subject to autocratic checks, was a thing unknown. It is true that
the Roman method of government admitted a great deal of local self-government
of various kinds, but these popular assemblies had strictly limited spheres
of action and had no control over the imperial officers who practically ruled
the provinces in the name of the emperor or of the senate.Marquardt, Roemische Staatstverwaltung, i. pp. 503-16, gives the details
known about the provincial assemblies under the Imperial Government; their powers (507-9);
the provinces where they existed (509-16) and the powers of the imperial officials (517 ff.).
A good deal of information on the subject is also to be found in Mommsen, The Provinces of the Roman Empire. Cyprian’s
conception of the autocracy of the bishop accorded so well with the atmosphere
of imperialist rule in which the Church of the third century lived that it could
scarcely avoid being largely adopted. In spite of Cyprian’s own limitation of
the autocratic idea to the office of bishop it suggested another form
of organization beginning with the bishop, rising through metropolitans, etc., to an
episcopus episcoporum, who in that age could be none other than the bishop of
the Church in the capital of the empire. No sooner had Cyprian’s conception
of the autocracy of the bishop of the local church been accepted than the path
was clearly marked for an ascending scale of autocrats up to the bishop of Rome,
and the appellation of Pontifex Maximus sarcastically employed by Tertullian
became the legitimate title of the head of the Church in the capital city.
Thus there were two ideals of organization within the Christian churches. On the one hand,
an autocratic organization which starting with the bishop as the
autocrat of the individual Christian community
ascended through metropolitans to the Pope; and, on the other, that which, starting from the congregational
meeting, ascended through provincial councils of varying importance to an oecumenical
council of the whole Church. These two ideals, mutually antagonistic as they
were, subsisted side by side within the Christian Church in the end of the third
and continued to do so in the succeeding six or seven centuries. Neither was
powerful enough to overcome the other. The imperialist conception proved the
stronger in the West, as was natural, and the other was the more powerful in
the East, but neither in the East nor in the West was the one able to vanquish the other.
In the end of the third century
and onwards councils or synods became a regular
part of the organization of the whole Church, and they became more and more
meetings of bishops only, at which presbyters and deacons with the people
of the church of the town where the council
met were present but almost entirely as spectators. It was natural that these
councils should meet in the provincial capitals, for the roads and the imperial
postal system by which travellers could journey all converged towards those
towns which were the seats of the Roman provincial administration. Conferences
require chairmen, and various usages obtained with reference to the natural
chairman. Frequently the oldest bishop was made the president of the assembly,
and this continued to be the practice for a long time in many parts of the empire.
But gradually it became the custom to place in the chair the head of the Christian
community of the town in which the council met. The bishops of these towns then
began to be called metropolitans, but the title was for a long time merely one of courtesy only, and did not carry
with it any ecclesiastical rank with specific authority attached to it. In the
fourth century these metropolitans were
entrusted with the right to call the provincial councils and even with some superintendence over the
election and ordination of the bishops of the province. Of course the man made the office, and metropolitans who had great
personal gifts and force of character insensibly gave their churches
and their successors an influence which lasted. In this growth of the metropolitan organization we can detect
a disposition to be guided by the civil organization of the empire.Compare Hatch, The Organization of the Early Christian Churches (1881), pp. 169, 170; also articles on
Metropolitan, Primate, and Patriarchate in the Dictionary of Christian Antiquities.
The second third of the third century also witnessed changes in the organization of the
individual local churches. The tendency was for the bishop to become more than
the pastor of a single congregation. It worked both in country districts and
in towns. Perhaps one of the chief causes of this was that it had become the
custom to require from the chief pastors the devotion of their whole time to
their ecclesiastical duties, and this implied that the Church had to provide
the means of livelihood at least for the bishops.
We have already seen that whenever a small group of Christians found themselves together, even
when they were fewer than twelve families, they were ordered to constitute themselves
into a Christian Church with an organization of bishop, elders, deacons, reader
and “widows.”Texte und Untersuchungen, II. v. pp. 7-24; The Sources of the Apostolic Canons, pp. 7-27. The smallest Christian community was in this way an independent
church. But this was possible only so long as the bishop did not depend for
his living on a stipend coming from the congregation. A paid pastorate altered
matters. The alteration took two forms, both of which can be seen working
among churches in the mission field.
A very common modern form is to appoint one man the pastor of several village
churches among which he itinerates, while one or more elders and deacons are
stationed in the little Christian village communities to watch over the spiritual
interests of the people. Inscriptions seem to prove that this form existed in
the uplands of Batanea among the small and scattered villages there, and it
probably existed in other places.Hatch, Organization of the Early Christian Churches, 194.
When a small group of villagers had been won to Christianity through the evangelizing work
of a congregation in the neighbouring
town, there was often a great unwillingness to sever the connexion between them and the
mother Church. We learn from Justin MartyrJustin Martyr, Apology, i. 67:—“On the day called Sunday, all who live in the cities or in the country
gather together to one place.” that the Christians came in from
the country to attend the services of the town congregation. It was always held
that a bishop could delegate his special function pertaining to public worship
to his elders or even to his deacons. This principle could easily be applied
to the outlying mission districts of a congregation, and the little mission
congregations became filials or daughters
of the town congregation, and were served by the subordinate office-bearers
of the mother Church. Thus the bishop became the pastor in several congregations
and multiplied himself through his elders who became his delegates in the
pastoral office. In doing this the Church followed civil procedure, for rural
authorities under Roman rule were frequently placed under the nearest municipality.
But we have abundant evidence that for many a century multitudes of the small
rural congregations remained independent churches, under bishops who were often
enough uneducated peasants.Eusebius, Hist Eccles. VI. xliii. 8.
The same principle worked in towns also, and perhaps more strongly there. The bishop
was held to be the head of the Christian community in one place, whatever its
size might be. He was the pastor; he baptized; he presided at the Holy Supper; he admitted catechumens to the full communion of the brotherhood. By the
middle of the third century the work, in most large towns, was more than one
man could overtake. Take the case of Rome. We have no record of the number of
the Christian community, but we know that at the close of the Decian persecution,
i.e., a little after the middle of the third century, the number of widows,
sick and poor cared for by the Church was more than fifteen hundred, and that
the bishop had to assist him forty-six elders, fourteen deacons and sub-deacons,
with ninety-two men in what are called minor orders—acolytes,
exorcists, readers, and door-keepers.Compare the letter of Cornelius, bishop of Rome, to Fabius, bishop of Antioch, in Eusebius,
Hist. Eccles. VI. xliii. 11. At the close
of the century and during the Diocletian persecution there were
over forty Christian basilicas, or separate Christian congregations in Rome
itself.Optatus of Milevis, De Schismate Donatistarum, ii. 4 (Vienna ed. [1893]; p. 39). In Alexandria the number of Christians could not have been much fewer.
It is evident that one man could not fulfil the pastoral duties for such a multitude;
At first the idea of the unity of the pastorate was strictly preserved. For
example, it was for long the custom in Rome that the bishop consecrated the
communion elements in one church, and that the consecrated elements were carried
to the other congregations whether they met in churches or in private houses,
to be distributed to the communicants by the elders there in charge.This custom existed in the time of Innocent the First (450 A.D.) and
is described by him in a letter he wrote to Decentius, bishop of Eugubium in
Umbria; compare the fifth section. The custom preserved the conjunction of
ideas strongly insisted upon by Cyprian between the one sacrament and the one bishop. The bishop
was the one pastor in every congregation; the elders and the deacons belonged
to the whole local Christian community; they served all the congregations and
were not attached to any one; the organization was collegiate as we see it
existing at present in the Dutch Presbyterian Church: All communities, however,
were not so conservative as that of Rome. In Alexandria, for example, while
the Christians who lived in the outlying
suburbs were at first reckoned to be members of the bishop’s congregation
and had no separate constitution for the churches in which they met, this was
found to be inconvenient. Special presbyters were set over the outlying congregations,
and thus something like a parish system under the bishop was begun. But the
original pastoral status of the bishop was always preserved by one portion of
the pastoral duties being invariably retained in his hands—the admission of
the catechumens to the full communion of the Church. This is still
retained in the modem episcopal system, and the fact that the bishops alone are entitled
to receive the young communicants at confirmation—for confirmation is simply
the reception of young communicants—remains to witness to the original simple
pastoral functions of the primitive bishops.
The middle of the third century also was the time when the ministry became much more complicated
so far as its subordinate officials were concerned. Sub-deacons, exorcists,
readers, acolytes, doorkeepers, and even grave-diggers, were added to that body
of men who were called the clergy.
Before the close of the third century the associated churches, grouped now around recognized
centres, had developed a somewhat elaborate organization both in their relations
to each other and in the arrangement of the ministry within the individual
local churches. Ecclesiastical archaeologists are disposed to recognize the
influence of the political organization of the Roman Empire in much of this
elaboration.This has been done with great erudition and much original investigation by
the late Dr. Hatch. The results of his work are to be found in his Bampton Lectures,
The Organization of the Early Christian Churches (1881), and in many of his articles
in the Dictionary of Christian Antiquities on Orders, Ordination, Primate, Patriarchate. This is a perfectly natural explanation and there is abundant
evidence to confirm it. Yet it may be that there was something more specific
on which the leaders of the Christian churches had their eyes fixed. If it should
ever become possible for the associated churches to come to terms with the empire,
as was done in the fourth century, there was an organization which the Christian
Church would necessarily displace. This was the great provincial organization
for providing for the due exercise of the official religion of the empire. No
account of the Church and its ministry during the early centuries can avoid
some reference to that great Pagan State Church (if the term may be used), as
it existed towards the close of the third century when the associated Christian
churches were rapidly approaching the
attainment of their end, and were about to give their religion to the Roman Empire.
The subject is a difficult one. Information has to be sought for in inscriptions on tombs,
on public buildings, on coins and in fast fading frescoes on the walls of houses
in Pompeii. It is full of details which are only partially known, and yet enough
has been preserved to enable us to learn something about it as a whole.Among the more important books and articles on the subject
of the imperial cult the following may be named. They all discuss the subject
as a whole or describe some important parts. G. Boissier, La Religion Romaine d’Auguste
aux Antonins (1878), 2 vols.; Otto Hirschfeld, Zur Geschichte des römischen Kaisercultus
in the Sitzungsberichte d. k. pr. Akademie d. Wissensch., Berlin (1888), pp. 833
ff.; also his I Sacerdozi municipali nell’ Africa
in the Annali dell’ Instituto di correspondenza archaeologica for 1866, pp. 22-77; V. Dury,
Formation d’une Religion officielle
dans l’Empire Romaine in the Comptes rendus of the Academie des sciences
morales et politiques, vol. xiv. (1880), pp. 328 ff.; E. Desjardins, Le Culte des Divi et le Culte de
Rome et d’Auguste in the Revue de Philologie,
vol. iii. (1879). pp. 33 ff. R. Mowat, La Domus divina et les Divi in the Bull. epigr. de la
Gaule, vol. v. (1885), pp. 221 ff., 308 ff., and vi. (1886), pp. 31 ff., 137
ff., 272 ff.; P. Giraud, Les Assemblées provinciales sous l’Empire Romaine (1890); Lebegue, L’Inscription
de Para Narbonensis in the Revue Archéologique
(1892), vol. xliii. new series, pp. 76-86, 176-84; M. Krascheninnikoff, in
the Philologus (1894), vol. liii. (new series, vol. vii.), pp. 147 ff.;
E. Beurlier, Le Culte Impériale, son histoire et son organisation depuis Auguste jusqu’ à
Justinien (1891) (by far the most complete treatise on the subject). Handbuch der roemischen Alterthümer
by Mommsen and Marquardt; Roemische Staatsverwaltung
by Marquardt, 2nd ed. i. 197 f.; iii. 71 ff., 463 ff.; Roemisches Staatsrecht by
Mommsen, ii. 752 ff.; G. Wissowa, Religion and Kultus der Roemer
(1902), pp. 71 ff., 82 f., 284 ff., 488 ff. (this gives the most succinct account); Beaudouin,
Le Culte des Empereurs (1891). A very full account of the literature on the subject will be found
in Roscher’s Lexikon, ii.
901 ff. by Drexler. I have quoted only the books known to me personally. A number
of references to the cult of the emperors will be found in Ramsay’s The Church in the Roman Empire
(1893), pp. 133, 191, 250, 275, 249, 304, 323 n., 324, 333, 336 n., 354, 373, 396, 398,
465 f., and in Mau’s Pompeii, its Life and Art (1899), pp. 14, 61, 89 f., 98,
100, 103 f., 106 f., 111 f., 122 ff., 264 ff.
It is the
universal testimony of historians that religion had lost most of its power during
the later years of the Republic. The temples were in ruins and the practices of religion were
generally neglected. When the wars which followed the death of Julius Caesar had given
the young Octavius the heritage of his mighty uncle, and that master of statecraft
set himself to the task of restoring an empire exhausted by long years of civil
war, he recognized that a people without a religious faith is in a state of
hopeless decadence. One of his earliest tasks was to attempt to revive the ancient
religious rites of the Roman people, and contemporary records tell what patience
and wealth he lavished on the work. His political needs mingled largely in this
successful attempt to revive the religious instincts of his subjects. He felt
the need for some common sentiment to bind together the provinces and peoples
of his unwieldy Empire. A state which acknowledged no limits of race and of
nationality required something more than the will of the emperor and the dread
of his legions to unite it into a harmonious whole. He saw that religion might
be the moral cement he sought, but the religion needed to be as universal as
the empire. To select one of the myriad cults which a manifold paganism presented
would have availed him nothing. He turned instinctively to that outburst of
popular devotion which had proclaimed his uncle a god in his lifetime, and which,
after his death, had demanded that the mighty Julius should be proclaimed as
a god with temples reared in his honour, sacrifices offered, and a special priesthood
instituted to the new divinity.Julius Caesar was added to the gods of Rome by a decree of the senate and people
in 42 B.C.:—Genio Deivi Iuli, parentis patriae, quem senatus populusque Romanus
in deorum numerum rettulit; cf. Mommsen, Staatsrecht, ii. 733. His temple or aedes Divi
Julii in Foro was consecrated in 29 B.C., and a special
flamen was appointed for the service of the new divinity. But Julius Caesar was never reckoned
as the first of the Divi Imperatores; they began with Augustus. Out of this popular deification of Julius Caesar
there came, fostered by the guiding hand of Octavius, now called Augustus, a
universal worship of the Emperor of Rome which took a three-fold shape. In almost
every part of the empire, Rome alone excepted, the Emperor Augustus was worshipped as a god during his lifetime;
there was the institution of the Divi, where the dead emperors and some near relations of the imperial house, wives,
fathers, uncles and brothers were, by solemn decree of the senate, elevated to the rank of
gods of the state and were voted temples, priests, and sacrifices; lastly there was the worship of
Rome and Augustus, and Augustus in this instance was not so much the name of a particular man as the title of
the supreme ruler—a title which itself implied that the prince was something more than man.“Imperator cum Augusti nomen accepit, tanquam praesenti et corporali Deo, fidelis
est praestanda devotio.”
Mommsen says that the word augustus,
like the Greek σεβαστὸς, had always a religious colouring (worshipful); that
it implied power so great as to be revered; that the title was not shared by
any one during the life-time of the Emperor; that Tiberius refused at first
to accept it; and that it was at last imposed upon him by a special decree
of the senate (Staatsrecht, ii. 812).
The worship of the emperor during his lifetime was never part of the state religion of the
Roman Empire, but it was a cult largely practised. Private persons, societies, even communities without
sanction from the government built temples, consecrated chapels and instituted priesthoods in honour of Augustus while he was alive.“Cultores Augusti, qui per omnes domos in modum collegiorum habebantur,”
Tacitus, Annals, i. 73.
This was not always done openly; it was some time veiled by affecting to recognize
the living emperor as embodied in one of the ancient gods. Thus the ministri
Mercurii Maiae in Pompeii became first the ministri Augusti Mercurii Maiae,
and then simply the ministri Augusti, and Livia
was honoured as Ceres, Vesta and Rhea. But this worship of the living rulers was never part of the state religion.
The state religion was, to begin with, the worship of the Divus Julius
along with that of Jupiter Optimus Maximus, Apollo, Vesta and Mars Ultor, in Rome;
the worship of Rome and Divus Julius for Roman citizens in the
provinces, and the worship of Rome and Augustus for provincials.
The beginning of this new state religion for the provinces
was perhaps the decree of Augustus of date 29 B.C., when, in reply to memorials
from the communities of Bithynia and of Asia, he issued an order that the provincials
were to worship Rome and Augustus,
and the Roman inhabitants of these provinces Rome and the Divus Julius.Compare Dio Cassius, li. 20; Tacitus, Annals, iv. 37; Suetonius, Augustus, 52.
The new cult of Rome and Augustus in Spain dates from 26 B.C.;
this worship became the state religion in Roman Gaul from 12 B.C., and it
was organized in Roman Africa on the same lines as in Gaul. Thus for the earlier
portion of the reign of the first emperor the state religion in the provinces
for all but Roman citizens was the worship of Rome and Augustus.Roma was never
a goddess for the Roman people. The beginnings of the deification of the city
of Rome came from the East and were originally symbolic of the trust placed
in the Roman State by cities and provinces in the East which had entered into
treaties with the great western power and had experienced its protection. The
earliest instance known is that of Smyrna, which in 195 B.C. built a
temple to Roma the protecting deity of the city; the cult spread rapidly; even in Athens there was a temple
to Dea Roma. In the East it was also the custom to associate as a divinity along with the city great
Roman generals whose successes in arms had benefited the towns which created
them objects of worship. Augustus had such precedents for Rome and Augustus as the earlier
Rome and Flaminius. (Plutarch, Flaminus, 16.)
It is a question whether this worship of Rome and
Augustus did not remain the permanent legal form which the imperial
cult took in the provinces. Authorities differ and the evidence is not clear
enough to admit of a decided answer.Beaudouin (Le Culte des Empereurs) insists
that from first to last the official religion, recognized in legal documents
as the State religion in the provinces, was not that of the Divi Imperatores but always
that of Rome and Augustus. This is scarcely probable; still before coming to an accurate conclusion the inscriptions
found in every province would need to be gone over and analysed province by
province; this has been done so far as I know for two provinces only—that of
Narbonne by M. Beaudouin himself and that of Africa by Prof. Otto Hirschfeld. Upon the whole the balance of evidence seems to be that even
during the lifetime of the first emperor the official religion became the
worship of Augustus simply (Rome being left out) and AugustusSuetonius says distinctly:—“Templa quamvis sciret etiam proconsulibus
decerni solere; in nulla tamen provincia nisi communi suo Romaeque nomine recepit” (Augustus, 52). Yet the
evidence from inscriptions would leave us to infer that the cult of Augustus
was instituted in many provinces without any mention of Roma. being taken to mean, not the person of the emperor but the
symbol of the deification of the Roman state personified in its ruler. After
the death of the first emperor a new development took place. Augustus, who
during his lifetime had never allowed himself to be called Divus,
but only Filius Divi Julii, was by solemn decree of the senate on September, 17, 14 A.D.
(he had died at Nola on the 19th of August preceding) awarded divine honours, and took rank
among the superior gods of Rome.“D.XV. (Kal. Oct.) nefastus prior Iudi in circo feriae ex senatus-consulto quod eo die divo
Augusto honores caelestes a senatu decreti; Sex. Appuleio, Sex. Pompeio cos.” He was the first of a long line of
Divi Imperatores, and the state religion assumed the form it continued to maintain
in strict legal conception till the time of Diocletian and practically till
the conversion of Constantine and the changes which followed that important event.
So far as Rome itself was concerned these Divi Imperatores, i.e.,
the series of emperors who were consecrated after deathSome emperors were never consecrated Divi; of
the eleven emperors from Augustus to Nerva only four—Augustus, Claudius, Vespasian
and Titus—were deified, but after Nerva the consecration of the emperor after
death became the rule which had very few exceptions. On the other hand as the
years passed the consecration of members of the imperial family, which was common
in the early years of the empire, almost ceased. Livia was made Augusta on the death
of her husband Augustus and Diva after her
own death. Neither Caligula nor Nero was deified, but Drusilla, the sister of
Caligula, and Claudia and Poppea the daughter and wife of Nero became Divae. The
daughter of Titus, the father, sister, wife of Trajan, the wife and mother-in-law
of Hadrian and the wives of Antoninus Pius and Marcus Aurelius were consecrated. by decree of the senate, along with the
GeniusTo worship the genius of the emperor was not to worship the living man; the genius
of a man was his spiritual and divine part; the genius of anything was its
ideal reality which lasted while the external form changed. When the Republic became a monarchy the
genius of the emperor naturally took the place of the genius of the Roman people. of the reigning
emperor, took their place among the greater gods of Rome, equal if not superior to them.
They formed a compact group of new divinities. Their names appeared in the official
oath. In republican days officials had been sworn in by a solemn oath to Jupiter
Optimus Maximus and to the Penates of Rome; the oath was now changed (to take
an example from the time of Domitian) to Per Jovem et divom Augustum et divom Claudium et
divom Vespasianum Augustum et divom Titum Augustum et genium imperatoris caesaris
Domitiani Augusti deosque Penates. Their names appeared among those of the deities to whom the great sin-offering made by the
Arval Brethren was offered. At the installation of Nero the Arvales offered to Jupiter Optimus Maximus,
to Juno, to Minerva, to Felicitas and “genio ipsius (Nero), Divo Augusto, Divae
Augustae (Livia), Divo Claudio.”
In the provinces, where the gods of the people were not the Roman deities, these
Divi Imperatores were the gods of the state and, along with the Genius of the reigning emperor, were
the divinities which were everywhere worshipped. In the eastern provinces, where
the people had been habituated to the worship of the reigning sovereign, the
cult of the Divi seems to have been inextricably mixed with the worship of the
reigning emperor; but in the west the two seem to have been clearly distinguishable,
and the worship of the Divi was looked upon as the state religion (as it was
legally everywhere), and it was left to private persons and to cities to worship the emperor while yet living.
Christianity has so impregnated European thought that most modern historians, until within
recent years, were inclined to regard all this worship of the rulers of the
Roman Empire as merely a form of slavish adulation. We forget that when polytheism
is the religious atmosphere in which thought lives, there is no
such gulf between man and God as Christianity has
made us know. If this worship of the Divi Imperatores be
tested by any standard that can be applied to a polytheistic religion, it will
be found to be as real a religion as any one of the multitudinous cults that
paganism has produced. The household shrines of Pompeii attest how deeply it
entered into the private life of the Italian people. There gathered round it
the worship of the old heroes of the fatherland, the all-pervading ancestor-worship,
the feelings of awe, reverence and thanksgiving which came from the contemplation
of a mighty and for the most part beneficent power.
It had long been the custom in the East to worship the head of the state, and this worship
had been adopted by the Greeks as soon as they became an Asiatic power. Long
before Augustus laid the foundation of his new state religion it had been fore-shadowed
in Greece and in Asia Minor.Otto Hirschfeld, founding on this, declares that the Imperial cult was neither
a development of Roman customs and institutions nor an original creation in
the new world of imperialism; it was appropriated entirely from the oriental
Greeks. This it seems to me is only partially true. The worship of the ancient
kings, Picus, Faunus, etc., was thoroughly Roman; and there was but a step
between it and the worship of the Divi Imperatores.
The worship of ancestors was thoroughly Roman; and it was
a stepping stone to the worship of the deceased pater patriae.
In India at present many a government official whose rule has
been beneficial in a remarkable degree is worshipped as a god. The worship of the genius of Rome personified
in the Divi Imperatores and in the Genius of the reigning emperor, took root almost at once and spread amazingly. The worship
of the personal reigning sovereign needed to be restrained rather than encouraged.
Everywhere we find that the desire of the people to adopt the new cult went
in advance of the attempts to spread and sustain it. All over the empire from
centre to remote circumference this imperial cult was received with enthusiasm.
It did not displace the ordinary religions in which the peoples had seen brought
up. There was no need for that in polytheism. It was added to the religions
with which they were familiar, and this everywhere. Thus it became the one universal religion
for the whole empire and took its place as the ruling cult, the religion of the great Roman
state. Subjects were free to practise any religion which wa national; but no one, without being liable to charge of treason, might neglect to pay religious
homage to the Genius of the emperor and to the Divi Imperatores.
Only Jews and Christians refused to bend before the new divinities. It was this imperial
state religion which confronted Christian confessors everywhere; refusal to
sacrifice to the emperor (either the living ruler in the East, or the Divi and the Genius in
the West) was the supreme test to which Christians were subjected, and which
produced martyrdoms; Pergamos, the centre of the imperial cult for its district,
is called in the Apocalypse the place “where Satan’s throne is.”
This imperial
cult required priests to preside over the worship rendered to the imperial divinities.
Its great officials were curiously interwoven with many of the ancient priestly
colleges at Rome. It gave rise to special colleges of sacred men who belonged
exclusively to the new cult, and it had priests of its own all over the empire.
The priests of the imperial cult in Rome would demand a special description
applying only to themselves, but for our immediate purpose the organization
in the capital may be neglected. What concerns our present enquiry is the position and rank of the
priests of the cult in the provinces. It should also be remembered that the organization of this special
priesthood differed somewhat in the East from what it was in the West; and
this difference may be very generally described by saying that in the West the
worship of the Divi Imperatores was
such a new thing that it required a new priesthood, while in the East the new
imperial cult seems to have been largely engrafted upon the worship of the local
divinities, which necessarily implied a great variety of organization which
space does not permit us to describe.
These explanations premised, it may be said that a network of imperial priesthoods was spread
over the whole Roman Empire throughout all its provinces and in all its chief municipalities;
and that amidst the myriad cults which the paganism of the times produced, there was this one great pagan
state religion in which all shared and to which all gave honour, and whose priesthood
stood conspicuously forward as the guardians of the worship of the imperial divinities.
This priesthood was of two kinds—the priests who were the representatives of the state religion
for a whole province, and the priests who were at the head of the religious
administration for the municipalities. The priests of the imperial cult for
the provinces were great personages. They were directly responsible to the emperor alone who, as Pontifex
Maximus, was the supreme religious as well as the supreme civil head of the empire. It is difficult to say whether they
occupied an hierarchical position of authority over the priests at the head
of the imperial cult in the municipalities during the first two and a half centuries.
The probability seems to be that they may have done so in the West from the
beginning, but not in the East. From the last quarter of the third century,
however, when a great reorganization was introduced, the priests who superintended
the imperial worship in every province were made the overseers of all the priests
of the cult within the province, and not only so, but they had the oversight
of the priests of every pagan cult whatsoever who were within the province.
There was thus from the be-ginning a pagan hierarchy with its Pontifex Maximus
in Rome, its metropolitans at the head of every province, and the municipal
flamens at the head of the organization in the municipalities; and from the
last quarter of the third century these pagan metropolitans had the strict supervision
everywhere of the whole religious administration within their provinces.
These pagan priests of the imperial cult who presided over the provinces were functionaries
of very high rank. They were chosen from among the wealthiest and most illustrious
of the provincials, and were men who for the most part had held high office
in the civil sphere. Great privileges were accorded to them. They presided over the provincial assemblies which the
imperial government had created in every province. They had the right of audience of the emperors
when they went to Rome on the business of the province. They wore a distinctive dress—a robe with a band of purple; they
were preceded by lictors; they had special seats at all public spectacles. They
claimed to rank next in precedence to the civil head of the province, who directly represented the emperor.
The cult in the municipalities was more varied, but the priest at its head had a very
honourable position. He was a man who had usually filled the highest municipal
offices, and he was ex officio a member of the municipal council. Everywhere in province and in municipality
the office carried with it high civil rank and rights of precedence.
This was the religion and these were the priests that the Christian Church, or rather
the associated churches, had to supplant ere it could come to terms with the
state and become the acknowledged religion of the empire. Christianity could
not become the religion of the empire until this great state religion had been
overthrown and its priests abolished or their offices secularized. The question
arises—Did the churches seek to adapt themselves to the form and organization
of this great imperial religious system in such a way that when the hour of
Christian triumph came the Christian leaders could at once step into the position
of those who held the leading places in it and who formed that great pagan hierarchy?
The answer seems to be that in two marked particulars at least the Christian churches did
copy the great pagan hierarchy. They did so in the distinction
introduced into the ranks of bishops by the institution of metropolitans and grades of bishops, and they did so also in
the multiplication of the lower orders of clergy on the model of the organization of the state temple service.
M. Desjardins, the learned author of the Geographie Historique
et Administrative de la Gaule Romaine,Dejardins, Geographie Historique et Administrative de la Gaule Romaine, iii. 417, 418.
has investigated carefully
the geographical organization of the imperial cult for ancient France, and has compared it with
the Christian ecclesiastical administration which succeeded it after the conversion
of Constantine. The result he has come to is, that the pagan organization
was everywhere the forerunner of the Christian. His conclusion is that, almost
without exception, every city which had a flamen to superintend the worship of
Rome and Augustus or of the Genius
of the reigning emperor and of the Divi Imperatores, became
the seat of a Christian bishopric when diocesan episcopacy emerged—and the diocesan
system began in Gaul—and every city which had a provincial priest of the imperial
cult became the seat of a metropolitan archbishop. The Christian hierarchy,
modelled on the earlier pagan hierarchy, stepped into its place. When the Bishop
of Rome claimed to be the Pontifex Maximus and
to rule the Christian metropolitans, and when the metropolitans claimed rights
over the bishops of their provinces, and when these claims were largely acceded
to, then the pagan hierarchy of the imperial pagan worship was christened
and became the framework of the visible unity of the Church of Christ.
The same result appears when the other principle of association—that of councils—is
investigated. M. Paul Monceaux, in his thesis De Communi
Asiae Provinciae,Monceaux, De Communi Asiae Provinciae, pp. 117 ff. has shown how the councils of the Church established themselves in the cities where
the old assemblies of pagan times had met under the presidenoy of the provincial
priests of the imperial cult, and how these Christian councils had frequently
the same number of members as attended the pagan assemblies. The organization
of the imperial cult or the Roman pagan state religion was copied, to be supplanted,
by the Christian churches.
The investigations which have led to these results have not been prosecuted with regard
to every province of the empire and there is still room for a great deal of
archaeological research but where the subject has been examined the results show the
close resemblance between the pagan and the succeeding Christian organization. The Abbé Beurlier, whose monograph
Le Culte Impérial is the most detailed account of the subject yet published, appreciates the force of the arguments of MM. Desjardins and Monceaux, but explains that
this close correspondence did not necessarily imply that the Christian Church copied the organization of the state religion of pagan Rome. He thinks that
the leaders of the Christian churches followed so closely in the footsteps of the pagan religious administration because the Christian Church found it
necessary to cover the same ground, and took advantage of the same imperial administration and its land divisions.Beurlier, Le Culte Impérial, pp. 304-307. He admits that the organization of the
imperial state religion did not exactly follow the civil administration; that some provinces had no provincial priest, and that others had more than one;
and that the organization of the Christian Church followed these deviations.
But he is of opinion that all this can be explained by natural causes common
to the needs of both organizations. “The geographical reasons which had
grouped together cities to render a common worship to Augustus, and
which had led them to establish the centre of the cult sometimes in the capital
of the province, sometimes at a point where several provinces met, or, as in
Asia, in a certain number of cities rivalling each other in size, acted in the
same way in grouping together the bishops of the small towns of the province,
and consequently in gradually increasing the jurisdiction of the bishop in the
principal centres.”
There are, however, coincidences which the distribution of population and the geographical
utility of centres will not fully account for. The Christian bishops—the metropolitans
and their urban bishops—had assigned to them under the Christian emperors who
followed Constantine the same powers to investigate contraventions of religious
arrangements which in the pagan lays belonged to the provincial and municipal
priests of the imperial cult. Nor will it explain how Christian bishops
of important centres demanded and obtained from Christian emperors the same places
of civil precedence which belonged to the provincial priests of the Divi Imperatores.
The fact that the chief ecclesiastic in England has to this day precedence of every
one save princes of the blood comes down through long generations, a legacy
from the state paganism of the old Roman empire. “The conquering Christian
Church,” as Mommsen says, “took its hierarchic weapons from the arsenal of
the enemy.”Mommsen, The Provinces of the Roman Empire (1886), i. 349.
The modelling of the Church on the organization of the imperial
cult grew more intimate as the decades passed, and the resemblance between
them stronger when the recognition of the Christian religion by the state gave
the leaders of the Church more opportunities. The pagan title of Pontifex Maximus,
applied in scorn by TertullianTertullian, De Pudicitia, 1.
in the beginning of the third century to an overweening Bishop of Rome, was
appropriated by the Christian bishop of the capital and still remains, and with
it the implied claim to be the ruler over the whole religious administration of
the empire. The vestments of the clergy, unknown in these early
centuries—dalmatic, chasuble, stole and maniple—were all taken over by the
Christian clergy from the Roman magistracy;Bock, Geschichte der Liturgischen Gewänder des Mittelalters (1859); Marriott, Vestiarium
Christianum (1868); also, but not so exact, Stanley’s Christian Institutions (1881), pp. 148 ff. the
word Bull, to denote a papal rescript, was borrowed from the old imperial administration—but
these things take us far beyond our period.
The imitation of the pagan priesthood was also seen within our period in the multiplication
of subordinate ecclesiastical offices. The second half of the third and the
fourth century witnessed an increase in the lower orders of the clergy, both
in the East and in the West. The organizing genius of the Roman Church led the
way. The institution of these minor orders, as they were called, can almost be dated. They began about the year
236 A.D. So far as the West is concerned, the minor orders seem to have reached their completion by
the beginning of the fourth century, if not a little earlier.The final form which the new organization of the congregation took, says Harnack, “was
characterized by four moments:—(1) by the quality of the sacrificing priesthood,
who now took the position of higher clergy, and were settled in it by a solemn
consecration; (2) by a comprehensive adoption of the complicated forms of the
heathen worship, of the temple service, and of the priesthood, as well as by the development of the idea
of a magical power and real efficacy of sacred actions; (3) by the strict and perfect carrying out of the clerical organization
in the sense that everything, however old, of dignities, claims and rights should
be excluded, or at any rate made over and subordinated to this organization; and (4) by the dying out, that is by the extermination, of the last remains
of the charismata, which under the new ideas were dangerous, seldom appearing. and often compromising and discrediting
as far as they rose above the ranks of harmless.” Sources of the Apostolic Canons (1895, Eng. Trans.), p. 83. We find included
in the clergy, besides the bishops, elders and deacons, subdeacons, readers,
exorcists, acolytes, door-keepers and grave-diggers. The subdeacons are evidently
developed from the deacons. The readers and the exorcists represent the old
prophetic ministry.Compare Harnack’s masterly constructive bit of historical criticism, his essay on The Origin
of the Readership and of the other Minor Orders, appended to Sources of the Apostolic Canons, pp. 54 ff. The acolytes and the door-keepers were added to the
clergy in imitation of the officials in the state temples during the days of paganism.
The service of priests in the state temples was so arranged that there was a higher and
a lower priesthood, and that the members of the latter were looked upon as the
personal attend-ants of the former. The one was set apart for the performance
of the sacrifices and other holy mysteries, the others were their servants who
performed the menial parts of the services. At first they were slaves; afterwards
they were usually freed-men; these servant priests could never rise to be priests
of the higher class. They had different names, all of which conveyed their menial
position; they were the body-servants, the messengers, the robe-keepers, etc.,
of the higher priests. Besides these
servants of the sacred persons, there were servants of the holy places or temples. There
was always a keeper (aedituus), and he had various servants under him, whose
duty it was to open, shut and clean the sacred place; to show strangers its
curiosities; to allow those persons who had permission to offer prayers
and present offerings according to the rules of the temple, and to refuse admission
to all others. All these attendants of the lower class—whether servants of the
higher priests or servants of the sacred place—were included in the temple ministry,
and had in consequence their definite share in the temple offerings.Compare what Marquardt says about the state temples and their attendants and about the
state priests in his Staatsverwaltung, Pt. ii. (Handbuch der Römischen Alterthümer, Mommsen
and Marquardt, VI.).
The acolytes and the door-keepers (ostiarii, πυλωροὶ) correspond to these two classes of
the lower priesthood in the pagan state temples. The acolyte (ἀκόλουθος)
was originally an attendant, a scholar, a follower; or more definitely the boy
or man-servant who followed his master when the latter went out of his house.
They were the servants of the Christian priests doing all manner of services
for them, carrying their messages or letters,Acolytes are mentioned as carrying letters in Cyprian’s Epistles frequently:—xlv. 4 (xli.); xlix. 3 (xlv.); lii. 1 (xlvi.);
lix. 1, 9 (liv.); lxxviii. 1 (lxxviii.); lxxix. The point is, of course, not that Christian bishops should
have persons to carry their letters, but that these acolytes acting as the servants
of the bishops should be reckoned among the clergy. and in general acting like the
calatores of the state temples. The door-keepers or ostiarii had the same duties
in the Christian churches that the aeditui had in the state temples. “He had
to look after the opening and the shutting of the doors to watch over the coming
in and out of the faithful, to refuse entrance to suspicious persons, and, from
the date of the more strict separation between the missa catechumenorum and
the missa fidelium, to close the doors, after the dismissal of the catechumens,
against those doing penance and against unbelievers. He first became necessary when there were special
church buildings, and when they, like temples, together with the ceremonial of divine service,
had come to be considered as holy, that is since about 225 A.D.”Harnack, Sources of the Apostolic Canons, p. 88.
The significant thing is not that the Christian churches should have given
servants to their bishops and elders or attendants to their buildings for public
worship, but that these officials should be classed among the clergy. It is
this that was taken over from the pagan state religion.
The Church, however, did not copy its pagan models slavishly. It broke the pagan rule that
the higher ministry was to be reserved for men of a certain rank, and that there
was a social gulf between the acting and the serving priesthood. It made
those lower orders the recruiting ground for the higher, and in this way constructed
a ladder by which deserving men could climb from the lowest to the highest ranks of service within the Church of Christ.
Thus the ministry of the Church of the fourth century had become so closely fashioned
after the organization of the imperial state religion that when the time of
the Church’s triumph came, which it did early in the century, very little change
of previous state arrangements was needed to instal the new religion in the
place of the old. The influences of religion on the state, and the support given
by the state to religious rulers and teachers, acted through an administration
which, so far as external organization was concerned, was surprisingly like the one
that had gone before—only now the cisterns stored and the conduits distributed
a wholesome water. The gradations in the hierarchy, the times and places of
its synods, the additions to its lower ministry, were all borrowed from the
methods of the old imperial paganism.
This need not be a matter of reproach. The Church and its leaders had a lofty aim before
them in all these changes; and the evangelical life could be and was sustained under this complicated
ministry. The Church acquired an external polity which gave it not merely such a
sense of unity as it had not previously possessed, but also endowed it with the power of acting
as one great organization in its work of Christianizing the Roman Empire and
the cultivated paganism which died hard. The Church undoubtedly lost its old
democratic ideals; the laity counted for little and the clergy for much; but
the times were becoming less and less democratic, and the principles of democratic government were scarcely
understood unless when applied within very small areas. In the centuries which came long afterwards it can be seen how
this centralized government helped to preserve the Church in the dissolution
of the empire in the West in those times which are called “The Wandering of
the Nations.” On the other hand, there were evils. The spirit of
compromise with paganism, which this imitation even of the externals
of a pagan religious administration could scarcely
fail to produce, did lead to much corruption both in the beliefs and in the
life of the Christian Church. These need not be here dwelt upon. The evangelical
life in the Church was strong enough to enable her to conquer for the Christian
faith, not merely persecuting Rome, but the barbarian nations which overthrew
the western portion of the empire. That only need be remembered now.
It is enough to say that the chief seeds of evil which lay in this new organization of the
Church which had assumed a definite form by the beginning of the fourth century,
were the two pagan ideas introduced mainly by Cyprian of Carthage: (1) that
of a special priesthood, in the sense that a man (the bishop) could, by reason
of the power ascribed to him of forgiving sin, and, flowing from that, the
right claimed for him of exacting implicit obedience, stand practically in the
place of God towards his fellow-men; and (2) that of a sacrifice in the Eucharist,
unique in kind, propitiatory, differing essentially from all other acts of worship
that imply self-surrender to God and from all services of self-denying love, and possessing
an efficacy independent of the faith and the piety of the worshippers. It was these thoughts,
not the organization which enclosed them, which were to breed evil more abundantly as the centuries passed.
A study at first hand of the contemporary evidence belonging to the first three centuries—and
this has been accumulating wonderfully during the last quarter of a century—reveals
the important fact that changes were being continually made. Almost every ancient
document as it unexpectedly appears, rescued from nooks in eastern convent libraries,
dug out of Egyptian sands, unrolled from bundles of forgotten parchments, tells
us something new about the organization of the early churches. The unvarying
lesson they teach is, that there was anything but a monotonous uniformity in
the ecclesiastic& organization of the churches of the early centuries. They
all speak of changes, experiments,
inventions in administration made by men who were alive to the needs of their times and who were unfettered
by the notion that there is only one form of government possible to the Church
of Christ and essential to its very existence as a Church. The changes made
from half-century to half-century, and in different parts of the Church contemporaneously,
are all multiplied proofs that it belongs to the Church to create, to modify,
to change its ministry from age to age in order to make it as effective an instrument
as possible for evangelising the world. They teach, in short, that it is the
Church that makes the ministry and not the ministry that makes the Church.
The close of the third century is the limit of our period; it saw the last stage in the growth
of the Church before it became absorbed within the administration of the Roman empire.
But the use of the word Church is very misleading. There was no one all-embracing institution, visible to the
eye, which could be called the Church of Christ. What did exist was thousands
of churches, more or less independent, associated in groups according to the divisions of the empire. The real bond of
association was the willingness of the leaders of the individual Christian communities to
consent to federation, for the terms of communion were never exactly settled.
The federation was constantly liable to be dissolved. When the party in Rome
which favoured a stricter dealing with the lapsed formed a second and rival
congregation and placed Novatian at the head of it as bishop, he and not Cornelius
was in communion with many of the Eastern bishops and their churches. It was
only the magnanimity of Cyprian which prevented the breaking up of the federation
on the question of the re-baptism of heretics. Hundreds of the associated churches
broke away from the confederation in what was commonly called the Donatist
schism. Church is therefore scarcely the, word to use; associated churches is the really accurate
phrase.
It should also be remembered that according to the view of Cyprian every bishop occupied
a thoroughly independent position, and could accept or reject the conditions
of federation and decline to be bound by the action of the associated churches.
Examples of such bishops are to be met with very late.Compare article Autocephaloi in the Dictionary of Christian Antiquities, and Hatch, The Organization of the Early Christian Churches (1881), p. 180. But besides
such sporadic cases, there were rival associations of churches outside what historians misleadingly call the Catholic Church of Christ. In
some parts of the empire they were more numerous than the Catholics, and everywhere
they were, to say the least of it, as sincere and as whole-hearted Christians.
Marcionites, Montanists, and many others, lived, worked and taught, following
the precepts of Jesus in the way they understood them, and suffered for Christ
in times of persecution as faithfully as those who called them heretics and
schismatics. The state of matters was much liker what exists in a modern divided
Christendom than many would have us believe.
It is very doubtful whether the great body of associated churches would of itself have
been able to overcome these non-conformists of the early centuries and stand forward as the one
Christian Church, including all or
all but a very few Christian communities. That this state of things did actually
come to pass was due to the constraints and persecutions of the imperial government,
which never tolerated these Christians, and whose persecution was almost continuous
after the Council of Nicea till the dissolution of the empire. It was the State
which first gave a thoroughly visible unity to the associated churches. The imperial
unity was the forerunner of the Papal. The State supported the associated churches
by all the means in its power. It recognized the decisions of their councils and
enforced them with civil pains and penalties; it also recognized the sentences
of deposition and excommunication passed on members of the clergy or laity belonging
to any one of the associated churches and followed them with civil disabilities.Compare the evidence collected from the imperial codes by Dr.
Hatch in his Organization of the Early Christian Churches, p. 176 n.
It did its best to destroy all Christianity outside of the associated churches,
and largely succeeded. The rigour of the state persecution directed against Christian
nonconformists in the fourth and fifth centuries has not received the attention
due to it. The State confiscated their churches and ecclesiastical property (sometimes
their private property also); it prohibited under penalty of proscription and death
their meeting for public worship; it took from these nonconformist Christians the
right to inherit or bequeath property by will; it banished their clergy; finally,
it made raids upon them by its soldiery and sometimes butchered whole communities,
as was the case with the Montanists in Phrygia and with the Donatists in Africa.Procopius, Historia Arcana, 11.
And this glaringly un-Christian mode of creating and vindicating the visible unity
of the Catholic Church of Christ was vigorously encouraged by the leaders of the
associated churches who had the recognition and support of the State.Compare letter of Ambrose
written to the Emperor Theodosius, in the name of the Council of Aquileia demanding the suppression by force of
non-conformist ordinations and meetings for public worship: Ambrose, Opera, Epist I. x. (Migne’s Patr. Lat. cvi. p. 940).
Safe within the fold of the State,
they could speak of themselves as the one Catholic Church of Christ outside of
which there was no salvation; they could apply to their own circle of churches
all the metaphors and promises of Old Testament prophecy and all the sublime descriptions
of the Epistle to the Ephesians, while their fellow-Christians who were outside
state protection were being exterminated. Such strange methods do men think
it right to use when they try in their haste to make clear to the coarser human
vision the wondrous divine thought of the visible unity of the Church of Christ!
APPENDIX
Sketch of the History of Modern Controversy About the Office-bearers in the Primitive Christian Churches
The history of modern discussions about
the nature of the government and the office-bearers in the earliest Christian Churches
begins with Dr. Lightfoot’s Essay on the Christian Ministry, published in
1868, in his Commentary on the Epistle to the Philippians. This essay has
been recently republished, but unfortunately the valuable dissertation on the terms
bishop and presbyter has not been appended to the republished essay.
In his dissertation on the words bishop and presbyter,
Dr. Lightfoot begins by examining the previous history of the words.
Episcopus in classical
Greek was used to denote the Athenian commissioners appointed to take over and regulate
a new territorial acquisition, the inspectors appointed by Indian kings, the commissioner
appointed by Mithridates to settle the affairs of Ephesus, magistrates who regulated
the sales of provisions, certain officers in Rhodes whose occupation is unknown,
and perhaps the officials of a club or confraternity. In the Septuagint the word
was used to mean inspectors or taskmasters, captains or presidents, the commissioners
appointed by king Antiochus when he resolved to destroy the Jewish religion. From
this survey Dr. Lightfoot argued that the primary meaning in the word was inspection,
and that it contained two subsidiary thoughts, responsibility to a superior power,
and the introduction of a new order of things.
Presbyter or elder,
both name and office, was distinctly Jewish, Dr. Lightfoot thought. It was a common
practice certainly to call the governing body the aged (senate, gerousia, aldermen),
but all through Jewish history there are elders; these elders were mainly civil
officials, but the synagogues of the Dispersion had religious elders belonging to
them. It was not unnatural, therefore, that when the Christian synagogue took its
place by the side of the Jewish;
a similar organization should be carried over from the old
dispensation into the new.
These two names, episcopus, with its Greek, and elder, with
its Jewish history, mean in the primitive Christian Church absolutely the same
thing; this can be proved from Scriptural and patristic evidence. The “elders” of Ephesus were also “bishops” (Acts
xx. 17, 28), and the identity of the
names is shown in 1 Peter v. 1, 2; in 1 Tim. iii. 1-7
and v. 17-19; and in
Tit. i. 5-7. The same identity is observed in the First Epistle of Clement (42,
44). With the beginning of the second century a new phraseology began and the
words took their modern significations; by the close of that century the original
meanings seem to have been forgotten. But in the fourth century, when the fathers
of the Church began to examine the records of the primitive times, they perceived
the original meanings, and Jerome, Chrysostom, Pelagius, Theodore of Mopsuestia
and Theodoret all recognized the original identity of episcopus and presbyter.
The question then arises, how
it came to pass that in the end of the second century everywhere the original
college of presbyters or bishops had given place to a different organization,
in which we find one president called generally the bishop, and frequently the
pastor, and under him a college of elders or
presbyters and a band of deacons? This is the question which Dr. Lightfoot set himself to answer in his essay
on the Christian Ministry. He first collects his facts, which are these. That
the change from a Church government where the rulers were a college of presbyter-bishops
to the type in which there is one president with a college of presbyters under
him is first apparent in Asia Minor. We get the information from Ignatius,
who was himself at the head of the Church in Antioch, and who gives us the name
of two other presidents in that region—Polycarp at Smyrna and Onesimus at Ephesus.
The change came later in Macedonia and Greece; for the Church at Philippi was
ruled by a college of presbyter-bishops during the time of Polycarp. Corinth
had the new constitution before 170, and from some various considerations we
may fix the date of the introduction of the new organization into Greece about
the time of Hadrian. The same date may be assigned to the new organization of
the churches in Crete. The early history of a single presidency in the Roman
Church presents a perplexing problem. Neither Clement nor Ignatius allow us
to see the presidency of one man in the early Roman Church, and the evidence
to be gathered from Hermas is too uncertain to be relied upon. There are lists
of so-called bishops of Rome from St. Peter and Linus, but these belong at the earliest to the end of the
second century; and the names they give may only be
those of men known to strangers to be prominent in the Church of the Capital.
We know absolutely nothing of the Church in Africa before the time of Tertullian,
but the institution of the single ruler was established in strength in his time.
In Alexandria there is evidence to show that up to the middle of the third century
the bishop was not only nominated but apparently ordained by the twelve presbyters
out of their own number. In Gaul the earliest bishop recorded was Pothinus,
the immediate predecessor of Irenaeus. It is to be observed, however, that it
is scarcely reasonable to suppose that the three-fold ministry only began to
exist when we can prove that a “bishop” is actually mentioned, for there are
many things which witness that the three-fold ministry was not regarded as a
novelty at the close of the second century.
Having stated his facts, Dr. Lightfoot
proceeded to construct a theory of the origin of this three-fold ministry, or,
to put it otherwise, to give an explanation how the two-fold ministry of the
primitive Church became a three-fold ministry in the third century.
He notes the gradual and uneven
development of the three-fold order. He accepts the statements of Jerome, “that one presbyter was elected that he might be placed over the rest as a remedy
against schism, and that each man might not, draw to himself and thus break
up the Church of Christ.” The dissensions between Jew and Gentile,
the disputes occasioned by the Gnostic teachers, the necessity for preserving
a united front in times of trial and persecution, were the causes for the gradual
change which gave a single and permanent head to the college of presbyter-bishops
which had ruled the Christian communities in the earliest times.
This statement, facts and theory, was generally accepted by
all save certain Anglicans, who were too much in love with a theory to care to
look closely at historical facts. It may be said to have represented the ideas
of competent scholars in England and in Germany until the late Dr. Hatch
published his celebrated Bampton Lectures in 1881.
Dr. Hatch was one of the most original
and erudite students of early Church History that England has produced. These
lectures and his articles in the Dictionary of Christian Antiquities, were the
result of extensive reading, with the view of constructing a scientific history
of the beginnings of Canon law—a work which the author’s premature death prevented
him from accomplishing.
Dr. Hatch set himself to investigate
the origins of ecclesiastical organization from a comparative review of the
political, social and religious assemblies and confraternities in society contemporary
with the beginnings of Christianity. He was not the first to do this. Renan had directed
attention to the confraternities of pagan times and instituted a parallel between
them and the organization of the early Christian societies. Heinrici had carried
on the same kind of investigation in two learned articles published in the Zeitschrift
für wissenschaftliche Theologie, in 1876-7, and in his Commentary on the First
Epistle to the Corinthians, published in 1879. But Dr. Hatch brought to the
work a wealth of material more abundant than had been collected by any of his
predecessors, and grouped it in a much more skilful way. His idea was that the
term episcopus came into the Christian Church from the heathen confraternities,
and was used for the leaders in the Gentile, as the term presbyter was used
in the Jewish, Christian societies. If the Gentile Christian churches are to
be alone considered, Dr. Hatch thought that the presbyters whom we find in them
had an origin quite spontaneous and independent of the example of the Jewish
communities. He derived the Christian presbyters from the common practice of
a council of elderly men which superintended most of the confraternities which
abounded in the early centuries of our era.
Dr. Hatch seems to have thought that the office as well as
the name episcopus was distinct from that of presbyter from the beginning,
but he did not make this opinion very emphatic. His idea was that the episcopus
filled an administrative and financial office, and its duties in both respects
came from the position of the episcopus as the leader of the worship, and therefore
the receiver of the “gifts” of the people, who gave them after the service
to the officiating minister, by whom they were distributed to those to whom
they were due. Dr. Hatch thus disputed the identity of presbyter and
episcopus, at least in Gentile Christian societies. He agreed with Dr. Lightfoot,
however, in declaring that all the Christian churches were originally governed
by a plurality of office-bearers, none of whom had a pre-eminence over his fellows.
In attempting to account for the fact that in course of time we find this government
by a plurality of office-bearers of equal rank superseded by a three-fold ministry,
in which the local Church was governed by one episcopus, a college of presbyters
and several deacons, Dr. Hatch followed Dr. Lightfoot’s argument. He adduced
the general tendency in all societies to have a president at their head, and
the natural tendency when once a single president had been appointed for power
to grow in his hands; the specific tendency in the Christian societies of the
second century to believe that the coming of the Lord was at hand, and the consequent
endeavour to represent each society as having at its head one who would represent the Lord until
He came; and lastly the need felt in times of danger, whether from persecution or from speculation,
to have one head who could be obeyed by all. He declared that his explanation
of the change was exactly that made by Jerome.
Dr. Hatch’s
Lectures, at once original and erudite, attracted a great deal of attention
both in this country and abroad. They were the object of some grossly unfair
and almost virulent attacks on the part of High Church Anglicans, and these
attacks continue. In Germany the Lectures made a very great impression, all
the more so that the distinguished Church historian, Dr. Adolf Harnack, then
a professor at Giessen, now at Berlin, was so struck with the book that he translated
it into German and published it with elaborate notes of his own. With this translation
modern German critical research into the organization of the primitive Church
may be said to have begun.
While Dr. Hatch had denied Dr.
Lightfoot’s starting point, the identity of episcopi and presbyters,
he had done so mainly by insisting on a difference in origin and perhaps in
work; but he had not made very clear the real relation between the episcopus
and the presbyter, nor had he explained why it was that when the three-fold
ministry emerged the superior officer was called episcopus and not presbyter.
Dr. Harnack, in his “analecta” to his translation set himself to supply these
defects. He insisted in a much more thoroughgoing way than Dr. Hatch that the
two offices of episcopus and presbyter were distinct in their origin, and represented
two distinct types of organization which could never throughout their whole
history be completely identified. The former, along with the deacons, were administrative officers, and had mainly to do with the distribution and reception
of the offerings of the worshippers, and through these with the worship of the
congregation, while the presbyters were from the first and always men who had
charge of the discipline and morals of their fellow Christians. In his “analecta,”
Dr. Harnack attempts to trace this clear distinction down through sub-apostolic
literature. This translation was published in 1883. In the same year appeared
the Didache, issued by Bishop Bryennios—a venerable relic from primitive times,
which shed a light on many things hitherto obscure in primitive Christianity.
The appearance of the Didache was the occasion of a very thorough-going resifting
of the earliest literature bearing on the organization and worship of the primitive
Church. As a result of this we have now the completed hypothesis of Dr. Harnack
about the beginnings and growth of the Christian organization, which is as follows.
While we have traces of at least four separate roots of organization in the
primitive Church, which may be called the “religious,”
the “patriarchal,” the “administrative” and the “aristocratic,”
it may be said that a completely organized congregation possessed at the end
of the apostolic age: (1) “prophets and teachers,” who were awakened
and taught by the Spirit, and who spoke the “Word of God”; (2) a circle of
“presbyters” or “elders,” select old men, but perhaps not yet
elected “old men,” who in all emergencies which affected the congregation
could guide them, and whose special duty it was to watch over the life and behaviour
of the members of the community, and who therefore comforted, admonished and
punished; they also formed the court of .arbiters before whom all cases of dispute
between members of the Christian society were brought and judged; (3) the administrative
officers—“episcopi” and deacons who possessed the “gifts” of
government and public service, and who had to act especially in public worship
and in the care of the poor; the “episcopi” were also members of the circle
of “presbyters.” But besides these there were also in the congregations many
varied “gifts” (1 Cor. xii.); and each individual “gift” or talent which
was useful to edify, in the widest sense of the word, the members of the society,
was considered a “gift” of the Spirit; but only those who possessed in peculiar
measure the “gift” of speaking the “Word of God,” the apostles,
prophets and teachers, held a special rank in the congregation. That was the
first stage in the organization.
The second stage arose during the second century, when the basis of organization
was thoroughly altered and the alteration was mainly due to the gradual dying
out of the “charismatic” element. It shows three elements. (1) The “prophets
and teachers” either gradually died out or probably the calling led to so many
abuses that these men lost their original pre-eminence, and their places were
taken by the “episcopi.” (2) The worship and other things made it
more and more necessary for one man to be at the head of the administration—the
“episcopi” coalesced into one “episcopus” or “pastor.” (3) The
college of “presbyters” lost much of its earlier standing and became more
an advising college supporting the “episcopus” or “pastor.” Thus
the organization became a three-fold order of ministry—“episcopus”
or “pastor,” presbyters or “elders,” and deacons—and
these officials formed a consecrated body of men set over the laity. This change
came with varying degrees of rapidity in the various parts of the empire, and
we find transitional forms. One of the most important parts of the change was
that the duty of edifying the people by sermon and hortatory address passed
for the most part to the “episcopus” or “pastor,”
and in a lesser degree to the “elders”; but on into the
third century there were, surrounding the “pastor,” laymen who not merely
edified the congregation by exhortations, but who instructed it in the faith.
Such gifted individuals, along with members who bore eminent testimony to the
faith in peculiar holiness of life or in suffering, such as the confessors,
virgins and widows, held a place of special honour within the congregation alongside
of the clergy.
The first half of the third century
saw the final form of organization adopted, and it is characterized by attributing
a sacerdotal character to the clergy, who had this character fixed upon them
by a solemn service, by a comprehensive adoption of the complicated forms of
heathen worship, of the temple service, and of the priesthood, with a corresponding
idea of the magical power of priestly actions, by strictly and thoroughly including
within the clerical order everything of ancient dignity and rule, and by the
complete extinction of the old “charismatic” gifts of edification, or their
relegation to a very subordinate place.
These views of Dr. Harnack will be found
stated at length with his proofs in his second volume of the Didache, in his
Sources of the Apostolic Canons (Texte und Untersuchungen, II. i. ii. v.), and
in an article contributed to the Expositor, 1887, January-June, p. 321. In the
same number, on pp. 1 and 97, will be found two articles by Dr. Sanday summarizing
and criticising Dr. Harnack’s positions.
Dr. Harnack’s theory was at once
adopted by many distinguished students of early Church History in Germany, such
as Weizsäcker and Sohm, and has been assented to by many Americans, such as
Dr. Allen in his Christian Institutions (1898); but it has also met with a
good deal of opposition. The hypothesis is marked by all Dr. Harnack’s
originality of view, and is illustrated by a wealth of references which perhaps
he alone could give. It fascinated me at first, and it was only after reading
and re-reading the evidence that I was obliged to come to the conclusion that
it was untenable. Its leading opponents are Seyerlen (Zeitschrift für praktische
Theologie, 1887, pp. 97 ff. 201 ff., 297 ff.), Loening, Loofs and lastly Schmiedel.
Dr. Loening (Die Gemeindeverfassung
des Urchristenthums, 1889) is Professor of Law in the University of Halle, and
the author of a valuable work on Church Law. He has a lawyer’s demand for exact
evidence and a lawyer’s love of precedents. He holds that there was
little or no organization in the Christian communities during strictly apostolic
times.Dr. Loening belongs to that school of New Testament critics who are furthest removed from the traditional ideas about the date and authorship of
the New Testament writings. He does not believe that we can accept the account
given in the Acts of the Apostles as trustworthy history for apostolic times.
Therefore while he accepts the account of the election and setting apart of
the Seven, he refuses to admit that Paul and Barnabas saw “presbyters” appointed
in the Churches founded during their first mission journey, and to accept the
fact of the existence of “presbyters” in the primitive Christian Church in
Jerusalem. He holds that Rom. xvi. 3-15 is not part of the Epistle to the Romans,
but a letter to the Church at Ephesus, and to be taken as evidence for the organization
of the Churches in further Asia and in Greece. He does not believe in the Pauline
origin of the Epistle to the Ephesians or of the Pastoral Epistles. He dates
the former at 70-90 A.D. and the latter at sometime during the first quarter
of the second century; while he relegates the date of the Acts of the Apostles
to the beginning of the second century. He makes up for this incredulity by
accepting with unquestioning faith the gossip of Hegesippus and such writers. What we find are little societies of Christians
meeting and worshipping together in house churches; we see no traces of office-bearers in the proper sense of
the word; we have various terms applied to men because of the work they do,
but no word of office. In the last genuine Epistle of St. Paul, that written
to the Philippians, we meet for the first time with real office-bearers who
are called “bishops and deacons.” This epistle and these names must
be the starting point of investigation into the origins of primitive Christian
organization. After a rapid criticism of the statements of Dr. Hatch and Professor
Harnack, he comes to the conclusion that no real proof has been brought forward
to enable us to explain these names from the titles of the officials of heathen
confraternities; as little have they any connexion with the organization of
the synagogue. We can learn nothing about “bishops and deacons” save from
the ordinary uses of the Greek words and their special use in Christian literature.
It would almost seem, thinks Dr. Loening, that the Apostle Paul used these special
words to show that the organization of the Christian societies founded by him
had no connection with Judaism on the one hand, nor with heathenism on the
other. When we examine patristic and sub-apostolic literature there is a much
closer connexion between the function of teaching and these office-bearers than
Harnack allows; indeed, Dr. Loening is inclined to question Dr. Harnack’s
opinion that the “bishops and deacons” of the Didache were the officials who
had specially to do with the worship as distinct from the instruction. He finds
that the Poimenes of the Epistle to the Ephesians, the Hegoumenoi of the Epistle
to the Hebrews, and the Episcopi of the Didache, meant the same kind of officials, and that there was a
close union between teaching and oversight in the last quarter
of the first century. But what of the “presbyters”? Dr. Loening asserts strongly
that the “presbyters” in the Gentile Christian communities had no connexion
whatever with officials in Greek city life, social or political. The name comes
from Judaism; but the Christian presbyters have nothing in common with the
Jewish presbyters but the name. Although he does not accept the Acts of the
Apostles as a testimony for the organization of the churches in the earliest
days of Christianity, yet it is a trustworthy witness for the organization which
prevailed in the beginning of the second century. That book, the First Epistle
of St. Peter, and the Apocalypse, all show that there were “presbyters” in
the Gentile Christian communities in Palestine, in Syria, and in Asia Minor,
and that that office had been established in these parts for some time. Where
did it come from? From Judaism, says Dr. Loening; and his proof is that it,
he thinks, brought with it “ordination,” which was a distinctly Jewish institution.
He finds this in the Pastoral Epistles, and further declares that in these epistles
we see the Jewish term “presbyter” and the Gentile term “bishop” applied
to one and the same set of office-bearers. Thus Dr. Loening arrives at the conclusion
of the identity of “presbyter” and “episcopus,” with which Dr. Lightfoot
started. But he has a difficulty to encounter from his rejection of the authority
of the Acts of the Apostles, and from his placing the Pastoral Epistles at such
a late date. Dr. Harnack had said, standing on the same critical ground as Dr. Loening, that if the Gentile Christian organization had taken elders from the
Jewish, these officials would surely have appeared earlier than the last years
of the first century, which is the earliest date which the critical theories
about certain New Testament writings permit. Dr. Loening gets round this objection
by supposing, on the authority, or at least on what he calls the authority,
of Hegesippus, that there was no organization at all in Jewish Christian communities
until after the death of James, and that the Jewish Christian Church was first
thoroughly detached from Judaism and furnished with an organization of its own
when Symeon became its head. His refusal to accept the trustworthiness of the
Acts of the Apostles, and his full credence of all the gossip of Hegesippus,
justifies Loofs’ sarcasm that Loening is an ideal “modern critic,” because
the only sources of information that are not to be accepted uncritically are
the canonical Scriptures. Coming to the question of how the single president
of a Church emerged from the college of “presbyter-bishops,” Dr. Loening has
a theory which is all his own. The thick veil which covers the change from the two-fold to the three-fold
order of the ministry can be lifted, he thinks, by the aid of the Epistles of Ignatius.
With these to guide us we can gather that while in Rome and Macedonia there
was still a collegiate constitution, there was in Antioch and Asia Minor a
three-fold ministry; but the “bishop” was not considered a successor of the
apostles but a representative of Jesus Christ and of God. The change did not
come from the colleges of “presbyter-bishops” taking to themselves a permanent
president, for there is no evidence of any such movement, nor did it follow
any analogy of heathen gilds or civic constitutions, for no such analogies present
themselves. It came from an imitation of the position of Symeon at the head
of the Jewish-Christian community at Pella. Symeon, of the natural family line
of our Lord, was the representative of Jesus; and Ignatius got the “ecclesiastical
precedent” required there, and that is why he considers the “bishop” or permanent
president of the college of “ presbyter-bishops” the successor of the Lord.
Ignatius seized on this idea, and his enthusiastic support of it made the conception
widely known. Besides, it was useful in the circumstances of the second century,
and so the practice spread throughout the Church. Only the main thought of Ignatius—that
the permanent president represented Christ—was departed from, and the “bishop” was looked upon as the successor of the apostles. Then came Cyprian with his
sacerdotal ideas, and the simple president changed into the hierarchical bishop
through the idea of an ordination which gave a “charismatic” character to
an office held for life.
The theory of Professor Loofs of
Halle is given in an elaborate article published in the Studien und Kritiken
for 1890 (pp. 619-658). Professor Loofs is the most distinguished of the younger
Church historians of Germany, and is an eminently sane and scientific worker
and thinker.
Professor Loofs agrees with all
our authorities that there was in apostolic and in sub-apostolic times a “charismatic
ministry” of “apostles, prophets and teachers,” and that they were
in no sense the office-bearers in local Churches; but he thinks that some authorities
have drawn too hard and fast a line between the two classes of ministry. As
to the office-bearers in local Churches, the controversy concerns these points
: Whence comes the name “episcopus,” and what were the original functions of
the men so called? What was the origin of the “presbyteri,” and
what was their relation to the “episcopi”? At what time did the guidance
of the community fall into the hands of one episcopus, and how did it come
about? These questions exhaust the points in dispute.
He has not much belief in the relation of the name “episcopus”
to the officials of heathen confraternities or to civil officials; the references given by Dr.
Hatch and Dr. Harnack do not prove their contention. He does not think that
the word is a direct term of distinct office in the New Testament writings any
more than poimen (pastor) or hegoumenos; in the address to the Epistle to the
Philippians episcopi are merely those members of the brethren who take an active
oversight, and diakoni are those who render active assistance. When we get
beyond the New Testament writings and come to the Didache, the episcopi are
undoubtedly the officials of the congregation who preside over the public worship,
but the question is whether they did this and nothing else, and whether this
was their original work. He thinks that they were more than merely the presiding
officers at public worship and what that included, for they are continually
called poimenes, and “to shepherd” surely means more than to preside at worship
and distribute the offerings. And he is of opinion that originally they were
simply prohistamenoi, and gradually became the presidents of the public worship.
It is difficult to say whether they taught, but 1 Thess. v. 12 seems to imply
that teaching was from the first associated with leading the congregation.
Then as to the “presbyters”—excluding for the
sake of argument the Acts of the Apostles, the Apocalypse and the Epistle of
James—the first fairly debatable places where they are mentioned are in the
First Epistle of St. Peter and the First Epistle of Clement. The presbyters
or elders mentioned in these epistles are undoubtedly office-bearers; and it
is impossible to prove that the “presbyters” in the Gentile Christian Churches
were not the same as in, and taken from, the Jewish Christian Churches, unless
it can be shown that the office they held in the one was different from what
they held in the other, or that there was a period when there were no “presbyters” in the Gentile Churches, and to prove this more is needed than the argument
of silence from St. Paul’s epistles. If “presbyters” were in Gentile Christian
Churches then they were exactly the same as “episcopi”; and “presbyter”
is the name of the office, while “episcopus” tells us that this official exercised
the function of “oversight.” This can be proved without reference
to the presence of the word “presbyter” in writings disputed on critical grounds.
The testimony of Jerome is not to be set aside lightly; it is unquestionable
that Clement calls “episcopi” “presbyters”; even if the word
“episkopountes “ be rejected in 1 Peter v. 2, “presbyters” are called “pastors” in that epistle, and
“pastor” is a common equivalent for “episcopus”;
the “presbyters” of Ephesus are called “episcopi” (Acts xx. 17, 28), and
this evidence is quite independent of the date or historicity of the book; and there is finally the witness
of Tertullian (Apol. 39) and of Irenaeus. All this is much stronger evidence for the
identity of the words than anything that Hatch or Harnack has brought forward against
the conception. But this does not settle the question whether the “presbyter”
and the “episcopus” were identical from the first, or when the term “presbyter”
came into the Christian organization. All the probabilities are that it came from
the Jewish Church; Christianity came out of Judaism, and that gives an antecedent
probability. This does not mean that they got the word from Palestine; Jewish synagogues
abounded all throughout the Roman Empire, and converts must have come from them
into the Christian Churches. But there is no need to suppose that all Christian
congregations got hold of the word in the same way; some may have got it from others,
and some may have taken the idea and the function from the civil and social organizations
around them; we need not suppose any monotonous uniformity of derivation. At all
events, the word and the function were within the Christian congregations, and if
St. Paul says nothing about “presbyters,” he recognizes “prohistamenoi,”
who were much the same. But of course it is quite unnecessary to suppose that the
organization of Christian congregations took from the very first the form it afterwards
assumed in apostolic and post-apostolic times. There is a growth which takes time.
It is much more credible to believe that the terms “presbyteri,” “prohistamenoi”
and “episcopi” all mean the same thing than to accept any of the more recent
reconstructions. Thus it will be seen that Professor Loofs reaches exactly the same
position as Dr. Lightfoot. In all that has been said, it is presupposed that there
was at the head of each local Church a number of “presbyter-bishops,” and the next
question is, How did the three-fold ministry arise? Dr. Loofs answers that we
really do not know. We are in absolute ignorance about two things which might give
us light on the question if we could learn something about them—the relation of
the “House Churches” to the body of Christians in the town to which they belonged,
and what provision was made for the instruction of candidates for baptism, and
by whom this instruction was given. But while we can give no certain answer to the
question, something can be said both negatively and positively. We can say negatively
that the change from the one to the other did not come by any sudden alteration
which gave rise to contentions; there is no word of such contention in the whole
round of primitive Christian literature; the change came naturally, so naturally
as to make it seem that there was no change. We can say positively that there is
great likelihood that the channel of the change was the relation of the
officials to the conduct of public worship, and more especially in their relation to the Eucharist. What happened there
while a college of “presbyter-bishops” was at the head of the congregation we
do not know; but it is manifest that there could not be a collegiate superintendence
of the Lord’s Supper. Did the “presbyter-bishops” take it in turn to
officiate, or was one of their number appointed to undertake this service usually? We do not know. But it did become the duty of one man to superintend the ad-ministration
of the Eucharist; we see this in Justin Martyr; and the man whom Justin calls
the προεστὼς is plainly the forerunner of the single
episcopus. This, however,
is not all that is needed to account for the change which did come about; and probably
something has yet to be done in the line of following up Harnack’s idea that the
single president was supposed to inherit the spiritual gifts of the charismatic
ministry. Once, however, the single bishop became the rule, the growth and the importance
of the higher order can easily be traced.
The theory of Professor Schmiedel on the origin and growth of the ministry in the
primitive Christian congregations is to be found in the article on Ministry in the
Encyclopaedia Biblica. It is easily accessible. I have recently described and criticised
it in an article contributed to the first number of the Hibbert Journal. It may
be sufficient to say that the whole of the recent discussions in Germany on the
origin of the Christian Ministry are condensed in the article.
The article Church, contributed by the Rev. S. C. Gayford to
Hastings’ Bible Dictionary, is one of exceptional interest. It is a very exhaustive
account of the Churches of the New Testament, based on a searching analysis of the
documents of the New Testament. Unfortunately the author confines himself almost
exclusively to the canonical writings. The article is marked by two things which
are treated in a fresh clear way—a description of the gradual growth of organization
to be seen within the Churches during apostolic times, and a clear account of the
prophetic ministry. The article is in every way worthy of attention and of study.
Indexes
Index of Scripture References
Index of Greek Words and Phrases
- oἱ καλῶς προεστῶτες πρεσβύτεροι διπλῆς τιμῆς ἀξιούσθωσαν, μάλιστα οἱ κοπιῶντες ἐν λόγῳ καὶ διδασκαλίᾳ:
1
- Διδαχὴ τῶν δώδεκα Ἀποστόλων:
1
- Θυσίαι πνευματικαί:
1
- Καὶ ἀγγελικῶν δυνάμεων ἐφισταμένων τοῖς ἀθροίσμασι τῶν πιστευόντων καὶ αὐτοῦ τοῦ κυρίου καὶ σωτῆρος ἡμῶν δυνάμεως ἤδη δὲ καὶ πνευμάτων ἁγίων, οἶμαι δὲ, ὅτι καί προκεκοιμημένων· σαφὲς δὲ, ὅτι καὶ ἐν τῶ βίῳ περιόντων, εἰ καὶ τὸ πῶς οὐκ εὐχερὲς εἰπεῖν.:
1
- Μιμηταὶ γίνεσθε Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ· :
1
- Μνημονεύετε τῶν ἡγουμένων ὑμῶν, οἵτινες ἐλάλησαν ὑμῖν τὸν λόγον τοῦ Θεοῦ:
1
- Συναγωγὴ Μαρκιωνιστῶν κώμης Λεβάηων τοῦ Κυρίου καὶ Σωτῆρος Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ:
1
- Τιμὴ:
1
- Τοὺς μερισμοὺς φεύγετε· :
1
- Τὴν σάρκα ὑμῶν ὡς ναὸν Θεοῦ τηρεῖτε· :
1
- Τὴν ἕνωσιν ἀγαπᾶτε· :
1
- Χωρὶς τοῦ ἐπισκόπου μηδὲν ποιεῖτε· :
1
- ἀπόστολοι:
1
- αὐτοῖς, ἄ́ν τινων κρατῆτε κεκράτηνται.:
1
- γένη γλωσσῶν:
1
- γερουσιάρχης:
1
- γερουσία:
1
- γνώμη:
1
- γραφὴ:
1
- γυναικὸς ἄνδρα:
1
- γένη γλωσσῶν:
1
- δι9ακονία:
1
- διαδοχή:
1
- διακονεῖν:
1
- διακονεῖν :
1
- διακονεῖν τραπέζαις:
1
- διακονία:
1
2
3
- διακονία καὶ ἀποστολή:
1
- διακρίσεις πνευμάτων:
1
- διδάσκαλοι:
1
- διδασκαλία:
1
- διδαχή:
1
- διδάσκαλοι:
1
- διάκονος:
1
- διάκρισις:
1
- δυνάμεις:
1
- ἐνεργήματα δυνάμεων:
1
- ἑρμηνεία γλωσσῶν:
1
- επὶ τῆς παροικίας:
1
- επίσκοποι:
1
- εἰς διακονίαν τοῖς ἁγίοις:
1
- εἴ́τε διακονίαν, ἐν τῇ διακονίᾳ:
1
- εὐαγγελισταὶ:
1
- θιασάρχης:
1
- θυσιαστήριον:
1
- θυσιαστήριον Θεοῦ:
1
2
- θυσία ζῶσα:
1
- θίασος:
1
- καταστήσομεν:
1
- κατὰ τὴν ἀναλογίαν τῆς πίστεως:
1
- καὶ τοῦ̂το εἰπὼν ἐνεφύσησεν καὶ λέγει αὐ̓τοῖς, Λάβετε Πνεῦμα Ἅγιον ἄν τινων ἀ̓φῆτε τὰς ἁμαρτίας, ἀφίενται (ἀφέωνται:
1
- κεκοπίακα:
1
- κλῶντές τε κατ᾽ οἶκον ἄρτον:
1
- κοινωνία:
1
2
3
- κοπιῶντες, νουθετοῦντες:
1
- κυβερνήσεις:
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
- λαλοῦντες τὸν λόγον τοῦ Θεοῦ:
1
- λειτουργία:
1
- λόγος γνώσεως:
1
- λόγος σοφίας:
1
- λόγος γνώσεως:
1
- λόγος σοφίας:
1
- μαθηταὶ:
1
2
- μέτοικοι:
1
- μέτοικος:
1
- νεώτεροι:
1
- νουθετεῖν:
1
- νοῦς:
1
- οἱ κοπιῶντες ἐν ὑμῖν:
1
- οἱ τῆς ὁδοῦ ὄντες:
1
- οἵτινές εἰσιν ἐπίσημοι ἐν τοῖς ἀποστόλοις:
1
- οἶκος:
1
- παροικία:
1
- παροικίαι:
1
- πίστις:
1
- πλέθρα:
1
- πνευματικοί:
1
- πνευματικὸς:
1
2
- ποιμαίνειν:
1
- ποιμάνατε τὸ ἐν ὑμῖν ποίμνιον τοῦ Θεοῦ:
1
- ποιμένας καὶ διδάσκαλοι:
1
- ποιμένες:
1
- ποιμένες, ἐπίσκοποι, πρεσβύτεροι, διάκονοι:
1
- ποιμὴν:
1
2
- ποίμνιον:
1
- πρεσβυτέριον:
1
- πρεσβύτεροι:
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
- πρεσβύτεροι . . . ποιμάνατε . . . ἐπισκοποῦντες:
1
- πρεσβύτερος:
1
2
3
4
5
- πρεσβῦται:
1
2
- προεστὼς:
1
2
3
4
5
- προηγούμενοι:
1
- προηγούμενος:
1
- προκαθήμενοι:
1
- προνοεῖσθαι:
1
- προνοήσονται:
1
- προστάτης:
1
2
- προστάτις, προστάτης:
1
- προφητεία:
1
- προφητεία:
1
- προφῆται:
1
2
- προϊστάμενοι:
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
- προϊστάμενος:
1
- πρῶτον ψεῦδος:
1
2
- πυλωροὶ:
1
- πίστις:
1
- πᾶσα ἡ ἀδελφότης:
1
- πᾶσα ἡ ἀδολφότης:
1
- σεβαστὸς:
1
- σεβόμενοι:
1
- συγγνώμη:
1
- συμμύστας τοῦ ἐπισκόπου:
1
- συναγωγὴ:
1
2
- συναθροίζειν:
1
- συνεδριον θεοῦ:
1
- σχολὴ Τυράννου:
1
- τετιμημένοι:
1
2
- τιμη:
1
- τοὺς δὲ ἀπολυθέντας ἡγήσασθαι τῶν ἐκκλησιῶν, ὡσὰν δὴ μάρτυρας ὁμοῦ καὶ ἀπὸ γένους ὄντας τοῦ Κυρίου:
1
- τοὺς πρεσβοτέρους:
1
- τρόπῳ τινὶ ἀπεχομένους τῆς πρὸς γυναῖκας συνελεύσεως:
1
- τὰς ἀπαρχὰς αὐτῶν:
1
- τάδε λέγει ὁ ἅγιος, ὁ ἀληθινός, ὁ ἔχων τὴν κλεῖν Δαβίδ, ὁ ἀνοίγων καὶ οὐδεὶς κλείσει, καὶ κλείων καὶ οὐδεὶς ἀνοίγει:
1
- τὴν λογικὴν λατρείαν ὑμῶν:
1
- τὸ πολυεύτακτον τῆς κατὰ Θεὸν ἀγάπης:
1
- τὸ τέρμα τῆς δύσεως:
1
- τὸν ἐπίσκοπον:
1
- τὸν ἐπίσκοπον Συρίας:
1
- τύπος διδαχῆς:
1
- τῶν ὑπερλίαν ἀποστόλων:
1
- χαρίσματα ἰαμάτων:
1
- χαρίσματα ἰαμα̜των:
1
- χαρίσματα:
1
- χειροτονήσαντες:
1
- χειροτονήσαντες δὲ αὐτοῖς πρεσβυτέρους κατ᾽ ἐκκλησίαν.:
1
- ἀδελφότης:
1
- ἀδολφότης:
1
- ἀκόλουθος:
1
- ἀντιλήψεις:
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
- ἀνὴρ δεδοκιμασμένος:
1
- ἀξιοπλόκου πνευματικοῦ στεφάνου:
1
- ἀπόστολοι:
1
- ἀπόστολοι μεμαρτυρημένοι:
1
- ἀρχισυνάγωγος:
1
2
3
- ἄρχοντες:
1
- ἐκκλησία:
1
2
3
- ἐκλεκτοὶ τρεῖς ἄνδρες:
1
- ἐκοπίασα:
1
- ἐνεργήματα καὶ χαρίσματα καὶ διακονίαι ὀνομάτων διαφοραὶ μόναι, ἐπεὶ πράγματα τὰ αὐτά:
1
- ἐπισκοπεῖν:
1
- ἐπισκοποῦντες:
1
- ἐπισκοπὴ:
1
2
- ἐπισκοπή:
1
2
3
4
- ἐπισκέπτεσθε ἀλλήλους καὶ ἀντιλαμβάνεσθε ἀλλήλων:
1
- ἐπισκόπους:
1
- ἐπισκόπων:
1
- ἐπιταγὴ:
1
- ἐπίσκοποι:
1
2
- ἐπίσκοποι . . . ἐπισκοπήσαντες ἁγνῶς:
1
- ἐπίσκοπος:
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
- ἐπίσποκος:
1
- ἔργον:
1
- ἡ ἐπιτιμία αὕτη ἡ ὑπὸ τῶν πλειόνων:
1
- ἡγούμενοι:
1
2
3
- ἡγούμενοι, ἐπίσκοποι, πρεσβύτεροι:
1
- ἡγούμενος:
1
2
- ἱεραπόστολοι:
1
- ἵνα:
1
- ὁ διακονῶν:
1
- ὁ μεταδιδοὺς:
1
- ὁ προϊστάμενος:
1
- ὁ ἐλεῶν:
1
- ὄνομα ἐπισκοπῆς, λειτουργία ἐπισκοπῆς, δῶρα ἐπισκοπῆς:
1
- ὅπως τιμήσωσι καὶ ἐντιμηθῶσιν, εἰς ὃ ἂν δέῃ:
1
- ὅτι κλείετε τὴν βασιλείαν τῶν οὐρανῶν ἔμπροσθεν τῶν ἀιθρώπων:
1
- ὑμεῖς δέ ἐστε σῶμα Χριστοῦ:
1
- ὑμεῖς οἱ πνευματικοὶ καταρτίζετε τὸν τοιοῦτον:
1
- ὑπηρέτης:
1
- Ὡς καὶ αὐτὸς τοῦ πατρὸς αὐτοῦ.:
1
Index of Latin Words and Phrases
- . . . Haec propterea, ut ostenderemus, apud veteres eosdem fuisse presbyteros, quos et episcopos; paulatim vero ut dissensionum plantaria evellerentur, ad unum omnem sollicitudinem esse delatam. Sicut ergo presbyteri sciunt, se ex ecclesiae consuetudine ei, qui sibi praepositus fuerit, esse subjectos; ita episcopi noverint se magis consuetudine, quam dispositionis dominicae veritate, presbyteris esse majores, et in commune debere ecclesiam regere.:
1
- Ad Filemonem una, et ad Titum una, et ad Timotheum duas, pro affecto et dilectione in honore tamen ecclesiae catholice in ordinatione ecclesiastice descepline sanctificatae sunt.:
1
- Agnitio vera est apostolicorum doctrinae, et antiquus ecclesiae status in universo mundo et character corporis Christi secundum successiones episcoporum quibus illi eam, quae in unoquoque loco est, ecclesiam tradiderunt: quae pervenit usque ad nos custoditione sine fictione scripturarum tractatio plenissima, neque additamentum neque ablationem recipiens:
1
- Aguntur praeterea per Graecias illa certis in locis concilia ex universis ecclesiis per quae et altiora quaeque in commune:
1
- Altar:
1
- Auro distincta aquearia of pretiosi marmoris crustis vestita domicilia.:
1
- Catechumenus baptismo initiandus si ab iis, qui eum adducunt, bono testimonio commendatur, eum illo tempore, quo instruebatur, infirmos visitasse et debiles sustentasse seque ab omni perverso sermone custodisse, laudes cecinisse:
1
- Collegia si qua fuerint illicita, mandatis et constitutionibus et senatusconsultis dissolvuntur; sed permittitur eis, cum dissolvuntur, pecunias communes si quas habent dividere pecuniamque inter se partiri:
1
- Communicat populum stans ad mensam corporis et sanguinis Domini . . . Deinde porrigat illis episcopus de corpore Christi dicens: Hoc est corpus Christi; illi vero dicant: Amen; et ei, quibus ille calicem porrigit dicens: Hic est sanguis Christi, dicant: Amen:
1
- Congregentur quotidie in ecclesia presbyteri et diaconi et anagnostai omnisque populus tempore gallicinii, vacentque orationi, psalmis, et lectioni scripturarum cum orationibus. . . . De Clero autem qui convenire negligunt, neque morbo neque itinere impediti, separentur:
1
- Cultores Augusti, qui per omnes domos in modum collegiorum habebantur:
1
- Cum episcopis, presbyteris, diaconis, confessoribus pariter ac stantibus laicis:
1
- Cuncta collegia, praeter antiquitus constituta, distraxit.:
1
- D.XV. (Kal. Oct.) nefastus prior Iudi in circo feriae ex senatus-consulto quod eo die divo Augusto honores caelestes a senatu decreti; Sex. Appuleio, Sex. Pompeio cos.:
1
- De his qui usurpant sibi, quod soli debeant episcopos ordinare, placuit ut nullus hoc sibi praesumat nisi assumptis secum aliis septem:
1
- Deinde eligatur unus ex episcopis et presbyteris, qui manum capiti ejus imponat, et oret dicens:
1
- Diva:
1
- Divae:
1
- Divi:
1
2
3
4
5
- Divi Imperatores:
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
- Divus:
1
- Domnus:
1
- Ecce jam sex annis nec fraternitas:
1
- Edant bibantque ad satietatem, neque vero ad ebrietatem; sed in divina praesentia cum laude Dei:
1
- Episcopi:
1
- Episcopus eligatur ex omni populo . . . dicat populus: nos eligimus eum. Deinde silentio facto in toto grege post exhomologesin omnes pro eo orent dicentes: O Deus, corrobora hunc, quem nobis preparasti:
1
- Episcopus episcoporum:
1
- Erat sane illi etiam de nobis:
1
- Este potius . . . Christianus, pecuniam tuam adsidente Christo spectantibus angelis et martyris praesentibus super mensam dominicam sparge.:
1
- Et presbyteri portant alios calices lactis et mellis ut doceant eos, qui communicant, iterum eos natos esse ut parvuli, quia parvuli communicant lac et mel.:
1
- Et sint illis psalmi pro tintinabulis, quae erant in tunica Aaronis.:
1
- Etiam anagnostai habebant festiva indumenta:
1
- Filius Divi Julii:
1
- Genio Deivi Iuli, parentis patriae, quem senatus populusque Romanus in deorum numerum rettulit:
1
- Genius:
1
2
3
- Habere namque aut tenere ecclesiam nullo modo potest qui ordinatus in ecclesia non est.:
1
- Idem est ergo presbyter, qui episcopus; et antequam diaboli instinctu studia in religione fierent, et diceretur in populis: ego sum Pauli, ego Apollo, ego autem Cephae, communi presbyterorum consilio ecclesiae gubernabantur. Postquam vero unusquisque eos, quos baptizaverat, suos putabat esse, non Christi; in toto orbe decretum est, ut unus de presbyteris electus superponeretur caeteris, ad quem omnis ecclesiae cura pertineret, et schismatum semina tollerentur. Putat aliquis non scripturarum, sed nostram esse sententiam, episcopum et presbyterum unum esse, et aliud aetatis, aliud ease nomen officii; relegat apostoli ad Philippenses verba, dicentis:
1
- Imperator cum Augusti nomen accepit, tanquam praesenti et corporali Deo, fidelis est praestanda devotio.:
1
- Jam cum toto populo orant, qui eos osculentur gaudentes cum iis cum jubilatione:
1
- Luce clarius est, duo in clero ordines tum temporis (i.e. in the time of the apostles) fuisse, episcopos (= presbyteros) et diaconos:
1
- Mulier libera ne veniat veste variegata . . . neve crines demittat solutos, habeat potius capillos complexos in domo Dei, neve faciat cirros frontales in capite quando vult participare in mysteriis sacris:
1
- Nam servis, respublica et quasi civitas, domus est:
1
- Nam sicuti Deus solus de se idoneus est testis in suo sermone; ita etiam non ante fidem reperiet sermo in hominum cordibus, quam interiore Spiritus testimonio obsignetur:
1
- Ne multi inter vos sint doctores:
1
- Ne quis multum loquatur neve clamet, ne forte vos irrideant, neve sint scandalo hominibus, ita ut in contumeliam vertatur qui vos invitavit, cum appareat, vos a bono ordine aberrare:
1
- O Deus, Pater domini nostri Jesus Christi, Pater misericordiarum et Deus totius consolationis . . . . Respice super N., servum tuum, tribuens virtutem tuam et spiritum efficacem, quem tribuisti sanctis apostolis per dominum nostrum Jesum Christum, filium tuum unicum; illis, qui fundaverunt ecclesiam in omni loco ad honorem et gloriam nominis tui sancti. Quia tu cognovisti cor uniuscujusque, concede illi, ut ipse sine peccato videat populum tuum, ut mereatur pascere gregem tuum magnum sacrum. Effice etiam, ut mores ejus sint superiores omni populo sine ulla declinatione. Effice etiam, ut propter praestantiam illi ab omnibus invideatur, et accipe orationes ejus et oblationes ejus, quas tibi offeret die noctuque, et sint tibi odor suavis. Tribue etiam illi, O Domine, episcopatum et spiritum clementem et potestatem ad remittenda peccata; et tribue illi facultatem ad dissolvenda omnia vincula iniquitatis daemonum, et ad sanandos omnes morbos, et contere Satanam sub pedibus ejus velociter, per dominum nostrum Jesus Christum, per quem tibi gloria cum ipso et Spiritu Sancto in saecula saeculorum. Amen.:
1
- Per Jovem et divom Augustum et divom Claudium et divom Vespasianum Augustum et divom Titum Augustum et genium imperatoris caesaris Domitiani Augusti deosque Penates:
1
- Pontifex Maximus:
1
2
3
4
5
- Porro autem tempore, quo canit gallus, instituendae sunt orationes in ecclesiis:
1
- Praepositus:
1
- Psalmos recitent, antequam recedant:
1
- Quando quis dignus est, qui stet coram tribunali et afficiatur poena propter Christum, postea autem indulgentia liber dimittitur, talis postea meretur gradum presbyteralem coram Deo, non secundum ordinationem quae fit ab episcopo. Immo, confessio est ordinatio ejus. Quodsi vero episcopus fit, ordinetur. Si quis oonfessione emissa tormentis laesus non est, dignus est presbyteratu; attamen ordinetur per episcopum. Si talis, cum servus alicujus esset, propter Christum cruciatus pertulit, talis similiter est presbyter gregi. Quamquam enim formam presbyteratus non acceperit, tamen spiritum presbyteratus adeptus est; episcopus igitur omittat orationis partem, quae ad spiritum sanctum pertinet:
1
- Quando vero doctor quotidianum pensum docendi terminavit, orent separati a christianis:
1
- Qui pseudapostoli nisi adulteri evangelizatores:
1
- Quocunque die in ecclesia non orant, sumas scripturam, ut legas in ea. Sol conspiciat matutino tempore scripturam super genua tua:
1
- Quotiescunque episcopus mysteriis frui vult, congregentur diaconi et presbyteri apud eum, induti vestiment is albis pulchioribus toto populo potissimum autem splendidis. Bona autem opera omnibus vestimentis praestant:
1
- Si autem ordinatur presbyter, omnia cum eo similiter agantur ac cum episcopo, nisi quod cathedrae non insideat. Etiam eadem oratio super eo oretur tota ut super episcopo, cum sola exceptione nominis episcopatus. Episcopus in omnibus rebus aequiparetur presbytero excepto nomine cathedrae et ordinatione, quia potestas ordinandi ipsi non tribuitur:
1
- Si quis autem verba prophetica dicit, mercedem habebit:
1
- Si quis petitionem porrigit, quae ad ipsius ordinationem pertinet, quod dicit: Nactus sum charisma sanationis, non prius ordinetur, quam clareseat ea res. Imprimis inquirendum est, num sanationes, quae per eum fiunt, revera a Deo deriventur:
1
- Si quis prophetas despicit, semet segreget.:
1
- Si quis viduis coenam parare vult, curet, ut habeant coenam et ut dimittantur, antequam sol occidat:
1
- Successio Petri:
1
- Templa quamvis sciret etiam proconsulibus decerni solere; in nulla tamen provincia nisi communi suo Romaeque nomine recepit:
1
- Ut hanc fidem consequamur, institutum est ministerium docendi Evangelii:
1
- Viduis propter copiosas orationes, infirmiorum curam et frequens jejunium praecipuus honor tribuatur:
1
- ab evangelicis autem praeceptis omnino recedendum ease . . . cum ergo neque ipse apostolus neque angelus de caelo adnuntiare possit aliter aut docere praeterquam quod semel Christus docuit et apostoli ejus adnuntiaverunt.:
1
- ad satietatem neque vero ad ebrietatem:
1
- aeditui:
1
- aedituus:
1
- afflatus:
1
2
3
4
5
6
- album:
1
- altar:
1
- antistes:
1
- aram enim Dei mundam proponi oportet:
1
- augustus:
1
- authenticae:
1
- calatores:
1
- carmen Christo quasi Deo dicere secum invicem:
1
- cathedrae:
1
- certum veritatis charisma:
1
- certum veritatis charisma.:
1
- charisma:
1
- charisma veritatis:
1
2
3
4
5
6
- charismata:
1
- collegia:
1
- collegia tenuiorum:
1
2
- collegium:
1
2
3
- collegium quod est in domu Sergiae Paulinae:
1
- comes urbis:
1
- comitia:
1
- communicatio pacis:
1
- communicatio pacis, et appellatio fraternitatis et contesseratio hospitalitatis:
1
- confessor:
1
- consessus:
1
- contesseratio hospitalitatis:
1
2
- copiosas orationes et infirmorum curam:
1
- decretum:
1
- decuriones:
1
- diakoni:
1
- dies natalis:
1
- diligentia:
1
2
3
4
- disciplina:
1
2
- dispensatores Dei et Christi:
1
- disponere singula vel reformare:
1
- documenta:
1
- dominica hostia:
1
- ecclesias novellas et posteras:
1
- episcopatum:
1
- episcopi:
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
- episcopo et clero et in omnibus stantibus constituta:
1
- episcopus:
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
- episcopus episcoporum:
1
2
- eucharistia:
1
- ex officio:
1
- expositionem:
1
- flamen:
1
2
- flamens:
1
- genio ipsius (Nero), Divo Augusto, Divae Augustae (Livia), Divo Claudio.:
1
- institutio divina:
1
- interea se a divisione mensurna tantum contineant:
1
- ipso facto:
1
2
- itaque alius hodie episcopus, cras alius.:
1
- libellatica:
1
- libellatici:
1
2
- libellaticus:
1
- libelli:
1
2
- libellus:
1
- mensa:
1
- ministri Augusti:
1
- ministri Augusti Mercurii Maiae:
1
- ministri Mercurii Maiae:
1
- missa catechumenorum:
1
- missa fidelium:
1
- novellis et posteris:
1
- omnis fraternitas:
1
- ordinationis lex:
1
- ordo:
1
2
3
4
5
- ostiarii:
1
2
- pastor:
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
- pater patriae:
1
- patronus:
1
- pax Romanorum:
1
- placuit si quis quid queri aut referre volet, in conventu referat, ut quieti et hilares diebus solemnis epulemur.:
1
- plebis sulfragium:
1
- plebs:
1
2
- praepositi:
1
- praepositus:
1
- presbyter:
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
- presbyteratum:
1
- presbyteri:
1
2
- presbyterii ordine:
1
- presbyterium:
1
- primus inter pares:
1
- pro magnitudine sua debeat Carthaginem Roma praecedere:
1
- propter potiorem principalitatem:
1
- propter principalitatem:
1
- quis enim non omnes honoris gradus crederet tali mente credente:
1
- quo tempore canit gallus:
1
- religio licita:
1
2
3
- sacerdos:
1
- sacramenta:
1
- sacrificata:
1
- sacrificati:
1
- sacrificatus:
1
- scholae:
1
- secundum arbitrium vestrum et omnium nostrum commune consilium:
1
- stips menstrua:
1
- successio:
1
- suis locis praesident:
1
- summus sacerdos:
1
- thurificati:
1
- tyrannico terrore:
1
- universa fraternitas:
1
- ut cum ecclesia matre remanerent et stipendia ejus episcopo dispensante perciperent:
1
- ut sordes postmodum quascumque contrahimus eleemosynis abluamus:
1
- veritatis charisma:
1
Index of French Words and Phrases
- Ils ont encore la coûtume de faire des Agapes ou des repas de charité après les Bâtêmes, et les enterremens, pour tous ceux qui veulent s’y trouver; donnant à un chacun un plat de bouillie, avec un morceau de viande dedans, et du pain autant qu’il en peut manger; et ces repas se font ou dans 1’église même ou sur le toit de 1’église, qui est, selon la coûtume des Levantins, toujours plat, et capable de contenir un grand nombre d’hommes.:
1
- L’exaltation du pouvoir épiscopal qui se donne libre tours à travers les Épîtres d’Ignace fait trop souvent perdre de vue aux commenteurs cette intime association de 1’autorité presbytérale et de 1’autorité épiscopale, qu’un examen plus attentif dégage très clairement.:
1
- Tous ceux qui ont 1’experience de la parole en publique ne savent-ils pas que le ton n’est plus le même quand on parle à une assemblée que lorsqu’on s’addreese à une peraonne en particulier:
1
- prévôt:
1
Index of Pages of the Print Edition