Comments

There Are 64 Responses So Far. »

1. 1 Comment by robert reavis on 14 May 2008:

   TJF writes
   “The language of the early Church is Greek, not Latin and not Aramaic. I would remind you that until the 6th century, Greek was the common and sometimes the predominant in the Roman Church. ”

   Yes, I have never understood this rivalry between the Eastern Church boasting of Greek for the first six centuries, and the Western Church boasting of Latin for the last fifteen. Especially in a time,such as our own when vernacular is all the rage anyhow. But I digress.
   Ephesus was a bustling place in those days both for the Church and the World. St. John was said to have been there along with Mary, The Mother of God and of course St. Paul and some of the other earliest followers of Christ. Other than the Bishop,Onesimus, and the deacons who went out to meet Ignatius as his guards were taking him to Rome, did Ingatius ever visit Ephesus. He says he visited the whole community through meeting Onesimus, but this is more like saying I visited Rockford the other day after having had lunch with Chris Check in Chicago. I point this out because it is everywhere in his letters and is anything but literal in meaning. .

2. 2 Comment by M.A. Roberts on 14 May 2008:

   In this letter (and others), wouldn’t the stress placed upon the local authority of bishops contravene the centralizing tendencies of modern organized religion (in both Protestantism and Catholicism)? On the same theme, when Ignatius uses the adjective ‘katholikos’ to describe the church as “universal,” do you think that this notion of “universal” means something different from what it means today? It certainly wouldn’t have all the political implications, would it? I know the second question is very broad and in reality may require a book-length response, but I’m curious what you think if it is something that can cursorily be discussed. (I can’t remember whether you touched upon ‘katholicos’ or not in Morality of Everyday Life.)

3. 3 Comment by I am not Spartacus on 14 May 2008:

   I have learned,however, that certain persons from elsewhere, who have evil doctrine, have stayed with you; but you did not allow then to sow it among you, and you stopped your ears so that you would not receive what they sow. (William Jurgens collection).

   Fantastic. It appears these good folks had the great good sense to both extend courtesy, kindness, and compassion to their visitors (prolly food, shelter, water etc) but refused to let them pollute the pellucid saving waters of Tradition and Gospels.

   It isn’t noted but I am sure they took the opportunity to witness to the truth to them.

   How often it is we endanger our souls by opening the doors of our intellect to the most abominable guests; evil, heresy, schism, etc. What we allow into our minds is, at the very least, as consequential as what we put into our mouths.

4. 4 Comment by Rob on 14 May 2008:

   “Heis said to have been a disciple of the apostle John, and some time in Trajan’s reign he was sent to Rome, where he was martyred about 110, roughly 60 years after the crucifixion.”

   Who was crucified around 50 AD?

5. 5 Comment by Aaron D. Wolf on 14 May 2008:

   @4:

   It’s probably a typo, Rob. I don’t think anyone here is disputing the traditional date of Christ’s crucifixion,resurrection, and ascension, which is (or is at least near) A.D. 29.

6. 6 Comment by Jeff Anderson on 14 May 2008:

   Mr. Roberts,

   The centralizing tendencies of modern Protestantism?

   Dr. Fleming,

   I always have a “comfortable by the home fires” kind of sensation when I read the letters the Fathers wrote to one another. This isn’t only because of the content, but also stems from the fact that many of these giants of ecclesiastical history actually knew one another…there was an amazing sense of unity and familiarity among many of the early Christian writers – even if some of them were not personal acquaintances.

   In an instance like the one you discuss here, do you believe Ignatius was writing about staying in harmony with the office of bishop writ large, or was he talking about staying under the tutelage of a particular bishop (or bishops)?

7. 7 Comment by Patrick Hall on 14 May 2008:

   The Crucifixion was Friday, April 3rd, 33 AD. On that particular day, there was a partial lunar eclipse at moonrise in Jerusalem, and given the sand storms in the region earlier that day, the eclipsed part of the moon would have been coloured red. So, as Our Mother, Saint John, Saint Joseph of Aramethea, and the Holy Women were finished laying the Body of Christ in the Tomb, and trying to get back inside, as there was the “double Sabbath” of both the Sabbath and Passover occurring at moonrise, they would have undoubtedly seen this blood red moon rising. A powerful image for them, as well as for the Apostles and disciples that scattered in fear when Jesus was arrested, tried, and ultimately crucified. This information regarding moon phases and eclipses is readily available on the “internets”.

   As for the language(s) of the early Church, yes, the lingua franca was Koine (meaning “common”) Greek. As the Faith was introduced to the West, the lingua franca was, of course, Vulgar (once again, meaning “common”) Latin. There really is no argument among traditional Catholics against the use of the [Koine] Greek language as a liturgical language; even the use of Old Slavonic is acceptable. Traditions are ORGANIC, and the use of Vulgar Latin was an organic development in the Church, as was the use of Old Slavonic. The use of English, and other languages, however, definitely was NOT organic, but Revolutionary . I know of NO “ultra-traditional Catholics” that would protest the use of the Koine Greek in a particular ancient Liturgy that uses it, nor would they even protest Old Slavonic. As a matter of fact, they even accept, nay, PROMOTE the use of some Koine Greek in the Latin Rite: the Kyrie Eleison.

   Honestly, the point Mr Flemming says is “obvious” is not. Is he suggesting the “ultra-traditional Catholics” should be instead pushing for the exclusive use of Koine Greek in the Latin Rite? As mentioned above, Koine Greek has no place in the Latin Rite, except for the Kyrie Eleison. Is his point that “ultra-traditional Catholics” accept the use of any and all vernacular in any and all liturgies? Or is his point that “ultra-traditional Catholics” be accepting of their brothers in the other (non-Latin speaking) rites?

8. 8 Comment by TJF on 14 May 2008:

   It is premature to enter into a discussion of the Church structure circa 100 AD. Katholikos means both what we mean by universal and also (I think) with the implication of “throughout, in every particle”. In general, as we shall soon see, Ignatius strongly upholds the authority of bishops. I’ll post a few references, I hope by the end of the day.

   Sorry for the typo, but my goodness what suspicious people we have reading this website.

9. 9 Comment by TJF on 14 May 2008:

   Patrick Hall’s response is an interesting misreading of my observation, which merely reported something I have frequently observed and discussed with Catholics who like me attend the traditional Latin mass: “This is a rough fact for two groups: ultra-traditional Catholics who come close to worshiping the Latin texts of the Vulgate.” I do not see how anyone without a very large ax to grind could read into this sentence either an endorsement of the vernacular in liturgies–though Greek was certainly the vernacular of the day–or a proposal to replace Latin with Greek. What I did intend was a light-hearted rebuke of ultra-traditionalists, few of whom are competent in Latin, who overvalue Latin texts and Latin as a liturgical language. If Mr. Hall has not run into such people, I congratulate him on his good fortune. But his is typical of all internet discussions. A Latin and traditional Catholic is taking to task for denigrating the use of Latin.

   It is important to distinguish beteen the things we know, from revelation and reason, and the things we believe based on conjecture and interpretation. We are not told the date of the crucifixion, and if that date were really important to us, we should have been informed. Even if Mr. Hall’s extrapolation happened to be true, we would not be justified in basing any conclusions on it because we could not know.

10. 10 Comment by Patrick Hall on 14 May 2008:

    As a matter of fact, no, I haven’t met any traditional-minded Catholics that oppose the use of either Greek or Old Slavonic in their respective liturgies. I guess I have to consider myself lucky.

    As for the date of the Crucifixion, yes, the specific date isn’t important, as it is not specifically spelled out in Sacred Scripture. However, the astronomical facts are interesting, and since the date of the Crucifixion was brought into play (due to the innocent typographical error) I thought I would share them with the group.

11. 11 Comment by Rob on 14 May 2008:

    I have been a long time reader and poster at this website and have been buying Chronicles at my local Books A Million for a number of years (and had the pleasure of being a subscriber for two years). I’m sorry that Dr. Fleming thinks he has suspicious readers. I would expect that type of name calling from say Father Richard John Neuhaus; I would not expect it from Dr. Fleming.

    The reason I asked was I am currently reading the Holy Father’s little book on the Apostles and the founders of the Early Church which has been published by OSV. While offering some insight on the Apostles, the Holy Father does not offer much in the way of biographical information. I have been reading up on what little biographical information that is known of the Apostles and have found that a good deal of it contradicts other parts of it. I was wondering if perhaps there had been an account of St. John that I had missed.

    Mr. Wolf’s reply is gracious and I thank him for it.

12. 12 Comment by Ronduck on 14 May 2008:

    I hat to but into the discussion like this, but is this the book you are referring to:
    http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Ante-Nicene_Fathers/Volume_I/IGNATIUS

    It seems to be the same one that is listed in the Christian Classics Ethereal Library.

13. 13 Comment by Aaron D. Wolf on 14 May 2008:

    In an earlier discussion, attention was drawn to the fact that most OT references in the NT plainly are derived from the Septuagint translation into Greek, the earliest authoritative text of the OT and clearly the proper version for Christians to use.

    Protestants, of course, disagree on this last point (as did the Council of Trent, which threatened with anathemas any one who “should dare or presume to reject the Vulgate edition under any pretext whatsoever”). We would not dispute the fact that the NT writers quoted mostly from the LXX. Lutheran theologian Martin Chemnitz explains:

    “[T]he apostles used and quoted the then-common edition of the Septuagint, because it was at that time in everybody’s hands; but they did not make it authentic against the sources themselves but derived the emphasis and peculiarity of meaning from the sources themselves, if the translators had departed from them in any place, as Jerome shows by many examples.”

    This approach has support from both Jerome and Augustine, although Augustine was famously critical of Jerome’s efforts, since Jerome translated the OT from Hebrew (while comparing it with the LXX). Yet Augustine himself says, in De Doctrina Christiana (2:11), “[M]en who speak the Latin tongue . . . need two other languages for the knowledge of Scripture, Hebrew and Greek, that they may have recourse to the original texts if the endless diversity of the Latin translators throw them into doubt.”

    Jerome thought the Hebrew (“Hebraica veritas“) he was using, which according to some scholars seems to be an antecedent to the Masoretic Text, better proclaimed Christ in the OT. At any rate, both the Protestants’ KJV OT and most of the Roman Catholic Vulgate’s OT flow from Hebrew mss., not the LXX. The Fathers, on the other hand, used the LXX but also deferred to Theodotion, whenever the regula fidei required it.

14. 14 Comment by Robert Taft on 14 May 2008:

    Dr. Fleming,

    Indeed, I found Mel Gibson’s gory, ultra-traditionalist, RC Crucifixion flick (notice that the NT texts are NOT gory, nor to they dwell on the Passion) to be especially farcical when Pilate and Christ conversed in LATIN. While Pilate almost certainly wrote in and official correspondence with Rome in Latin, and probably could speak it, almost certainly he spoke only Greek with Hellenize Jewish leaders, never presuming that they knew Latin (though it is not inconceivable that a very Hellenized, Sadducee scholars may well have).

    Mr. Hall,

    The introduction of modern English (Chaucer and after; not contemporary English) as a liturgical language was only “revolutionary” because the See of Rome’s equally “revolutionary” canonization of Latin. Your noting of Rome’s comfort with Greek and Slavonic as proper litrugical tongues is anachronistic as, at the time of Wycliffe and Tyndale, Rome most certainly did not regard either as anything but heretical, the scourge of Jesuitical Uniatism not having yet been hatched. Once, Rome’s conversion of the vulgar to the sacred was seen for what it was, English ORGANICALLY continued to evolve as a sacred language: Wycliffe, Tyndale, The Great or Bishop’s Bible, The English Litany, The Book of Common Prayer, and The Authorized Version. All the former is atleast as organic as the abrupt, and artificial imposition of Pious V’s Tridentine Mass on nearly all Catholics and John XXIII’s equally innovative and cut-from-whole-clothe Novus Ordo (especially in its present street English translation!)

15. 15 Comment by TJF on 14 May 2008:

    To Rob: I would happily apologize if I thought I had done wrong or that it would do some good. I should think that everyone would take a remark such as “Sorry for the typo, but my goodness what suspicious people we have reading this website” as a lighthearted jest addressed anonymously to two comments. Contrast this with the brusque and peremptory question, “Who was crucified around 50 AD?” A remark that would have got you kicked out of my class, when I was teaching a Greek course on the Apostolic Fathers back in the days of Justinian. I employ a tit-for-tat strategy on this website. To polite responses, I am polite; I answer rudeness, brusqueness, and impudence with severity or flippancy as the occasion seems to demand. Why? Certainly not because I am offended by what an anonymous stranger might say, but simply to force people to think about what they are doing and saying. As a former colleague of Richard Neuhaus, I have to say you seriously underestimate his capacity for extreme rudeness. Whatever other talents he may–or generally does not–possess, he is a good hater, one of the best.

    I thank Aaron Wolf for his enlightening comment. I must confess to having a limited admiration for Jerome. His self-conceit and arrogance towards his contemporaries are not evidence, I believe, of the good judgment required for making such significant textual decisions. Of course, quibbling over OT textual traditions is putting the cart before the horse. I am perfectly content to follow the tradition of the Fathers and the Church. Chemnitz might not have agreed with that statement or could agree only in the sense that he and his mentors would reserve the right to redefine the Church against its traditions. I don’t understand why Jerome, Chemnitz or any Christian would be so quick to dismiss the version quoted by the apostles–a strange if not bizarre approach for those who regard Scripture as inspired or inerrant.

    But enough. To go back to the position of the bishop, Ignatius takes the position that communion with one’s bishop is a protection against heresy (Trall. 6, Phi. 3). He tells the people of Smyrna that marriages must be performed in his presence and that neither baptisms nor the eucharist are valid without the bishop’s approval. Now, obviously, in those days each church, generally, was its own diocese, and it was only later that different parishes were under the administration of one cathedral church, where the bishop’s chair was kept, and one baptistry. Unless we reject Christ’s teachings on the Holy Spirit who would come to guide the Church, we should see this gradual evolution as both a response to the Church’s growth and as a fulfillment of its mission. It would be a serious mistake to pick a date, say 70 or 100, when liturgy and structure were fixed.

    As for katholikos, the universal church is almost literally the body of Christ. See that you all follow the bishop as Jesus Christ follows the Father, and the presbytery as if it were the apostles. … Wherever the bishop appears, let the congregation be present; just as wherever Jesus Christ is, there is the Catholic Church. [Smyrn 8,2].

    Elsewhere, Ignatius champions the teaching authority of the bishops as the bulwark against heresy. I think it is safe to say, putting Clement and Ignatius together–both of them revered figures in the age that followed the apostles–that bishops were to be respected and obeyed and that a bishop from an important apostolic church (Rome, Antioch) was within his rights in advising and admonishing other churches.

16. 16 Comment by robert reavis on 14 May 2008:

    “All the former is at least as organic as the abrupt, and artificial imposition of Pious V’s Tridentine Mass on nearly all Catholics.”
    This is not as true as contemporary parlance about liturgical tradition would have us believe, but in the spirit of Ignatius who requested of Christians (then as now) to ” remain in unity (III) and in obedience to their bishop (IV) and uses the image of being attuned to the bishop as the strings of a harp. This is not simply a question of good order: In obeying their bishop Christians remain within the sanctuary, and if the prayers of one or two are effective, how much more effective are the prayers of the bishop and the whole Church.(V) ”
    In so doing, even American soldiers in Iraq today could attend one of the Coptic services and recognize the broad outlines of the Anglican, Lutheran, Orthodox or Tridentine worship of God.
    If we don’t take his advice, the alternative is a Tower of Babel in which the likes of Rev. Wright and Rev. Hagee continue to make it up as they go along. IMO

17. 17 Comment by Patrick Hall on 14 May 2008:

    Mr Taft,

    Where to begin, where to begin?

    I agree with you entirely regarding Mr Gibson’s work. Jesus spoke Koine Greek with Pilate, that much is certain. Having them speak Latin was absolutely propaganda.

    As for the Catholic Church’s “…“revolutionary” canonization of Latin”, I disagree with you entirely. The “canonization” of Latin came about not as “revolution”, but COUNTER-revolution. Latin had been used in the Western (Latin) Church from it’s very beginning; the fact that there developed a large part of the population that could neither read nor understand the Latin language did not prohibit a richness in the Faith. The Tridentine Council understood that liberal use of vernaculars would have meant the liberalization of the Liturgy. The use of English was correctly seen as the linguistic equivalent of the “Cranmer table”.

    Further, the Missal of Pope St Pius V was promulgated in 1570. The Union of Brest was in 1596. Are you trying to claim that it only took 26 years for the Catholic Church to break down and accept Greek and Old Slavonic, after fanatical opposition to them?

    The use of English in the Latin Liturgy WAS Revolutionary; if not, why did it happen to take place ONLY during a Revolt? Why had not Latin been replaced by the earlier forms of English, or Gaelic Irish in Ireland, etc.? If something is organic, it happens without a Revolution behind it.

18. 18 Comment by alessio1947 on 14 May 2008:

    Reading these comments is a veritable laff riot. We see much deep thought concerning Catholicism and Protestantism, i.e., Christianity in the West. Yes, Greek was the language of the Early Church. Yes, Greek was the language of the New Testament. Might this language thing point in the direction of the, well, one true church, then and now … ? Also, re ~catholic~ (kata holos, containing the whole): The word is not synonymous with ~universal~. ~Catholic~ means that every local church, under every local bishop, contains the complete truth and all the saving grace of the universal church, period. This is why the Greek had to be Latinized in the Creed, catholicus, a, um. Latin already had a word for universal, obviously, but no word for what the Greek ~katholikos~ expresses, so the Latin translation of the Creed had to adopt a neologism …

19. 19 Comment by Patrick Hall on 14 May 2008:

    The fact the lingua franca of the Levant was Koine Greek in no way means the Greek Orthodox Church is the “One True Church”, nor the Eastern Orthodox churches in general.

    Once one accepts the authority of the bishops based on Sacred Scripture, and, necessarily the primacy of Saint Peter, and his office, then one must accept the hierarchy of the Catholic Church, which has it’s Seat in Rome on Vatican Hill, the location of the martyrdom of Saint Peter himself.

    By the way, Latin speakers would have recognized the word “katholikos”; knowledge of the Greek language was widespread throughout the Empire, even into Gaul.

20. 20 Comment by Rob on 14 May 2008:

    Dr. Fleming,

    My apologies if my question came off as brusque however your typo left me confused and I misread your jest.

    I had the severe displeasure of attending mass at Father Neuhaus’ parish a few times when I was at NYU for a semester and I agree with your take on the man.

21. 21 Comment by David on 14 May 2008:

    For Robert Taft:

    Your reference to Pius V’s “abrupt and artificial” imposition of the Traditional Mass would seem to miss the point that Quo Primus simply codified the liturgy of the Mass, directing that any portion of the liturgy that was in use for a quarter of a millenium anywhere was to be incorporated into the Mass as he proclaimed it. Hardly seems precipitate. And what would be “artificial” about it? The Mass itself or the proclamation of it in your view?

    Quo Primus was, to put it simply, a means by which Holy Mother Church rationalized the liturgy throughout the world. Surely, at the very least, a huge convenience to the faithful traveling anywhere. In my travels, when I am obliged to attend Sunday Mass where a Traditional Mass is unavailable, I experience some of the most bizarre liturgies imaginable. Often the celebrant as entertainer!

22. 22 Comment by I am not Spartacus on 15 May 2008:

    . Your noting of Rome’s comfort with Greek and Slavonic as proper litrugical tongues is anachronistic as, at the time of Wycliffe and Tyndale, Rome most certainly did not regard either as anything but heretical

    Mr. Taft. I do not think you are correct.

    Whilst the Greek language is the norm and the original of the Byzantine or Greek Rite, its actual use as a church language is limited to a comparatively small number, reckoning by population. The liturgy and offices of the Byzantine Church were translated from the Greek into what is now Old Slavonic (or Church Slavonic) by Sts. Cyril and Methodius about the year 866 and the period immediately following. St. Cyril is credited with having invented or adapted a special alphabet which now bears his name (Cyrillic) in order to express the sounds of the Slavonic language, as spoken by the Bulgars and Moravians of his day.

    Later on St. Methodius translated the entire Bible into Slavonic and his disciples afterwards added other works of the Greek saints and the canon law. These two brother saints always celebrated Mass and administered the sacraments in the Slavonic language. News of their successful missionary work among the pagan Slavs was carried to Rome along with complaints against them for celebrating the rites of the Church in the heathen vernacular. In 868 Saints Cyril and Methodius were summoned to Rome by Nicholas I, but arriving there after his death they were heartily received by his successor Adrian II, who approved of their Slavonic version of the liturgy.

    http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/14041b.htm

    http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/04592a.htm

23. 23 Comment by TJF on 15 May 2008:

    Variously:

    To Rob: No offense taken and none intentionally given. We are trying to manage a civil discourse here and that is quite alien to the WWW.

    To Alessio: I’d lay off the potted etymologies. If we are going to look at the root, the phrase is kata holon, which may mean something either like “on the whole” or “throughout, universally” There is also the adverb katholou, in general. The notion of containing is not present in kata, whose root sense is “down” as in the adverb kato as opposed to ano, but (and I am citing from the intermediate LSJ, which is all I have in the office) with the genitive it means down from, against, or concerning, while with the accusative, it i used again to describe downward or hostile motion but also distributively as of a whole divided into parts, hence once can assemble a host or people kata phula, by tribes. This the catholic church is the entirety of the church, made up of all the people in their various groups. When terms become fixed in a specialized discourse, they are often not translated but merely transliterated or transferred. Where would the English language of cuisine and fashion be without French? Finally, I would observe that your manner is as faulty as your pretended knowledge of Greek.

24. 24 Comment by robert m. peters on 15 May 2008:

    Dr. Fleming,

    SIDEBAR:

    When you cited “kata phula” in post 23, you gave me a start. For a fleeting second, I considered the thought that my late “Catahoula” Leopard, Miss Samantha, might have been Greek.

    TO TOPIC:

    I have studied Latin; I have used Latin in research; and I have even taught some basic grammar courses. However, I am far from being a Latin expert and even further from being a Latin scholar. Greek, in any of its periods, I am familiar with only through encounters in linguistics. I am neither Eastern Orthodox nor Roman Catholic. Therefore, there is little that I can contribute to this dicussion, athough I do see the words of Christ as revealed in the Gospels and the thoughts of St. Paul as revealed in his epistles in the words of Ignatius; however, for me to point out the obvious would be, well, to be stating the obvious. As I read the posts, I learn a lot and acquire much to think about.

    I have read Ignatius’ Epistle to the Ephesians in translation, once long ago in college and now again online. I, of course, read it with the eye of a Protestant and with the focus of a Southern Baptist. I can say that the epistle would be well received in most Southern Baptist congregations and would get some hearty “Amens.” Were Ignatius’ Epistle to the Ephesians to be read to our congregation, it should be read by an old preacher who is loving called “The Bishop” because he is held in such high esteem among the churches of the hill country.

25. 25 Comment by Theodore Van Oosbree on 15 May 2008:

    Antioch was a Greek-speaking city. Had Ignatius been bishop of Seville (for instance), he would have spoken and written Latin, reflecting the linguistic dichotomy of the Roman Empire.

26. 26 Comment by TJF on 15 May 2008:

    Re Antioch: Yes, the entirely Middle East including Egypt and Judaea were publicly Greek, whatever they spoke at home. I don’t think in his day there were large congregations in Spain, but it is interesting that even in Rome, the Church’s language was Greek, reflecting the Eastern origin of the Christian faith.

    Re the bishop: There is a difference between a well-beloved preacher who has earned the respect of his congregation and someone who speaks, as Clement pointed out, with the authority of the apostles or, as Ignatius insists, is to be treated as Christ would be treated. Some authority is based on an individual’s talents and accomplishments, but there is an institutional authority that transcends the individual, as apostolic authority appears to do. Now, even someone claiming apostolic authority can abuse his power and forfeit a large part of respect, but as one ancient writer observed, if a chamber-pot were made king, we should still have to bow to it. Suppose a mediocre and stupid Ignatius, he would still have to be obeyed.

    Perhaps we should move on through Ephesians. I shall post a few paragraphs at the end of my original piece and also put it into a writeback. When we finish Ephesians, I’ll try the experiment of renaming the original, as Ignatius II and posting the addition at the end of the original, but the whole thing should pop up again at the top.

27. 27 Comment by TJF on 15 May 2008:

    More on Ephesians:

    The rest of the epistle is largely taken up with a contrast between heresy and orthodoxy. Those who parade “the name” (i.e., Christ or Christian) but do not live the faith are ravening dogs (7), while the Ephesians are worthy of praise for staying away from evil teaching (kake didache), and he exhorts them to be steadfast in faith but humble and gentle in rebuking false doctrine (10). In these last times (11), they should meet more frequently (13), probably to receive communion more frequently, because by doing this they shall confound the powers of Satan by the concord (homonoia) of your faith. Then, the mystical note so frequent in Ignatius: “There is nothing better than peace, by which every heavenly and earthly beings is abolished.” A brilliant coda, as it were, comparing Christian discord with Satan’s rebellion. This is a theme that echoes through the early Fathers. Contrast this spirit–so prominent in St. Dionuysius of Alexandria–with, for example, the bitterness of Montanists like Tertullian or the later holier-than-thou sects such as the Novatians.

    In joining faith with love, Christians will live without sin, and he does not hate who obtains love. As Our Lord told us, the tree is known by its fruits, so Christians are known by the things they do, which are not a matter of professions and promises but of the faith that a Christian maintains unto the end. (14) In this connection–of those who talk a good game but do not persist in leading a life of faith–Ignatius says silence may be better than speech. Teaching is good, but only when the teacher acts on his own professions. Preaching false doctrine is worse than destroying a family (by murder or seduction, presumably), and if those who corrupt according the flesh are made to suffer, the false teacher will go into the everlasting fire. (16)

    Finally, a few words on true doctrine and its mysteries. Quoting Paul on the foolishness of those who are wise in their own conceit and disputatious (against the apostolic teachings), Ignatius reminds us of the dispensation by which Mary conceived by the Holy Ghost. (18) Her virginity and childbirth were hidden from the Prince of This World, as was the death of the Lord. By His mysterious birth, illumined by a star, the powers of magic and wickedness were destroyed. While it is true that one might stretch parthenia to mean something like the years when Mary was a maiden, the way in which he couples it with childbirth as a world-changing mystery should remove all doubt about this reference to the virgin birth, a teaching he appears to take for granted

28. 28 Comment by robert reavis on 15 May 2008:

    “as being stones of the temple of the Father, prepared for the building of God the Father, and drawn up on high by the instrument of Jesus Christ, which is the cross, making use of the Holy Spirit as a rope, while your faith was the means by which you ascended, and your love the way which led up to God.”

    This is an ancient and timeless theme for the follower of Christ. From Jacobs Ladder to the Ascent of Mount Carmel, to St. Benedict’s ladder of humility, there is always this notion of being drawn up to a higher degree of understanding and charity through suffering ( the instrument of Christ, which is the cross ) . I once knew a prosecuting attorney who often said Christ must have been hiding in the county jail because every time he sentenced a person to jail, that person found Christ. And there is a certain truth about this as well as a certain exageration . One time as a young marine, I had lunch with the old warrior,(and yes, he was Bill Buckley’s brother -in – law) , Brent Bozell Sr. After lunch I asked him where he was going. To the D.C. jail, he said. I always meet some of the prisoners over there on fridays. Brent was always a serious man and in my estimation a holy man in his laters years.
    The conversion or turning towards God is often after the ego has exhausted its own endeavors that have ended, like most human enterprises, in failure. The theological virtue, or gift, of faith begins the turning, then continues in hope and ends in Charity–the love of God above all else forever and ever.
    The Holy Spirit has been neglected in our times and sometimes misplaced to the point that “they have taken him away and we don’t know where to find him.” But traditionally the gifts of the Holy Spirit are wisdom, understanding, counsel, knowledge, piety and the fear of God. All present and praised in Ignatius’s letter to the Ephesians, but noticably absent in the contemporary culture we live and breath. Now, I will step down from my pulpit and you may continue the discussion..

29. 29 Comment by Aaron D. Wolf on 15 May 2008:

    I think it is safe to say, putting Clement and Ignatius together–both of them revered figures in the age that followed the apostles–that bishops were to be respected and obeyed and that a bishop from an important apostolic church (Rome, Antioch) was within his rights in advising and admonishing other churches.

    In the case of Clement, it was the assembled Christians of Rome, through their pastor (or one of their pastors) who addressed the Christians assembled in Corinth. Ignatius addresses the Christians assembled in Ephesus directly. This seems fitting, given Ignatius great emphasis on the authority of the (singular) bishop.

    On the other hand, Ignatius is quick to emphasize that he is not writing to these Christians as one who has authority over them. “I do not command you, as though I were somewhat. For . . . I am not yet perfected in Jesus Christ. [For] now am I beginning to be a disciple; and I speak to you as to my school-fellows” (3:1).

    Elsewhere (to the Romans), he goes even further (4:3): “I do not enjoin you, as Peter and Paul did. They were Apostles, I am a convict . . . ” Interestingly, in that epistle, Ignatius does not address Clement or any other bishop at Rome. He says that Peter & Paul had a different authority than his. And he doesn’t even extend the same sort of apostolic authority that Clement extends to the bishop. For in Ignatius, the bishop (every bishop) is the vicar of Christ. Thus, Ignatius writes to the Romans that, after his impending martyrdom, God will be the bishop of Antioch.

    There is a difference between a well-beloved preacher who has earned the respect of his congregation and someone who speaks, as Clement pointed out, with the authority of the apostles or, as Ignatius insists, is to be treated as Christ would be treated.

    Protestants clearly differ from Roman Catholics (and some Episcopalians) on this interpretation. (N.B. I don’t know whether Mr. Peters’ “old preacher” is a pastor.) What Ignatius is describing (in all of his epistles) is something akin to today’s “senior pastor.” He is the singular leader of the flock in a way similar to Christ’s leadership of the “catholic church/whole assembly.” The assistant or associate pastors function like the apostles, as they uphold the pastor’s ministry, preaching and teaching as assigned. His authority is not based on his personal talents and accomplishments, but neither does it derive from an institution in the current Roman sense.

    Questions of apostolic succession thus arise, if we are to escape the dichotomy of “preacher who relies on his talent” versus “institutional bearer of apostolic authority.” Protestants will point here to I Clement (44:1-2):

    “[O]ur Apostles knew through our Lord Jesus Christ that there would be strife over the name of the bishop’s office. For this cause therefore, having received complete foreknowledge, they appointed the aforesaid persons, and afterwards they provided a continuance, that if these should fall asleep, other approved men should succeed to their ministration. Those therefore who were appointed by them, or afterward by other men of repute with the consent of the whole church, and have ministered unblamably to the flock of Christ in lowliness of mind, peacefully and with all modesty, and for long time have borne a good report with all these men we consider to be unjustly thrust out from their ministration.”

    Here, the post-apostolic bishop/pastor is appointed by “other men of repute” and must be affirmed by “the consent of the whole church/congregation.” But the argument for apostolic succession in Clement turns on the above italicized “their.” “Other approved men should succeed to [whose?] ministry.” For Protestants, “their” naturally refers to the bishops they are succeeding, as opposed to the apostles per se.

    At any rate, Clement and Ignatius seem to be in harmony on this point, which may even clarify Ignatius’ ostensibly severe statement about the need for the bishop’s approval for all weddings. For we aren’t talking about the Diocese of Bridgeport here, but about a local church. Are you going to sneak off to the justice of the peace, or mustn’t you go to your pastor?

    What is missing from all of Ignatius’ corpus (as well as Clement’s) is any mention of a bishop’s authority extending beyond the congregation of which he is pastor. (Corinth, in fact, has no pastor, yet Clement urges and persuades the laity instead of commanding them, just as Ignatius “does not command” since he is “not an apostle.”) Nor is there any mention of Roman primacy, Antiochean primacy, or even the superiority of a larger or metropolitan church or congregation. (Ignatius does grant Rome a certain primacy when it comes to “charity.”) Those who would find Roman primacy in these earliest fathers would do better to infer from the occasion of Clement’s epistle than to appeal to Ignatius’ high regard for the bishop, however “bishop” is understood in his epistles. For in Ignatius, every bishop is the vicar of Christ, and it is the presbyters who are “types” of the apostles.

30. 30 Comment by robert reavis on 15 May 2008:

    Aaron,
    In the early church as in the case of Ignatius who was captured tried and condemned by the secular authority, who appointed his replacement ? Was his replacement elected by the Christians of Antioch, appointed by the Bishop in Rome or filled from another community of christians such as Ephesus ? Was the laying on of hands always an integral part of initiation to the office of bishop ?
    Finally, did Luther ever assume the title of Bishop and if so, how was he consecrated or selected ? If not, how did the office of Bishop originate in the reformed Churches ? Thank you

31. 31 Comment by I am not Spartacus on 16 May 2008:

    Mr. Reavis asks:Was the laying on of hands always an integral part of initiation to the office of bishop ?

    AFAIK, yes.

    Acts 13; Now there were in the church which was at Antioch, prophets and doctors, among whom was Barnabas, and Simon who was called Niger, and Lucius of Cyrene, and Manahen, who was the foster brother of Herod the tetrarch, and Saul. 2 And as they were ministering to the Lord, and fasting, the Holy Ghost said to them: Separate me Saul and Barnabas, for the work whereunto I have taken them. 3 Then they, fasting and praying, and imposing their hands upon them, sent them away.

    St. Ignatius of Antioch

    Also called Theophorus (ho Theophoros); born in Syria, around the year 50; died at Rome between 98 and 117.

    More than one of the earliest ecclesiastical writers have given credence, though apparently without good reason, to the legend that Ignatius was the child whom the Savior took up in His arms, as described in Mark 9:35. It is also believed, and with great probability, that, with his friend Polycarp, he was among the auditors of the Apostle St. John. If we include St. Peter, Ignatius was the third Bishop of Antioch and the immediate successor of Evodius (Eusebius, “Hist. Eccl.”, II, iii, 22). Theodoret (“Dial. Immutab.”, I, iv, 33a, Paris, 1642) is the authority for the statement that St. Peter appointed Ignatius to the See of Antioch. St. John Chrysostom lays special emphasis on the honor conferred upon the martyr in receiving his episcopal consecration at the hands of the Apostles themselves (“Hom. in St. Ig.”, IV. 587). Natalis Alexander quotes Theodoret to the same effect (III, xii, art. xvi, p. 53).

    http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/07644a.htm

    I once read, somewhere (Orthowiki, I think) that a man named Hero succeeded St. Ignatius.

    While it is true that many Communities/Christian Churches chose their Bishops it was always done so (afaik) with the idea the choice was subject to approval by Rome.

32. 32 Comment by TJF on 16 May 2008:

    Netslang like AFAIK and smiley faces are not acceptable on this site. I would prefer, also, to stay away from evidence drawn from Wiki sites. Not that they are not useful, but because so many ignoramuses send in misinformation that takes some time to get corrected.

    As for the preposterous notion that the selection of bishops was contingent on Rome’s approval, I should like to see some evidence that is not comprehended by AFAIK. In later years some Popes did protest the appointment of a particular patriarch in the East but always on some specific grounds, e.g., heresy. The Roman Church, virtually from the beginning, appears to have enjoyed great prestige, but this did not prevent other patriarchs from counseling or correcting Popes, when they felt it was necessary. But this is far off topic and introduced, it would seem, for the sole purpose of sowing discord between Catholics and non-Catholics.

    Peter’s episcopacy at Antioch would seem to be pious conjecture. We are told, however, that one Evodius was the predecessor of Ignatius and Hero the successor. There is a spurious correspondence between Ignatius and Hero. Apart from Ignatius, whose letters and martyrdom put Antioch at the center of the Church, we know little of the bishops until Theophilus (roughly between 170 and 186O, an apologist some of whose writings survive and who is said to have been the first to use the term Trias, trinity.

33. 33 Comment by TJF on 16 May 2008:

    I agree mostly with my colleague Aaron, though one might first have to ask if there could have possibly been a formal hierarchy at this time. Churches are few and scattered, regular communication difficult, and Christians subject to sporadic persecution. We should note, however, that Ignatius does assume a local hierarchy of bishop, presbyters, and deacons, which is the germ of the more extensive hierarchy that rather quickly develops.

    We can take up the position of patriarchal churches when they have had a chance to develop. Let us turn next to his Epistle to the Romans and see if Ignatius has any particular regard for the Church founded and presided over by Peter. To conclude our discussion of Ephesians, I want to cite an even stronger endorsement of the bishop’s authority.

    In his Epistle to the Magnesians, Ignatius goes even further, telling them to “be zealous in doing all things in harmony (homonoia) with God, with the bishop who sits in for God, and the presbyters in the place of the Council of Apostles, and the deacons, who are most dear to me, entrusted with the service of Jesus Christ…[Mag 6]. At this time deacons probably distributed the bread and wine but may also, as they later did, manage the Church’s charity (not easy to distinguish from distributing the elements).

34. 34 Comment by robert.reavis on 16 May 2008:

    Dr. Fleming @ 32 writes :
    ” But this is far off topic and introduced, it would seem, for the sole purpose of sowing discord between Catholics and non-Catholics.”

    Tom,
    I am not adverse to discord, but they were honest questions. My point was to give the air of reality to the current idea that some very irritating Catholics hold tioday that every Bishop ever appointed in the history of the Church was done by submitting three names to the Vatican for the Popes approval. Understanding how historical reality fits into this kind of general principle of papal approval, I think is helpful. It remains an issue in China, in large religious orders and in some special circumstances today, especially with the Eastern Orthodox who have much more in common with Western christians than the radical muslims taking over Kosovo. Sometimes I perhaps get ahead of discussions or sidetracked on an irrelevant issue, but Iago type plotting for dissention is really not my modus operandi else I would post annonymously and in secret.

35. 35 Comment by TJF on 16 May 2008:

    Robert,

    I had not in my haste even realized that Not-Spartacus was answering your question, and therefore it struck me as an out-of-the-blue irrelevancy. I apologize to both of you for misunderstanding the situation and will try to be more assiduous in studying the write-backs. The trouble is, to address your question, we know almost nothing about Ignatius’s predecessor, though we are told by one later source that it was he who first used the term Christian, and nothing of Hero. If we can judge from a later period, a bishop was chosen from among the leaders of the local church. Whether he required acclamation from all the members or merely the approval of the presbyters or whether a bishop might indicate whom he preferred for his successor, we do not know. One thing we do know from human nature and the nature of all organizations is that there is no such things as democracy. In Rome, the custom was for the people to approve the choice of a Pope, but even there, while the Romans might riot when presented an unpopular choice, it was only on rare occasions that they directly influenced the selection.

36. 36 Comment by PcH on 16 May 2008:

    I agree mostly with my colleague Aaron, though one might first have to ask if there could have possibly been a formal hierarchy at this time. Churches are few and scattered, regular communication difficult, and Christians subject to sporadic persecution. We should note, however, that Ignatius does assume a local hierarchy of bishop, presbyters, and deacons, which is the germ of the more extensive hierarchy that rather quickly develops.

    Is not the question (“one might first ask”) answered with historical information? For example, we know that at some point there was more than one congregation in many cities, but never more than one who was called “bishop”. We also know that at some point, there were places with a church that had a pastor, but no bishop. But according to Ignatius, in both instances each pastor must be responsible to a bishop.

    Regarding:
    

    My point was to give the air of reality to the current idea that some very irritating Catholics hold tioday that every Bishop ever appointed in the history of the Church was done by submitting three names to the Vatican for the Popes approval.

    Why deliberately sow discord? The RCC has never made such claims and certainly not since Valla proved the Donation of Constantine was a forgery back in 1440. The Vatican did not become papal residence until 1377.

37. 37 Comment by robert.reavis on 16 May 2008:

    “One thing we do know from human nature and the nature of all organizations is that there is no such things as democracy.”

    Especially noticeable in a classroom type endeavor ( such as these discussions ) where the mob will rule without a teacher using the latin ,”baculum” to keep good order. Or as was once taught and since proven true, “spare the rod and spoil the child.” Whatever else can ( and will ) be said about your former students, they are not a spoiled bunch. Carry on.

38. 38 Comment by Aaron D. Wolf on 16 May 2008:

    In the early church as in the case of Ignatius who was captured tried and condemned by the secular authority, who appointed his replacement? Was his replacement elected by the Christians of Antioch, appointed by the Bishop in Rome or filled from another community of christians such as Ephesus?

    Judge Reavis,

    As far as the documentary evidence goes, we simply cannot know how Ignatius was replaced. (Ignatius requests of Polycarp that he assemble a council to send a messenger to his beloved Antioch, but not a new bishop.) There seems to be no serious doubt that it was the deacon Hero who sat in his seat afterward, as no one challenged that aspect of the pseudo-Ignatian writings and Eusebius in fact confirms it. I can add that this at least jibes with the Clementine scenario I mentioned above, wherein someone worthy from within the community is nominated by the leaders of the church (“other men of repute”—whether presbyters or pious men, we aren’t told) then confirmed by the congregation.

    One of the pseudo-Ignatian epistles, To Hero, sort of jibes with this as well, if Ignatius himself is the “other man.” Someone puts into his mouth these words: “I charge thee before the God of the universe, and before Christ, and in the presence of the Holy Spirit, and of the ministering ranks [of angels], keep in safety that deposit which I and Christ have committed to thee, and do not judge thyself unworthy of those things which have been shown by God [to me] concerning thee. I hand over to thee the Church of Antioch. I have commended you to Polycarp in the Lord Jesus Christ.”

    There is no real agreement on Ignatius’ predecessor at Antioch, either. That both Peter and Paul (who based his mission to the Gentiles there) were in Antioch is not in question. How they functioned there is less clear (setting aside Tradition). Surely, though, at any assembly where either was present, they held the utmost authority as apostles. Some tradition makes Peter the first bishop of Antioch, but that seems to be in conflict with the biblical witness (depending on what we mean by “bishop” at this stage of development) which puts Barnabas there from an early time (sent by the Jerusalem church). If we are to believe that Peter was the first bishop of Antioch, then we have to admit that there was no episkopos there at all for at least a decade, while Barnabas was preaching and prophesying there. (Despite all of the attention later given to Peter’s ordination of Ignatius, and to the tradition that Ignatius was a disciple of John, Ignatius never mentions either.)

    On the other hand, we can make Peter the founder both of the ekklesia at Rome and the ekklesia at Antioch, insofar as it was his preaching at Pentecost through which the Holy Spirit converted both Jews from “Asia” and “strangers of Rome, both Jews and proselytes,” who undoubtedly returned home full of the spirit and preaching the Gospel.

    That Evodius was in some sense there at Antioch before Ignatius seems clear. According to the Apostolic Constitutions, Evodius and Ignatius were co-bishops; Evodius was appointed by Peter, and Ignatius by Paul. Eusebius makes Ignatius the “second in succession to Peter.” Origen has him as the second bishop of Antioch.

    Was the laying on of hands always an integral part of initiation to the office of bishop?

    Yes, as well as with others who were sent for the sake of the Gospel. They laid hands on Paul as he went out to his missions; Timothy received his “gift” through the “laying on of hands of the presbytery.”

    Finally, did Luther ever assume the title of Bishop and if so, how was he consecrated or selected?

    Luther did not become a bishop. He did consistently appeal to his doctorate as proof that the Church had sent him to teach.

39. 39 Comment by Sid Cundiff on 16 May 2008:

    There are translations of the Tanakh into Aramaic. They are called the “Targum”. They would have been used in the synagogues of Palestine and eastwards, and used from the Second Temple Period onward. So the Targum most likely would have been used in the synagogue of Capernam, among whose congregation would have been Jews named Simon bar-Jonah, his brother , Jacob bar-zibhdi and his brother, and one of the rabbis of that synagogue, by name Yeshua bar-Yosef, called in Mark “Yeshua bar-Miriam”.

    The Greek LXX was written for Diaspora Jews, most likely in Alexandria. It is a translation, and not a very good one, be it as a literal translation or a dynamic one. Translations unfaithful to the original language, literally or dynamically, are not Scripture, and are not therefore authoritative. Witness the worst translation ever done: The Living Bible. Those who know Greek and Hebrew and the target language are the best judges of a translation’s faithfulness.

    It is true that the NT quotes the handy LXX; the books of the NT were written for a Greek speaking (native language or lingua franca) church – to diaspora Jewish Christians or pagan converts. The earliest NT is 1st Thessalonians, c. a.D. 49, and written to such Greeks. In short, the use of the LXX was a pastoral decision, not a dogmatic one. Latter in Church history, often when a translator didn’t know what the Hebrew meant, he used the LXX — something done as late as the first edition (in French) of The Jerusalem Bible of the 1960s. The New Jerusalem Bible, 1984, abandoned this practice.

    The Dogmatic decision on Scripture was The Council of Trent, 4th Session, 8 April 1546. The Council approved the content (i.e. the books) contained in the Vulgate (Denzinger, #1505), and said that in the liturgy, “disputations, sermons, and exegesis” (D. 1506 [I use the 40th edition]) the Vulgate was “authentic”. The Council did not forbid other translations, or the use of the original languages, and instead was opposing Protestant interpretation (e.g. denial of the Virgin Birth because of the Hebrew in Isaiah 7:14) and Protestant canonical views (e.g. omitting the Letter of James and the Deutocanonical texts). Some texts used by the Eastern Church (e.g. the 151st Psalm) were put by the Council into the Vulgate’s appendix. The Council did not authorize or lend ultimate authority to the LXX.

    Jerome was the last Christian in the West who knew Hebrew until the Renaissance, himself having studied with rabbis in Bethlehem. He rightly told Augustine of the latter’s grave error in interpreting Romans 5:12. Augustine used a Vetus Latina translation which probably had in quo rather than a quod clause, an error resulting in the “inheritance” view of Original Sin, an wrong view that led to even worst errors by Calvin and Luther. Thus correct translations are important. The Eastern Church has the correct view on Original Sin.

    Jerome’s translation has many mistakes, almost all of which were copied by Luther’s translation and The King Jimmy translation. Case in point: Psalm 120 (121 for Protestants and Jews), verses 1, 2. Jerome (and the others) has the help coming from “the hills”, a Canaanite pagan heresy which the psalmist might be wishing to correct. The Hebrew has the help coming from the Tetragammaton. The RSV corrects this. We still use many of Jerome’s words (“ark” rather than the literal “box” [Noah did not build a ship], “Temple” for a divine “palace”, “Revelation” for “Apocalypse”, “Transfiguration” for “Metamorphosis”, etc).

    I thank Dr Fleming for this fine series on the early Church Fathers. To date I find nothing to quibble about regarding his exegesis of these Fathers. Now the question is, What’s left of the “Great Apostasy” and the “Restorationist” view?

40. 40 Comment by robert.reavis on 16 May 2008:

    Aaron,
    Thank you for your response. My wife’s family are all German Lutherans from Iowa. The rural parish they attended as youngsters ( they are all in their 70’s and eighties now ) is still standing on a hill with a graveyard attached in the back of the church yard with the altar against the wall and the pastor offering prayers with “his back to the people” at times during the service. I have great respect for these folks but know little about Lutheran Ecclesiology. Thus my questions and thanks for your responses. Now back to the letters of Ignatius.

41. 41 Comment by T. Chan on 16 May 2008:

    The Eastern Church has the correct view on Original Sin.

    Its view on ancestral sin is not necessarily opposed to the Catholic teaching on original sin, and the Orthodox do acknowledge the reality of spiritual death and the need for God’s grace.

    Still: Council of Trent, Decree on Original Sin

42. 42 Comment by T. Chan on 16 May 2008:

    The url for the decree is not being accepted–but the text from the Council can be easily found on the website. (The link I was going to post is to the history.hanover.edu archive.)

43. 43 Comment by TJF on 16 May 2008:

    I don’t know that in every instance we can say that the 70 rabbis erred in translation, unless we have the texts from which they were translating, nor do I know how good Jerome’s knowledge of Hebrew was, since he could undoubtedly avail himself of Eastern Christians who knew the language. From one point of view, at least, to say that the writers of the NT simply used a poor version of the OT because they had it is to impugn their authority. From another, it hardly matters because what matters is what the Church has always taught and continues to teach. I am not speaking of theological quibbles but main points of doctrine. i would very much like to stay away from issues like the Reformation or the Council of Trent. We are trying to look, somewhat naively if possible, at what these texts are actually saying rather than use them as cannon fodder in sectarian wars.

    Finally, Valla was a clever man and a good Latinist, but the phony text he debunks is utterly irrelevant to the Church’s claim to secular rule in Roman-held (what we call Byzantine Italy) including Rome. This authority was 1) de facto, as the ability of the Exarch to keep order dwindled and the authority of bishops, particularly the Bishop of Rome, came in to fill the vacuum, 2) de jure at least from the time of Justinian who included the Church in his political arrangements for post-Gothic Italy, and this power was later confirmed by the so-called Donation of Pippin and the settlement made by his son Charlemagne. Like too many debunkers, Valla had set up an anti-papal straw man, easy to knock down but not at all essential.

44. 44 Comment by Sid Cundiff on 16 May 2008:

    The Council, as all Westerners, reflected the “inheritance” view. But the content of the Council’s Decree on Original Sin can be accepted without the “inheritance” error. Indeed, the Council was opposing Calvinist error of Original Sin as “total depravity”, the Lutheran error that good works before Baptism are offensive to God, the Lutheran error that Grace only covers Original Sin, not removes it, so that men remain sinful, and that He Who changes is God, not man — His view of us, not our ontological condition –, and the general Protestant error of fiducia for fides, rejecting merit de gratia, and believing, as Newman accused them, that we are justified by faith by believing in the dogma of justification by faith. In short, the Council was opposing the excesses of Protestant treatment of what was Augustine’s error in the first place. The Council’s teachings are true regardless of “inheritance” view, an issue that neither the Council nor the Protestants had at issue.

    The Eastern Church had the best Greek edition of the New Testament and thus interpreted Romans 5 correctly: Original Sin is not inherited from Adam, but entered the world as a force or power with Adam. Calvin compounded the error.

    I once heard Dr. James Patrick, College of St. Thomas More, say that in the Eastern Church, the heresies were about the identity of Christ, and in the Western about Grace.

    Had the great Augustine a better translation of Romans, or had he listened to Jerome, Augustine would never have made the error that he did.

45. 45 Comment by Sid Cundiff on 16 May 2008:

    I had written post 44 before Dr. Fleming admonition to avoid dogmatic striff. I’ll henceforth heed him.

46. 46 Comment by Aaron D. Wolf on 16 May 2008:

    Judge,

    I like that altar. Thank you for your patience with my exceedingly long ramblings.

    In a nutshell, Lutheran ecclesiology teaches that the office of bishop (as distinct from that of the presbyter) was a pious and practical development that helped to promote unity and catholicity. But it is a human institution that can be reformed. The Confessions underscore our desire to maintain the hierarchy whenever possible for the sake of unity and catholicity. The bizarre story of Lutheranism in America, which shall have to be told over bourbon (at the Summer School?) explains what happened to this provision in modern times. Yes, back to Ignatius.

    Mr. Sid,

    Augustine’s view of OS is more complex than a mere “inheritance” view—something you yourself hint at with your quo and quod. The entire human race, being seminally present in our father Adam, sinned (at least in his interpretation of “in Adam all sinned”). At any rate, that is not the view of the West. And at any rate, none of this is taken up by Ignatius, real or pseudo.

47. 47 Comment by I am not Spartacus on 16 May 2008:

    Netslang like AFAIK and smiley faces are not acceptable on this site.

    Sorry for exercising those old habits. I apologise.

    As for the preposterous notion that the selection of bishops was contingent on Rome’s approval, I should like to see some evidence that is not comprehended by AFAIK.

    What I wrote was not what I was intending. I was trying to show the primacy of Rome, vis a vis Bishops, from a very early age in the Church. Very bad memory I am afraid. I’ll be more careful in the future.

    When I went back to do some checking, I discovered the Council of Serdica, 343-344 A.D., did not have to do with Rome’s ultimate approval/disapproval of the original selection of particular Bishops but rather it dealt with disputes amongst Bishops being sorted out with authoritative decisions taken in Rome. Occasionally, Bishops deposed other Bishops and the deposed one would appeal to Rome as the authority.

    …Hosius the bishop said: It has been agreed that, if a bishop has been accused, and the assembled bishops of the same region have deposed him from his rank, and in as much as he has appealed and taken refuge with the most blessed bishop of the Roman church, and he has wished to hear him, if he thinks it is just to renew the examination of his difficulty, let him deign to write to these bishops who live in the neighboring province so that they themselves may examine carefully and with exactness each matter and declare their vote on the problem according to their pledge of truth. But if anyone should ask that his case be heard again, and by his prayer seems to move the bishop of Rome to dispatch elders from his side; what be decides is good is in the power of the bishop himself, and if he determines that it is necessary to send those who will judge with the bishops and who have the absolute authority of him by whom they were sent, this also must be granted. But if he should consider it sufficient by reason of the examination of the difficulty and the sentence of the bishop, he will do what he thinks is good according to his very wise deliberation. The bishops gave an answer. What was said was agreeable.

    From the epistle “Quod semper” by which the synod

    transmitted its acts to St. Julius] *

    57e For this will seem to be best and most fitting indeed, if the priests from each and every province refer to the head, that is, to the chair of PETER the apostle..

    The next time I will not post just based on memory.

48. 48 Comment by woodcutter on 17 May 2008:

    My heart is truly glad as I follow along with this discussion. As a simple man who has been ordained a Permanent Deacon I can tell you that discussions of this quality do not exist among the present hierarchy of priest and bishops. I continually rely on discussions and writings of the early Church Fathers and the Saints to come to correct understanding of my role in the Church and among my friends and family. The only thing I might be able to contribute to this discussion is the lack of attention to the role the Holy Spirit plays in inspiring and helping us and the Early Church in making decisions. To discern the will of God is a prayerful activity and involves the Holy Spirit. Wrong teachings and discussions will arise from such undertakings that do not involve proper discernment. I believe the people in the early Church truly understood this. Unlike today, as in our Godless secular society (even the Romans would have understood their relationship to the Gods).

    “In this connection–of those who talk a good game but do not persist in leading a life of faith–Ignatius says silence may be better than speech. Teaching is good, but only when the teacher acts on his own professions. Preaching false doctrine is worse than destroying a family (by murder or seduction, presumably), and if those who corrupt according the flesh are made to suffer, the false teacher will go into the everlasting fire. (16)”

    “those who talk a good game” and “acts on his own professions” are examples where a person in the Early Church would unquestionably discern their role in relation to God and the Holy Spirit.

    Please excuse the poor grammar. I really am a woodcutter and I was not ordained because my intellectual gifts, only by some srange movements of the Holy Spirit.

49. 49 Comment by PcH on 17 May 2008:

    Robert Reavis-

    I should apologize for writing, “Why deliberately sow discord?” back up several comments. When I was typing away, I was interrupted every few minutes by someone who needed my help, and I did not refresh the screen to see Dr. Fleming’s comment to you. Your questions were relevant. All my best to you.

50. 50 Comment by PcH on 17 May 2008:

    On the LXX:

    Someone above remarked that the LXX was a bad translation. Then Dr. Fleming stated that it must be remembered that the writers of the NT overwhelmingly quote the LXX and that we cannot impugn their authority.

    The often made statement that the LXX is a bad translation is based on the assumption that the medieval Hebrew manuscripts we have are essentially the original and that since the LXX differs markedly from them, it is flawed. However, as was also noted, Jerome’s older Hebrew base differs yet again noticeably from the medieval Masoretic, meaning that the Masoretic is not the original. The history of the LXX confirms that the Masoretic are the product of an evolving tradition, and comparison of them with the LXX shows a consistent pattern of removing Christological references. Justin Martyr records this early on and states outright that the changes in the Hebrew tradition were deliberate.

    Because the LXX most closely resembles quotations and allusions in the New Testament, the New Testament is a witness that our currently available LXX is more accurate than the Hebrew. Nontheless, the history of the LXX and other Greek Old Testaments indicate that the LXX has been changed (although to a lesser degree than the Masoretic) to conform to the evolving Hebrew manuscript tradition.

    Someone also made a reference to the LXX being Alexandrene, which seems usually a reference to the poor Alexandrene texts favored by theological liberals of the nineteenth-century German school for the New Testament. These texts are criticized not only for being outside the Majority Text of 94% of manuscripts, but also because they suggest Arian influence. However, the Alexandria of 250 BC is not be confused with the Alexandria of ca 400 AD. But all current English editions of the LXX are based on the manuscripts of the fourth century, the ones with the faulty New Testament, meaning that a more original old Greek LXX has yet to be collated and produced. When this work is done, we can expect to have a text that is even closer to the New Testament allusions and still further from the medieval (ca 1000 AD) Hebrew.

51. 51 Comment by C. Edward on 17 May 2008:

    Amen to Woodcutters comments at 48. The Holy Spirit works in us, the Body of Christ, (see I Cor 12) and gives wisdom, insight and discernment. I appreciate the discussions I am reading here and eventhough there are differing views of the early Fathers writings there is still a commonality of understanding “most” of what was written. As noted these men were daily dependent on the leading of the Holy Spirit the Apostles teaching and the Word such as they had it. Even in difficult circumstance the supernatural love of Christ and a deep humility shines through.

52. 52 Comment by Sid Cundiff on 18 May 2008:

    In reply to PcH, when the earliest OT text that we had, the Leningrad text, now in the British Museum, about AD 1000, was compared with the Qumran documents of the OT from a 1000 years earlier, the consonants were identical. The rabbis were very careful about their texts, so sacred was The Word. They even copied faithfully what are clearly scribal errors, the most famous of which is the position of Job 31, 38-40. When such an error was copied, the rabbis wrote their correction only in the margin. Vowel points, of course are another matter, and were available neither to Jerome nor the LXX, and are truly Medieval. There is no evidence of the Rabbis tampering with the text, except for a possible change Job 2:9. (The MT has “bless God”. ) See the Stuttgartensia on all of this. (my edition is 1981). PcH needs to quote his sources that say or prove such putative rabbinical tampering for the purpose of attacking Christians.

    The earliest LXX MS that we have is the Codex Vaticanus and the Codex Sinaiticus from the AD fourth century. There are of course scraps of the LXX that are earlier. I know of no effort issue an new edition of the LXX based on these scraps. The Göttingen series <i<Septuaginta, the critical edition, has many of the scraps . The LXX was written in Alexandria. It was used in the Diaspora. In Palestine, the Targum was used. See Karen Jobes Invitation to the Septuagint, London: 2000, the standard introductory work.

    As the Rabbis were careful with the Tanakh, so Christians were careless with the NT. An examination of the question will show text variations for almost every verse in the NT. So a modern Greek NT is really the judgement of text-critical scholars as to the best text. Take a look at the standard critical edition, The Greek New Testament, Kurt Aland et al. (mine is from 1983), and notice the text variations that are just the major ones. The list of Mss and parchment scraps is included in this edition. See also the exhaustive work of Bruce M. Metzger. When the first historical-critical text study was done in the 18th C, some pious folk were upset when their favorite Bible verses began to fall apart. There is a reason for Christian carelessness with their scripture. Scripture just wasn’t that important to early Christian; the liturgy and the visible Church was more important, as we have seen in Clement and Ignatius. Sola Scriptura isn’t an early Christian principle. It’s not even a Tannaitic one. After the Marcion heresy, Christians got a bit more careful.

53. 53 Comment by PcH on 18 May 2008:

    Dear Mr. Cundiff,

    One irony of the post-Christian approach to the Bible is that the Alexandrene manuscripts mentioned above are the only ones permitted for the NT because they are “the oldest,” but the same manuscripts are forbidden to be used for the OT in favor of manuscripts which are more than 600 years newer. This is a glaring inconsistency. The former proscription is the more disturbing since more than 94% of all NT manuscripts agree precisely.

    In reply to PcH, when the earliest OT text that we had, the Leningrad text, now in the British Museum, about AD 1000, was compared with the Qumran documents of the OT from a 1000 years earlier, the consonants were identical.

    Identical to what? The readings taped together from the fragments and scraps of Qumram manuscripts differ widely among themselves and favor the ancient Septuagint over the medieval Masoretic. Weblinks are not the convention here, but you can easily find this analyzed by doing a search for ” grant septuagint ” and click on the site entitled “Notes on the Septuagint.”

    The rabbis were very careful about their texts, so sacred was The Word.

    Legend and fable are colorful and lovely but not very useful when empirical data such as the above and below contradict them.

    Since you mention Jobes and Silva, let us have a look on what they actually say.

    When Christianity spread outside the borders of Palestine, it was apparently the Greek version of the Jewish scriptures from which the Apostles, especially Paul, preached Christ. It is usually said that the resulting tension bewtween Christians and Jews… was the primary reason that the synagogue abandoned the Septuagint (38).

    Dr. Fleming is correct. A quick look at “Notes on the Septuagint” more emphatically demonstrates that the NT overwhelmingly quotes the LXX and a closer look demonstrates exclusivity. ON the same page they indicate the now lost Hebrew texts that form the basis for the medieval Masoretic were not standardized until 200 years after Christ, so any carefulness “about their texts” can only apply to after ca 1000 AD.

    The Septuagint was the only translation of the whole Bible produced prior to the standardization of the pre-Masoretic text… the Hebrew manuscript used for the Septuagint is more than one thousand years older than the oldest Masoretic manuscript available to us and at least five hundred years older than the “rabbinic standardization of the text,” and thus the Septuagint can be used to reconstruct the original Hebrew text. (148)

    That Midrashic rewriting of the biblical text is a distinctively Jewish technique suggests that the longer pluses and minuses that exist only in the Greek biblical texts were introduced by Greek-speaking Jewish revisers. (294)

    On pages 82-83 they remind us of St. Justin Martyr’s testimony that non-Christians obviously deleted portions of the OT, such as references to the resurrection, the virgin birth, the heavenly standing of Christ, etc, and all this can be easily verified at CCEL in his letters to Trypho. See also St. Augustin’s quite loud denunciations of Jerome in his letters also at CCEL.

    In regard to Qumram, on page 281, Jobes and Silva clearly state that the Judean desert material proves there were many Hebrew versions used at any one time.

    So much for Codex leningradensis ca 1000 AD being the original text!

    As to the allegation that Christians are incompetent copyists, I repeat that 94% of all manuscripts of the NT agree with precision and as an example of the textual work in that regard I give an example quote from a mailing from Wilbur Pickering, PhD:

    Down with canards! In graduate school (theology) I was taught that no two MSS of the NT are identical in text. If we consider a book at a time, which I take to be the only reasonable demand, the statement is not true… the care with which the monks did their work is impressive. I invite all who read this to join me in exposing this canard.

    Stricly speaking, the NT is here off-topic, so the above is brief. To oversimplify, Dr. Pickering has collated all available manuscripts for a number of books and found that all in the Majority textual family are word-for-word identical, or differ in one letter, breathing mark, or other such trivia. Search ” pickering walkinhiscommandments .”

54. 54 Comment by robert m. peters on 18 May 2008:

    PcH,

    Your posts at 50 and 53.

    I was in a “discussion” over this very topic about two three hours ago at church; how I wish I had had the facts as you have marshaled them in the two posts! You have given an excellent overview of the issue.

55. 55 Comment by TJF on 19 May 2008:

    I’ll try to keep this simple. I don’t think a proper discussion of textual questions can be carried out except by people who have throughly learned the languages in question and studied paleography and textual traditions. I have hardly done much more than crack open a Hebrew grammar, and anything I have to say on the question of Hebrew mss. would amount to selective quotation from people I agree with. On the case of the NT, I do not regard myself as an expert scholar, though I am confident of knowing more Greek than most people who claim to be NT scholars. I once tried to get up to speed on the text of the NT, but that was long ago. One thing I can say is that the textual tradition of the NT presents few problems when compared with the text of, say, Aeschylus or of most classical writers. The differences are mostly trivial, though there are a few serious questions. To make a proper comparison of the two ms. traditions, one would have to take so many things into account–number and age of mss., circumstances under which they were written, etc., that the whole thing would quickly become moot. Unless there are Hebrew scholars and text critics writing in, I would rather not take up these questions. Let me insert a paragraph from a noted Protestant scholar who praises the purity of the OT text but points out the percentage of variation:

    “Dr. Robert Dick Wilson has pointed out that there are about 284,000,000 letters in the manuscripts considered by Kennicott and that among these manuscripts there are about 900,000 variants, approximately 750,000 of which are the quite trivial variation of w and y. 4 There is, Dr. Wilson remarks, only about one variant for 316 letters and apart from the insignificant w and y variation only about one variant for 1580 letters. The variants for the most part are supported by only one or by only a few of the manuscripts. Dr. Wilson has elsewhere said that there are hardly any variant readings in these manuscripts with the support of more than one out of the 200 to 400 manuscripts in which each book is found, except in the full and defective writing of the vowels, a matter which has no bearing on either the pronunciation or the meaning of the text.

    His last point is not, perhaps, unchallengeable if we look backwards into the prehistory of the text, since we cannot know if in every instance the scribes who inserted the vowel signs were correct. The relationship with the Septuagint text remains a matter of controversy, and while many or most scholars think the LXX text has errors which derive from the lack of vowels in their Hebrew texts, others have drawn different conclusions. But, the larger issue and far more important is the inclusion in the LXX of texts that seem to point the way to Christ. The elimination of these texts during the Reformation would seem to be an error arising from the Judaizing tendencies of some, though by no means all the Reformers. This is question for Aaron Wolf.

56. 56 Comment by Sid Cundiff on 19 May 2008:

    Until we have a MS of the Tanakh from the period of the writing of the LXX, we cannot say if the LXX reflects a better, more authentic translation, and to say othewise is to make an argument from silence. What we can do is compare the LXX to the Qumran documents (which include the entire text of Isaiah). (I have never said the Leningrad is the oldest text.) Then we can compare the Qumran Isaiah with the Leningrad. The consonants are almost identical. (If the MT vowel points reflect the ancient use is another matter.) It is therefore not unreasonable to think that the rabbinical tradition preserved the consonants of the text rather well. The question is when this stabilization of the text took place. Probably no later than the council of Jamnia, and Qumran suggest earlier.

    If it is true that Qumran used a variety of differing texts for the Tanakh, then it would seem possible also for the translators for the LXX. The LXX itself has many versions and variations, as the Goettingen critical text shows. It too has to be pieced together by text critical scholars, whose work is often “best guess”.

    And it most probable that the first Christians, Our Lord and the Twelve, used the Targum for the Tanakh, not the LXX.

    As for the NT texts being 97% identical, here one throws up one’s hands. Even a cursory glance at the Aland proves otherwise. We have in fact two versions of Luke. Romans has all kinds of textual problems. II Corinthians might be more than one letter. The first chapter of the Gospel of John is a text-critical nightmare, and various denominations and sects have used various Mss for their theological struggles.

    More importantly,for cultic/liturgical religions (Temple Israel, early Christianity, Catholic Christianity, Orthodox Christianity, etc), Scripture serves the cultus, not vice versa. The Bible’s home is the Mass and the Divine Office. It is Islam, Protestantism, and post A.D. 70 Rabbinical Judaism where the text and its study assumes the supreme, if not sole, position. So I really don’t worry about Scripture, and leave it to text-critical scholars to put together the best text.

57. 57 Comment by Sid Cundiff on 19 May 2008:

    Since the topic is Ignatius, his comments in the Letter to the Philadelphians #8,2, might be germane to the discussion of the role of Scripture in the early church, and I look forward to Dr. Fleming’s interpretation. I am aware that there is much controversy among scholars about this passage. Is the Greek “archeious” or “archaious”? Does it refer to the OT, or the NT, or just “official records”?

    And I look forward to Dr. Fleming’s remarks on Ignatius’ Letter to the Romans, at the beginning, stating Rome holds the presidency “in the place of the countryof the Romans”, en topo chorion Romaion. Does it mean a presidency that is held only in the country of the Romans and no place else? Or does it mean Rome holds the presidency everywhere and just happens to be located in the country of the Romans?

    I thank PcH for his contributions, however we might disagree on the matter of the LXX as translation.

58. 58 Comment by TJF on 19 May 2008:

    Please, please, please. This is not the proper forum nor are our discussants the proper people to carry on a discussion of textual history. As for what texts were used by Christ and his disciples, it is entirely wrong to use phrases like ” probable” when in fact we know nothing apart from the written texts we have. Any attempt to import historical conjectures into the Sacred Tradition is a grave mistake. And, LET REPEAT THIS IN BOLD ENOUGH LETTERS THAT EVERYONE MAY READ THEM: MOST OF THE VARIANTS IN THE NT ARE TRIVIAL, AND HARDLY ANY CAN BE TWISTED TO SERVE A DOCTRINAL ARGUMENT.

59. 59 Comment by robert.reavis on 19 May 2008:

    Sid and PcH,
    I admire your interest and learning and perhaps even your stubborn willingness to continue to debate these textual issues in the face of requests to wait for a better time and place. But if we are going to take this meandering trail as a way back to the discussion of the early fathers let us put it in all perspective.
    ”
    [edit] (i) The Biblical Attack
    The origin of the Biblical attack is familiar to all, simpler, and much easier to account for than are most extravagances in religion.

    From its origins, the Catholic Church had adopted Holy Writ as the Inspired Word of God. It began by accepting the traditional Hebrew Books because Our Lord had appealed to their authority and had sanctioned it, because they led up to His Incarnation and Messianic Mission, because the first witnesses to His Miracles, His Resurrection and His own claim to the Godhead were steeped in, and appealed to, those Books; but above all because She, the Church, who knew herself to be the divinely appointed judge of Truth, recognized the sanctity of this scriptural inheritance and confirmed it.

    The decision of the Church to stand by the Jewish Scriptures was not maintained without difficulty. The documents were alien to that glorious civilization of the Mediterranean which the Church penetrated and transformed. Their diction was, in its ears, uncouth and irrational. The deeds they recounted (with approval) sounded barbaric and often absurd: taken as moral examples, some were found repulsive, others puerile: and the whole was of another and (to Greek and Roman) lesser and more degraded world. We have remaining echoes of the reaction against them including the fury of those heretics who ascribed them to the Devil; and even after they had been flooding Christian study for nearly four hundred years you may find such an ardent follower of them as St. Augustine confessing that they had disgusted his cultivated taste and that their alien style had presented for him an abject contrast to the noble tradition of classical letters.

    But the Church firmly maintained their supernatural value and revered them as Divine Oracles bearing testimony to Her Founder. She did not indeed accept them of themselves. Of themselves they would not have concerned her. As law they were superseded. But they introduced and pointed to the Divine Event whence She sprang, and as such were sanctified.

    The Church added to the Canon further books which were of greater moment, for these were not adumbrations and forerunners but records of the essential doctrines whereon She was founded. The precepts of Our Lord Himself as collected by His companions and their immediate associates, the chief events of His Mission, His Passion, His Rising from the Dead, the inward meaning of all this as He revealed it to the Apostolic group whom He had chosen (and in particular to St. John) these formed the Gospels of the Church: Her new and good tidings for men. These stood unique and on a different plane from aught else in the collection. To them were added the letters and exhortations written by the first propagators of the Faith and their successors, as also apocalyptic and symbolic treatises.

    The process of deciding what among the books read in the Churches should be admitted as inspired was long. There was a sifting of the older Hebrew books, which left some of them outside the Canon; of the newer Christian books, which excluded some of these also (as the Epistles of Clement, the Shepherd of Hermas). By the fourth and fifth centuries the thing was fixed. Its original Greek version in the East, its Latin translation in the West, had reached final form and Europe was henceforward in possession of the Holy Bible preserved and imposed by the Authority of the Catholic Church.

    The living voice of the Church must obviously be the organ of doctrine, and tradition its main support. But the Church also persistently maintained the parallel authority of Scripture. Doctrine was confirmed by quotation from it and a ceaseless appeal was made throughout the centuries to the written text of the Canon. Though no Bible had existed, the Church would have sufficed to give her own witness to truth: but to the Bible, Her book, She perpetually referred. Thus the Primacy of Peter was amply founded in an unbroken acceptance of the doctrine: but She emphasized the Petrine texts and has engraved them on Her central shrine at Rome. The dogma of the Eucharist is Hers to affirm and define: but She also sends Her adherents, as well as Her opponents, to excerpts from the Gospel accounts of the Last Supper.”

    Now understanding this let us can we please go back to the text of the Early fathers and the Christian Tradition in the broadest sense of that “Thing.”

60. 60 Comment by Aaron D. Wolf on 19 May 2008:

    I would very much like to stay away from issues like the Reformation or the Council of Trent. We are trying to look, somewhat naively if possible, at what these texts are actually saying rather than use them as cannon fodder in sectarian wars. . . .

    I’m tryin’ . . .

    The elimination of these texts during the Reformation would seem to be an error arising from the Judaizing tendencies of some, though by no means all the Reformers.

    It would seem so, at least to some Roman Catholics who have preconceived ideologies (“Judaizing tendencies”) about the theological clarifications of “the Reformation.” We can say that these were the “tendencies of some, though by no means all the Reformers,” but I’m not sure what that means practically, in this context. After all, Luther held that the books called Apocrypha by Jerome are “not regarded equal to Holy Scripture and yet useful and good to read.” In this context, that would damn Luther as one of those with “Judaizing tendencies,” so I’m not sure who would be left on the “by no means all” list. (More on this in a minute.)

    We aren’t really talking about anyone’s hatred or rejection of the LXX text of the undisputed books of the Old Testament Canon. After all, the Vulgate that was itself canonized at Trent comprised Jerome’s translation from Hebrew (save for the Psalms and the Apocrypha). What we seem to be criticizing is the exclusion from the canon of those books called Apocrypha, which is seen as a natural result of preferring Hebrew to every word of whatever LXX tradition was in hand at the time of the Reformation.

    It is said that to give any lesser regard to the books called Apocrypha is somehow to disrespect the authority of the apostles who cited them (a handful of times). This argument does not hold water. St. Jude (14-16) quotes not the Apocrypha but what both Rome and Protestants recognize as pseudepigrapha. (See Enoch 1:9.) In fact, St. Jude’s citation is virtually word for word, whereas the other few “citations” of the Apocrypha seem more like allusions. In no case in which the Apocrypha is referenced does the NT writer lend the authority of “it is written.”

    Some suggest that Protestants feel compelled to reject the Apocrypha because they fear the text of 2 Maccabees, which supposedly supports Purgatory. Second Maccabees tells of Judas and his men burying the pagans they had slaughtered, under whose robes were found idols. This does not jibe with any Roman understanding of purgatory. Nor do I think that any Roman Catholic would have such Judaizing tendencies as to endorse everything the Judas “The Hammer” did, simply because it is recorded.

    It is said that the books called Apocrypha should not be excluded because they point the way to Christ. Probably not Bel and the Dragon. But certainly, this is true of Sirach/Wisdom/Ecclesiasticus. Most of the allusions or citations of “the Apocrypha” in the NT are from Wisdom, which is also treasured by the Fathers. Lutherans love Wisdom—it is oft cited by our Confessors and by our theologians, including the great Gerhard. So great do we love Sirach that even one of our most popularly recognized (see Garrison Keillor) Lutheran hymns, “Now Thank We All Our God,” is based on Sirach 50:22-24! The Lutheran Confessions do not, in fact, say anything about the canonicity of the “Apocrypha.”

    How can we love something that we do not regard as on the same level as the “undisputed” Old Testament? We could ask Jerome, Origen, and Eusebius.

    Or (hat tip to Fr. Weedon) we could ask St. Gregory of Nazianzus, who wrote (On God and Man) concerning books outside of the “Protestant/Jewish canon”: “If there is anything else besides these, it is not among the genuine.”

    Or Athanasius, who wrote of the canon he lists in Festal Letter 39: “These are fountains of salvation, that they who thirst may be satisfied with the living words they contain. In these alone is proclaimed the doctrine of godliness. Let no man add to these, neither let him take ought from these.” What books did he list? Those of the “Jewish” canon.

    Athanasius goes on: “[T]here are other books besides these not indeed included in the Canon, but appointed by the Fathers to be read by those who newly join us, and who wish for instruction in the word of godliness. The Wisdom of Solomon, and the Wisdom of Sirach, and Esther, and Judith, and Tobit, and that which is called the Teaching of the Apostles, and the Shepherd. But the former, my brethren, are included in the Canon, the latter being [merely] read . . . ”

    That is, in a nutshell, what Luther said about them, and that is why he included them in his German translation of the Bible. The KJV had them as well. In fact, all “Protestant” Bibles had them until the 1820’s. Thus, they were not “eliminated by the Reformation,” but simply regarded in the same way that many others of good repute regarded them.

61. 61 Comment by Aaron D. Wolf on 19 May 2008:

    Speaking of Augustine’s conflict with Jerome regarding the usefulness of translating the Hebrew . . .

    It is certainly true that Augustine criticized Jerome for daring to go outside of the LXX for the Old Testament. Later, in City of God, however, after Jerome’s work had been circulated, Augustine’s views are more nuanced, as evidenced in Book XVIII, Chapter 43 and following. “Our times, however, have enjoyed the advantage of the presbyter Jerome, a man most learned, and skilled in all three languages, who translated these same Scriptures into the Latin speech, not from the Greek, but from the Hebrew.”

    Now clearly, Augustine still prefers the Septuagint, but now he finds that BOTH traditions have authority:

    “[I]f anything is in the Hebrew copies and is not in the version of the Seventy, the Spirit of God did not choose to say it through them, but only through the prophets. But whatever is in the Septuagint and not in the Hebrew copies, the same Spirit chose rather to say through the latter, thus showing that both were prophets. For in that manner He spoke as He chose, some things through Isaiah, some through Jeremiah, some through several prophets, or else the same thing through this prophet and through that. Further, whatever is found in both editions, that one and the same Spirit willed to say through both . . .”

62. 62 Comment by Sid Cundiff on 19 May 2008:

    My knowledge of these matters, including what follows, is fallible.

    The canon of the Tanakh for Jews (and thus the OT canon for Protestants) was establish finally at the Council of Jamnia, which met in the decades after the destruction of the 2nd Temple in aD 70. That destruction marked the shift in Judaism from a cultic religion to a scriptural one. It is relevant to our discussion of the early Fathers because it is contemporary with them.

    The rabbis at the Council decided the canon following three rules:

    1. A book of the canon had to come from prophecy, at least prophecy as the Rabbi’s understood it.

    2. A book had to be written before 167 BC, the year Antiochus IV Epiphanes desecrated the Temple, and thus when, for Jews, prophecy stopped. (Thus the appearance of the Baptist, dressed as Elijah, was considered remarkable.)

    3. A book had to be written in Hebrew, and available to the Rabbis in a Hebrew text. Thus the entire LXX was rejected by the Rabbis as authoritative, and those books in the LXX that had no Hebrew equivalent became the so-call “Apocrypha”. (Those books of the “Apocrypha” that are in the Catholic Bible are called “Deuterocanonical”.) It should be added that some of these books that the rabbi’s tossed out have now been found in Hebrew. With the decision of the Council, Hebrew became the language for Jews even in the Diaspora.

    NONE of these three principles are Christian principles for the canon. Why the reformers chose the Jamina canon, or questions about the Reformation in general, Dr. Fleming has asked us to avoid.

    The council also issued the notorious Birkat ha-Minim, a curse upon Christians and other perceived heretics, that was included in the synagogue service. With this curse, it became impossible for Jewish Christians to be both Jewish and Christian. Thus there was a final break between the two religions. And thus the early church Fathers no longer needed to appeal to Jews, unlike Paul in Romans chaps 9-11, written c. a.D. 53-55 . Luke makes a veiled reference to the Birkat (“you will be expelled from the synagogues”) suggesting his composition is contemporary with the Birkat. The final redaction of John’s gospel might reflect the post aD 70 Jewish-Christian break. Given Ignatius’ location, the Birkat would likely be known to him. I wonder if the effects of the Birkat among Christians is reflected in the Letter to the Magnesians 8,1; 10,3; 11; and to the Philadelphians, 8,2.

    By the way, the Birkat remained part of the synagogue service until the Medieval period, when Christians forced Jews to eliminate it. Then with Innocent III’s Constitution Licet perfidia Judaeorum, D772-773, the “Magna Charta of toleration for Jews”, Jewish Christian relations improved. May they continue to do so.

    I thank PcH and Dr. Wolf. I’ve learned something from them.

63. 63 Comment by Clyde N. Wilson on 19 May 2008:

    Jesus Himself shall thank you Thomas!

    Clyde

64. 64 Comment by PcH on 20 May 2008:

    Robert M. Peters and Sid Cundiff:

    Thanks for the compliments. People here sure are nice.