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THE MINISTRY

CHRISTIAN CHURCH

THE MINISTRY

OF THE

CHRISTIAN CHURCH

CHARLES GORE, M.A.

PRINCIPAL OF THE PUSEY HOUSB ; FELLOW OF TRINITY COLLEGE, OXFORD
AND EXAMINING CHAPLAIN TO THE LORD BISHOP OF LINCOLN

SECOND EDITION

JAMES POTT & CO.

14 AND l6 ASTOR PLACE

gorfe
1889

PREFACE.

THERE are two large questions having reference to Christianity
which it is important to keep distinct. There is the question ./, &gt;&lt;/

whether Christianity is true, and there is the question what,
as a fact in history, Christianity has been ? It is an indis
pensable preliminary to all effective dealings with the practical
problems, which arise in the attempt to apply and adapt
Christianity to current needs and circumstances, that we
should study profoundly the genius of Christianity as a con
tinuous historical fact that we should have a clear answer to
the question, what Christianity has been and is. This book,
then (assuming broadly the truth of Christianity), attempts to
give a partial answer to this second question. It maintains
that Christianity is essentially the life of an actual visible
society, and that at least one necessary link of connection in
this society is the apostolic succession of the ministry. In a

. ; J ,..-&lt; 4*.

word, this book claims on behalf of the apostolic succession
that it must be reckoned with as a permanent and essential

element of Christianity. It is an apology for the principle
of the apostolic succession.

As being an apology for one clause in the Church s prac
tical and theoretical creed, it will be subject to the usual
suspicions of prejudice and want of free criticism to which
apologetic literature is exposed, and from which the literature

vi Preface.

of free thought is supposed to be by comparison exempt.
But it is, perhaps, only while we are very young that we are
inclined to believe dissent from orthodox conclusions to afford
any guarantee for a just and critical judgment; in fact, the
ambition to form or propagate a new theory gives as strong a
bias to the mind as the desire to maintain an old one. At any
rate, I have tried to do with my prejudices all that a man can
do with those inevitable accompaniments alike of his birth into
a continuous society and of the first activities of his own
individuality ; I have tried to subject them to an exact and free
examination in the light of reason and history, and to let it
correct or verify them.

A word must be said in explanation of the order and con
tents of this book. The principle of the apostolic succession
has been a formative principle in church history. It seemed,
therefore, the best course, after making good the preliminary
grounds of this investigation (chap, i), and explaining the idea
of the ministry (chap, u), to exhibit the extent to which in
church history the principle of the apostolic succession has
been postulated and acted upon since the time when the con
tinuous record begins i.e. the latter half of the second century
(chap. in). The principle is then examined in the light of the
Gospels (chap, iv), of the apostolic documents (chap, v), and
of the links of evidence which connect the apostolic age with
the continuous history (chap. vi). After this nothing remains
but to draw conclusions and make applications (chap. vn).
This order treats the question What has the Church in fact
believed about her ministry ? as a preliminary to the investi
gation of her title-deeds, and it was hardly possible for the
present writer to treat the question in any other order.
Whether or no Mi 1 . Darwin is ricrht in maintaining; " that the

Preface. vii

only object in writing a book is a proof of earnestness, and
that you do not form your opinions without undergoing
labour" (Life and Letters, i. p. 334), it is, at any rate, true
that a book had better represent that process of labour by
which its writer s opinions have in fact been formed.

The purpose of this book not being primarily or simply
archaeological, it has been possible to leave out of discussion
a good many elements in the history of the ministry which do
not, or so far as they do not, affect the principle. It has been
necessary to deal largely in quotations from ancient authors,
but it has been possible to omit almost all that bears, e.g. upon
the growth of the metropolitan and patriarchal systems, the
relations of the later episcopate to secular society, the history
of ecclesiastical discipline or canon law in detail. On all these
subjects the student will find a great deal of very valuable
material in Dr. Hatch s published works, and in his articles in
the Dictionary of Christian Antiquities. I very much regret
that what seems to me his extraordinary, his most unhistorical,
under-estimate of the permanent element of belief and practice
in the Christian Church has led to his being mentioned in
these pages generally with criticism. I also regret that I had
not read till it was too late his article on Paul the Apostle, in
the Encyclopedia Britannica, vol. xviii. If I had done so, I
could not have complained, as I have in reference to his
Bampton Lectures, of his not plainly stating his position as
to certain disputed New Testament documents. In that
article he speaks of the Pastoral Epistles as " probably even
less defensible," i.e. from the point of view of authenticity,
than those to the Ephesians and Colossians (p. 422, col. 2 ; cf.
also the remark at the head of the column on the Acts of the
Apostles). I might also have noticed that he had already

viii Preface.

(Diet. Chr. Ant. ii. p. 1481) spoken of the Epistle of Polycarp
as " almost contemporary " with the Pastoral Epistles.

I had intended to conclude this book with a discussion of
the validity of the episcopal succession in the English Church,
but it has seemed better to reserve this, appealing as it would
to a different class of readers, for another opportunity.

It remains for me only to express my gratitude for advice
and help given me by my friend the Kev. Dr. Paget, and my
colleague the Eev. F. E. Brightman but especially I have to
thank another colleague, Mr. R. B. Eackham, who has given
ungrudging and continuous labour to preparing this book for
publication, and rescuing it from many mistakes. He has also
compiled the Table of Contents and the Index of Authors,
etc., which will, I hope, render the book more useful for refer
ence. Vallarsius edition of Jerome has been used throughout,
and Hartel s Cyprian, which however follows the Oxford
edition in the numbering of the Epistles.

PUSEY HOUSE,
St. Peter s Day, 18S8.

PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION.

IF there are almost uo alterations, except verbal corrections,
in this Edition, it is not because I have not received valuable
suggestions. For instance, I have been advised to enlarge
the argument on pp. 34-36, as to the fundamental indepen
dence of the Church and the Collegia, and in doing so I should
have had an opportunity of noticing Professor Kamsay s
remarks in the Expositor of Dec. 1888, pp. 415 ff., on the
use to which he supposes the Church in Phrygia to have put
the guild organization, for purposes of concealment. But I
have thought that I should do better to wait, before acting
on any suggestions that I have received, till I have had the
advantage of more criticisms, and till I can myself consider
matters again with a fresher mind. Meanwhile, there are
three points confirmatory of my argument, by mentioning
which, I may perhaps forestall criticism.

1. The newly discovered writings of the Spaniard Priscillian 1
give us, as the sentiment of bishops contemporary with him
in Spain, about A.D. 380, a view of the consecration and election
of bishops, which falls in with the argument of pp. 100 ff. ;
"Kescribitur . . . sicut dedicationem sacerdotis in sacerdote,
sic electionem consistere petitionis in plebe" (Tract, ii. p. 40).
The context makes the meaning tolerably plain, viz. that it
belongs to a bishop to consecrate a bishop, but to the people
to choose and ask for him.

1 Just edited by their discoverer, Georg Schepps, in the Vienna Corona
Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum.

x Preface to the Second Edition.

2. Dr. Salmon has kindly pointed out to me that the argu
ment about Colluthus on p. 139 admits of being strengthened
by calling attention to the fact that Colluthus claimed to be
a bishop when he ordained. This appears in the letter of
the Mareotic clergy, quoted by Athanasius, Apol. c. Ar. c. 76 :
"He [Ischyras] was appointed by Colluthus, the presbyter
who pretended to the episcopate and was afterwards ordered
by the synod of Hosius, and the bishops with him, to be a
presbyter as he was before." Thus Colluthus did not even
claim to ordain as a presbyter.

3. Besides that mentioned on p. 371 of this book, there is
another Syriac version of the Canons of Ancyra given by
Cardinal Pitrain Analecta Sacra Spicilegio Solesmensi iv. 219.
The 13th canon in this version is, I am told, inaccurately
rendered by the Abb6 Martin (p. 447). Translated literally
it runs thus : " To chorepiscopi it is not allowed that they
should ordain [make ordination] priests and deacons : but
again also not that they should consecrate priests of the city,
without the permission of the bishop with writings in every
one place." I am informed that there is no doubt that
priests of the city must be the object of the verb conse
crate and not its subject, i.e. that it represents Trpea-ftvTepov?
not Trpeafivrepois. This information I owe to Mr. C. H. Turner
of St. John s College, Oxford.

C. G.

Epiphany, 1SS9.

CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I. THE FOUNDATION OF THE CHURCH.

PAGE

Preliminary assumptions

(1) The genuineness of New Testament documents . 1

(2) The truth of the Incarnation ... 6

Preliminary inquiry : Did Christ found a visible Church ? . 9

The reasonableness of the idea in itself . . 9

(1) Witness of the early Christian belief in a visible

Church ...... 12

(unanimous in spite of differences in point of view) 1 3
in the West Tertullian, Cyprian, Irenaeus,
(holding nulla sal us extra ecclesiam together
with belief in God s wider dealings), the
Roman Church . . . .13

in the East Ignatius, Alexandrian writers . 23

the Apologists Aristides, Justin, Theophilus . 28

confirmed by the pagan conception of Christianity 30

(2) The social form of Christianity not due to the

secular influence of the collegia, for . . 31

(a) Christian writers show no trace of such

influence .... 34

(b) Christian terminology was derived from

Judaism . . . . .35

(3) Witness of the New Testament . . .36

(a) The Gospels

(i) Christ s method, . . 37

(ii) His institution of social sacraments 40

xii Contents.

PAOR

(iii) His Messianic claim . . .41

(relation of the Church to the kingdom of God ) 42
(the Church not exclusive, though it makes an

exclusive claim) . .44

(b) The Acts .... 45

This doctrine is not inconsistent with the doctrines of faith

and liberty ...... 49

but agreeable to the principle of all human society . 51
(Heaven in the Apocalypse a city) . . .52

Two misconceptions as to the origin of the visible Church

(1) That it arose out of a previous condition of in

dividualism . . . . .52

(2) That it was due to Roman influence : difference

between the Roman and Catholic conceptions

of church unity . . . . .56

Notes on The idea of an invisible Church pp. 19, 49.

CH. II. APOSTOLIC SUCCESSION.

The method of the inquiry . . . .65

The principle of Apostolic Succession expounded . . 69

It corresponds to the Incarnation, Sacraments, etc. . 71
The principle more important than the form in which

it is embodied . . . . .72

Its importance as

(a) a bond of union for a universal spiritual society 76

(b) emphasizing men s dependence on God s gifts . 77

Answers to objections that

(1) It is sacerdotal : true and false sacerdotalism . 83

(2) Unspiritual men are thus made to mediate spiri

tual gifts : distinction of character and office . 95

Contents. xiii

PACE

(3) It is opposed to liberty : but liberty is opposed

to absolutism, not to authority ; the Church not

at first or necessarily an imperialist institution . 97

(4) It cannot be true in fact : this objection not tenable 107

(5) It unchurches presbyterian bodies : but results

must not prevent our facing principles . 109

Note on Morinus de sacris ordinalionibus . p. 68
Sacramental teaching of the early Fathers 79
Doctrine of lay-priesthood in catholic theology 89

CH. III. THE WITNESS OF CHUECH HISTORY.

Church history bears witness to certain fixed principles
1. The principle of apostolic succession through the
episcopate (with the requirement for the ministry
of episcopal ordination) . . . .116

appealed to by Irenaeus . . . .116

accepted by Tertullian . , . .125

anticipated by Hegesippus . . . .127

A. Further evidence for the East

The episcopal successions

in Palestine, Syria, Asia, Greece, Macedonia,

Thrace, Crete . . . .128

the supposed exceptional constitution of the

Alexandrian Church . ,, . . 134

(a) very doubtful in fact . . .138

(6) not opposed to the principle of succession 142
The conception of the ministry in

(i) liturgical writings V Xp NVJW^ 144
(ii) canons of councils k & uioitoi . 152
(iii) Greek Fathers Athanasius, Gregory

Nazianzen, Chrysostom, Epiphanius . 154

B. Further evidence for the West

The episcopal successions undoubted - 1 V" . 161

xiv Contents.

PAGE

The conception of the ministry in

(i) Latin Fathers Cyprian, Lucifer, writers
who minimize the distinction of bishop
and presbyter, i.e. Ambrosiaster, Jerome,
etc. . . . . .164

(ii) canons of councils . . . 176

(iii) liturgies . . . . .177

2. Ordination was regarded sacramentally . . 183

and conferred by laying-on of hands . .185

3. It was believed to impose an indelible character 187

though the distinction of valid and canonical

was slowly formulated . . .191

4. The conception of the ministry from the first in

volved a sacerdotal principle, though the use of
sacerdotal terms was of gradual growth . 196

5. The ministry possessed exclusive powers, e.g. only

a priest could celebrate the Eucharist . . 200

Tertullian s statement to the contrary due to

Montanist views .... 204

Montanism its characteristics . . 207

not a conservative movement . 211

Summary ...... 213

Note on The conception of tlie ministry in tJie Clementines p. 1 30
Clem. Alex. 135

,, Origen . 140

The language of Firmilian . . .155

The early Irish episcopate . . .162

One bishop in a community . . .165

The primacy of Peter s see . . .169

Functions of the presbyterate . . .181

Morinus on the tradition of the instruments . 186
Signification of laying-on of hands . .187

Eeordination . . pp. 189, 192, 193

Sources of sacerdotal language . .199

Contents. xv

CH. IV. THE INSTITUTION OF THE APOSTOLATE.

PAGE

The postulates of church history to be verified by an

appeal to Christ s intention . . . .216

The Gospels generally suggest the institution of a per
manent apostolate . . . . .219
especially in the commissions to

(1) St. Peter his relation to (a) the other Apostles,

(6) the whole Church . . . .222

(2) All the Apostles after the resurrection . .226

(the commission in St. John xx to the Apostles

rather than the whole Church) . .229

Note on Sacrificial aspect of the Eucharist p. 226

CH. V. THE MINISTRY IN THE APOSTOLIC AGE.

Evidence of St. Paul s Epistles :

(a) The office of an apostle . . . .231

(6) The Church an organism with differentiated gifts

and functions . . . . .238

Cc) The Pastoral Epistles their importance ; they show 242

(1) a ministry of presbyter-bishops and deacons,

not the chief ministry . . .244

(ii) an extension of the apostolate to apostolic

men ... .246

(iii) St. Paul s idea of ordination by the laying-

on of hands .... 249

Evidence of the other Epistles . . . .251

Evidence of the Acts :

(a) The apostolate ..... 253
(6) A ministry of prophets and teachers . . 260

Summary : (1) The apostolate .... 265

(2) A subapostolic ministry . . . 266

(3) Presbyter-bishops . 267

(4) Deacons . . . . .268

(5) Ordination by laying-on of hands . . 268

xvi Contents.

PAGE

Evidence is lacking as to

(a) details in the division of functions . .269

(6) the form of the future ministry . . .269

Note on The Angels of the Apocalypse p. 254

CH. VI. THE MINISTRY IN THE SUBAPOSTOLIC AGE.

Links connecting this apostolic ministry with the epis
copate of church history . . . .270

In the East

I. St. James originates the episcopate in Jerusalem . 273
II. The Didache shows

(a) a general ministry of apostles and prophets

and teachers ;
(i) a local ministry of bishops and deacons . 276

III. St. John (with other Apostles) develops episco

pacy in Asia ... . . . 286

This is confirmed by the testimony of Ignatius to
the threefold ministry of bishops, presbyters, and
deacons ...... 288

(in what sense the presbyterate represents the

Apostles) . . . . .302

In the West

IV. Clement s Epistle

(a) shows a differentiated ministry having suc
cession from the Apostles ;

(5) postulates an order above the presbyter-
bishops and deacons . . . 308

V. Polycarp s Epistle

implies absence of a bishop at Philippi ;

but this is not inconsistent with a superior

ministry not localized there . . . 326

Contents. xvii

PACK

VI. The Shepherd of Hermas

suggests a third order above presbyters and

deacons ..... 331

Summary of possible theories :

1. A college of equal presbyters . . . 333

2. The bishop hidden in the presbyterate . . 334

3. What alone seems to satisfy the evidence the

episcopate derived from a gradual localization of

prophets, teachers, and apostolic men . 335

Note on A second apostolic council . p. 274
The office of reader . . 284

The Ignatian controversy . 289

CH. VII. CONCLUSION AND APPLICATIONS.

The verdict of history as to (a) the Church, (b) sacer
dotalism, (c) episcopal ordination . . . 337

Is confirmed by the witness of (a) the Gospels, (6) the apo
stolic, and (c) subapostolic documents . . 340

The cogency of the evidence : it can only be satisfied by

the doctrine of the apostolic succession . . 343

This doctrine in its application

(a) invalidates non-episcopal ministries . . 344

(6) recalls episcopal Churches to their true principles . 348

APPENDED NOTES.

A. Dr. Lightfoot s Dissertation on " The Christian Ministry " 353

B. The early history of the Alexandrian ministry . . 357

C. Rites and prayers of ordination . . . .363

D. (i) Canon xiii of Ancyra . . . .370
(ii) Chore piscopi . . . . .372

xviii Contents.

PACK

E. Supposed ordinations by presbyters in East and West . 374

F. The theory of the ministry held by Ambrosiaster,

Jerome, etc. ...... 378

G. Laying-on of hands ..... 383
H. Montanism ...... 390

I. Prophecy in the Christian Church . . . 394

K. The origin of the titles bishop, presbyter, and deacon,

with reference to recent criticism . . . 399

L. The Teaching of the Twelve Apostles . . . .411

Addendum on de Aleatorilms . . .420

CHAPTER I.

THE FOUNDATION OF THE CHURCH.

THE reader of the history of Christendom cannot

fail to be conscious, at each stage of his subject, of the in( i uir y-
prominent position held in the Church by a Ministry,
which is regarded as having a divine authority for
its stewardship of Christian mysteries an authority
which is indeed limited in sphere by varying political
and ecclesiastical arrangements, but which in itself is
believed to be derived not from below but from above,
and to represent and perpetuate, by due succession
from the Apostles, the institution of Christ. It is
this Christian ministry which is to be the subject of
the present inquiry. We shall endeavour to ascertain
its history, to trace it back through its series of
changes to the fountain-head. More than this, we
shall endeavour to investigate its authority and search
into its title-deeds. Is this ministry, with its claim

of an apostolic succession, the mere product of cir-_

i /^tA ^

cumstances valuable just so far as it is found spiritu
ally convenient ? As claiming to be a priesthood,
does it represent a temporary accommodation of the
Christian ideal, more or less necessitated by circum
stances, to the Jewish or pagan ideas amidst which the^

Church spread? Is it a temporary restriction of the /

2 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

free Christian spirit dangerous, however necessary ?
Or, on the contrary, is it an original portion of Christ s
foundation? Is the episcopal succession, as it meets
us in history, simply the fulfilment of Christ s inten
tion, an essential and inviolable element of Christianity
till the end ?

These are the main questions before us ques
tions much controverted, yet not on that account
incapable of yielding satisfactory solutions. But, like
other controverted questions, these which concern the
Christian ministry have a tendency to run off their
own field and get upon territory foreign to themselves
in one direction or another. It will therefore promote
preiim. as- clearness if at the beginning the area of the present

sumptions.

discussion is carefully marked out.
(i)The 1. As an historical inquiry, the investigation of the

genuineness

T origines of the Christian ministry involves conclusions
as to the date and authorship of a number of docu
ments. In regard to the great majority of these
there is no division of opinion which is of serious
moment for the present inquiry. But this is not the
case with regard to some of the documents contained
in the New Testament. The genuineness of the
Epistles of St. Peter and St. James and of the Epistle
of St. Paul to the Ephesians, still more the historical
character of the Evangelical records and of the Acts
of the Apostles, and the genuineness of St. Paul s
Pastoral Epistles, are questions of vital moment in
dealing with the history of the ministry. It is well
then, in order to narrow the field of inquiry, to make
it plain at starting that the genuineness of these

I.] The Foundation of the Church. 3

Epistles and the historical character of these records
are here generally assumed. True, a considerable part
of the inquiry is not affected by the decision in one
sense or another of these critical questions. But in
the discussion of the ministry in the apostolic age it
has great weight. 1 If a certain set of conclusions is
here in the main taken for granted, this is not at all
because it is desired to exempt the books of Scripture
from free criticism. It is done, because no investiga
tion is satisfactory which does not at starting make
plain the basis on which it rests, while a discussion of
so large a number of critical questions would occupy
too much space in preliminaries. It is done, then, to
limit the area of inquiry ; but, it must be added, with
the clearest conviction that the conclusions assumed
are those which the facts warrant. There does not
seem to the present writer to be any reasonable
ground for doubting, for instance, the unity or the
genuineness of the Epistles of St. Paul to the
Ephesians, to Timothy, and to Titus. The authorship
of the Epistle to the Ephesians is guaranteed, not
only by the external evidence, not only by its con-

1 Thus Professor Harnack (Expositor, May 1887) discusses the origin of the
Christian ministry on the assumption that not only the Pastoral Epistles but
also the Acts of the Apostles and the Epistle of St. James are second century
documents (pp. 334 n. 6 , 335 n. J ), and that the Epistle to the Ephesians
was written " a considerable time after the Apostle s death " (p. 331). As he
truly says when he is proceeding "to set forth the chronological data which
we possess for the origin and the earliest development of the ecclesiastical
constitution" "This problem would receive the most diverse solutions from
those occupying different standpoints regarding the origin of certain New
Testament and post-apostolic writings. Any one, for example, who admits
the genuineness of the Pastoral Epistles will reach quite different con
clusions from one who regards them as non-Pauline, and relegates them to
the second century " (p. 322).

4 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

nection with the more personal Epistles to the
Colossians and to Philemon, but also by the lofty
power and richness of thought with which it developes
and unifies the fundamental conceptions of predestina
tion and of the Church, which St. Paul had already
presented in the Epistles to the Romans and the
Corinthians. The Pastoral Epistles are linked to
gether by intense coherence of subject and tone ; and
there is hardly any writing which can be more certainly
pronounced genuine by internal evidence than the
second Epistle to Timothy. 1 When we pass to the
Acts of the Apostles, there would seem to be scarcely
any bit of literary controversy in which, within recent
years, we have experienced more completely the re
assuring effect of thorough inquiry. The remark
able Christology of the early chapters : the position
assigned to the prophets in the earliest Church : 2
the accurate knowledge, as tested by recently-
published inscriptions, which the author displays of
the titles of local magistrates and the details of local
sentiment : 3 the reiterated evidence, which the book
affords in its later portions, that the author was
an eye-witness of what he records all this taken
together goes to guarantee the substantial accuracy

1 Professor Salmon s vindication of the genuineness of these Epistles will,
I think, be considered adequate by a fair-minded and impartial reader. See
his Introduction to the New Testament, lecture xx. Cf. also Professor Godet
on the Pastoral Epistles in the Expositor, January 1888.

2 Harnack selects Acts xiii. i f. with vi. r f. as passages ill which the
reader " enters at once upon historical ground . . . which bears the marks
of higher credibility."

3 See Dr. Lightfoot s "Illustrations of the Acts from Recent Discoveries,"
Contemp. Revieio (May 1878), and Dr. Salmon s Introd. p. 339 f.

I.] The Foundation of the Chtirch. 5

of the whole record. 1 Further, the position assigned
to the Apostles in St. Paul s Epistles and in the Acts
suggests or presupposes some such dealings of Christ
with them in particular as the Gospels record. Once
again, then (for this reason and in virtue of all the
body of considerations which make for the trust
worthiness of the evangelic records), it is here taken
for granted without scruple that Jesus Christ did
really give in substance those instructions and com
missions to His Apostles and to His Church, both
before and after His Resurrection, which He is recorded
to have given in the narratives of St. Matthew, St.
Mark, St. Luke, and St. John. 2 It is then from no

1 While we wait for an article on the subject of the Acts by the man who
perhaps in all Europe is best qualified for the task, I may refer (1) to Dr.
Salmon s Introd. lect. xviii ; (2) to the discussions on the relation of the
Acts to the Epistle to the Galatians in Dr. Lightfoot s Commentary on
the latter Epistle, and the appended essay on " St. Paul and the Three " ; (3)
to the remarkable admissions of one of the last critics amongst those who pay
honour to the name of Baur Dr. Pfleiderer (see his Hibbert Lectures, lect. i).
Cf. Harnack Dogmengesch. i. pp. 62, 63, etc.

2 The authenticity of St. John s Gospel has been sufficiently vindicated
of recent years by Professor Godet and Dr. Westcott.

With reference to a point of some importance for the subject of the
ministry in St. Matthew s Gospel our Lord s commission to St. Peter
Prof. Harnack has recently argued (Contemp. Review, Aug. 1886, " The Present
State of Research in Early Church History," p. 230) that an earlier version
of the narrative is preserved in the text of Tatian s Diatessaron. We have
in Armenian St. Ephraem s Commentary on this Harmony of the Gospels.
In the Latin translation of this (Evangelii Concordantis Expositio facia a
S. Ephraemo, in Lat. trans, a R. P. Aucher, Mechitarista, pp. 153, 154)
the words run: Beatus es Simon, et portse inferi te non vincent.
Afterwards the words Tu es petra are quoted. Here it appears that
it is against St. Peter that the gates of death are not to prevail, and
nothing is said of the foundation of the Church. But we have not the
whole text of the Diatessaron ; St. Ephraem only quotes it to comment
on it. Nor does he always quote it fully. In this case he gives no hint
of the words Tu es petra till afterwards, out of their order. Elsewhere
it is manifest that he does not quote the whole text ; see his comments on St.
John, as incorporated in the Harmony (pp. 145-153); and again (p. 66) on
the Sermon on the Mount, where the quoted text of St. Matt. v. 22-32

6 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

fear of free criticism that the authenticity and trust
worthiness of these New Testament documents is here
assumed.
(2) The truth 2. It will also be taken for granted that the apostolic

of the In- m

carnation, interpretation of the Person of Christ is the true one
that He was the Incarnate Son of God. It is impor
tant to make this plain, because, though little stress
will be laid upon this doctrine, yet our rational attitude
towards the development of Christian institutions
depends to a certain extent upon our relation to it. 1
The Incarnation represents necessarily a climax in the
divine self-revelation. It represents this necessarily,
because no closer relation of God to man is conceivable
than that involved in the " Word Who is God
made flesh " in the historical Person, Christ Jesus, in
such sense that " he who hath seen Him hath seen the

runs thus: " Sed ego dico vobis : qui dicit fratri suo, fatue . . . qui dicit
fratri suo, vilis aut stulte. . . . Audistis quia dictum est : non adulterabis,
sed ego dico vobis : quicunque aspicit et concupiscit, adulterat. Si manus
tua vel pes tua scandalizet te . . . " St. Ephraem does not by any means
quote the whole text ; but he refers to more than he quotes. Thus in the
passage under discussion, if we reconstruct his text from his commentary
(Dominus cum ecclesiam suam aedificaret etc., p. 154), it must have run to
this effect : " Blessed art thou, Simon. Thou art Peter, and on this rock I
will build My Church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against thee."
The "thee" may be due simply to the " it " (O.VTTJS) being referred to irtrpa
and not to ^KKX?7&lt;na, a reference which Origen in loc. discusses. Probably
St. Ephraem accepts this reference and, interpreting the rock of St. Peter,
glosses O.VTTJS as equivalent to &lt;rov. There are no traces of any such reading
as Harnack imagines to have existed in the Greek or in the Syriac versions
(either Cureton s or the Peshitto), which have our text. See Zahn s Diates-
saron p. 163.

1 For example, it seems a grave critical defect in Dr. Hatch s Bampton
Lectures, The Organization of the Early Christian Churches, that, as he has not
explained his relation to certain most significant New Testament documents,
so also he has not made it plain whether he really believes the super
natural character of the Person of Christ. If he does, then his propositions
about the merely natural development of Christian institutions will surely
want correcting (lecture i. p. 18).

I.] The Foundation of the Church. 7

Father." God cannot come any nearer to man, man
cannot come any nearer to God than is effected in Him,
in Whom " dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead
bodily." This is "the end of the days." As M. Godet
strikingly observes : " The history of the world (from
the Christian point of view) is summarized in its
essence in these three words : He is coming : He is
come : He is coming again." 1 The development then of
God s revelation of Himself comes to its climax in the
Incarnation. Henceforth another sort of development
begins. All institutions, all races, all individuals are
gradually brought into the light of Christ and judged
by their relation to Him. Christ developes Himself
as the Second Adam, realizing the capacities of all
humanity by bringing it all, age by age, race by race,
individual by individual, into relation to Himself, till
He can come again/ in the revelation of the glory
of the sons of God, as the acknowledged centre and
head of humanity and of the universe.

It is not here proposed to inquire whether analogies
will be found in other departments of evolution to
what has taken place in the history of religion. This
is a large question, which does not belong to our pre
sent subject. But the general theory of evolution
must, of course, like every other generalization, mould
itself to the facts. It must take account, among other
things, of religious facts. Now in the history of
religion a term has, in a certain sense, been reached in
the past. The Christian moral standard, the Christian
character claims to be essentially final. The Person-

1 Etudes Bibliques, N. T. p. 291.

8 Christian Ministry, [CHAP.

ality of Christ, as it finds expression in His own lan
guage and action and in the belief about Him of His
earliest disciples, 1 represents finality. Thus also the
grace of His Spirit is the fulness of grace, adequate for
all ages and all men ; and the truth revealed in Him
is a faith once for all delivered/ simple and universal,
which is to mould human character to the end. 2

Plainly, then, the rational acceptance of this
position about Christ gives us certain premises or pre
suppositions with reference to the institutions which
perpetuate the presence, and represent the will and
mind, of Christ. A once for all delivered faith and
grace associates itself naturally with a once for all in
stituted society and a once for all established ministry.
The question whether " the Christian societies, and the
confederation of those societies which we commonly
speak of in a single phrase as the visible Church of
Christ, were formed without any special interposition
of that mysterious and extraordinary action of the
divine volition, which, for want of a better term, we
speak of as supernatural/ " 3 is rationally conditioned
by the question whether the manifestation of the
Christ is of this order. A supernatural cause sug-

1 I may refer to Dr. Sanday s What the First Christians thought about
Christ (Oxford House Papers) and to the argument in Mr. Stanton s Jewish
and Christian Messiah p. 1 54 f .

2 See Dr. Westcott s Christus Consummator pp. 124 f. 151 f.

3 Hatch B. L. p. 18. On p. 20, the author says the Church "is divine
as the solar system is divine." Now inasmuch as the Church is a human
society, he must mean that it is divine, as the British constitution or the
Roman empire is divine. But if Christ be personally God, if in virtue
of a divine life He burst the tomb and rose the third day from the dead,
the society to which He gave birth may presumably be divine in another
sense not as exempted from "the universe of law," but because it belongs
to that kingdom of law in which effects are relative to causes. JL e._^v&gt;

L] The Foundation of the Church. 9

gests supernatural effects. Nothing will be assumed
here about the Church and the ministry. The
conclusions shall be drawn strictly from the evidence.
But belief in the Incarnation opens our eyes to give
due weight to the evidence.

Now on the basis of these assumptions a Preiim.

inquiry.

question arises, which must be determined before
the proper subject of the present inquiry can be ap
proached. Did Christ found a Church in the sense Did Christ
of a visible society ? l gJSSL,

That He should have done so is intelligible enough. &gt; /

As it has recently been said, 2 "it is only by becoming
embodied in the undoubting convictions of a society, ^
by being, as it were, assimilated with its mind and
motives that is to say, with living human minds and
wills and informing all its actions, that ideas have
reality, and possess power, and become more than dry /i -
and lifeless thoughts." " As great moral and social
and political ideas are preserved in life and force by
being embodied in the common and living convictions
of the society which we call the State, so great spiri
tual ideas, which are the offspring of Christianity, are
preserved in life and force by becoming the recognised
beliefs and motives of the society which we call the

1 " For although it is indisputable that our Lord founded a Church, it is an\ i /
unproved assumption that that Church is an aggregation of visible or organ- 1
ized societies ; and although it is clear that our Lord instituted the rite of
Christian baptism, it is an unproved assumption that baptism was at the
outset, as it has become since, not merely a sign of discipleship, but also a
ceremony of initiation into a divine society " (Hatch B. L. pref. sec. cd. /

p. xii). To the idea that the Church is "a visible society, or aggregation
of societies," is opposed the idea that it is " synonymous with the elect."

2 The Christian Church by R. W. Church, Dean of St. Paul s, (Oxford House
Papers, No. xvii.) pp. 4, 5, 15.

io Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

Church." Christianity would never have done what
it has done in the world, if it had been a mere body of
abstract truth, like a philosophy, to be apprehended
by this or that individual. It would never have done
what it has done, if it had been embodied only in
a book or collection of books. It has lived on, and
worked upon men, as a society or group of societies.
This, of course, everybody would admit. The question
is whether believers in Christ were left to organize
themselves in societies by the natural attraction of
sympathy in beliefs and aims, and are, therefore,
still at liberty to organize themselves on any model
which seems from time to time to promise the
best results, or whether the divine Founder of the
Christian religion Himself instituted a society, a
brotherhood, to be the home of the grace and truth
which He came to bring to men : so that becoming
His disciple, meant from the first this in a real sense
this only incorporation into His society. If this was
the case, the Church was not created by men, nor can
it be recreated from time to time in view of varying
circumstances. It comes upon men from above. It
makes the claim of a divine institution. It has the
authority of Christ. Christ did not, according to this
view, encourage His disciples to form societies ; He
instituted a society for them to belong to as the means
of belonging to Him. 1

1 Of course this antithesis requires guarding. The supernatural influence
in the genesis of the Church did not annihilate " the natural inclination
which all men have unto sociable life : " but it controlled and intensified it.
This consilience of the natural and supernatural is beautifully expressed by
Hooker, E. P. i. 15. 2.

L] The Foundation of the Church. \ \

Now, as we watch the history of Christendom,
we discern "a great number of organized religious
bodies owing their existence and their purpose to
Christian belief and Christian ideas ; " but in the
midst of these we discern also something incom
parably more permanent and more universal one
great continuous body the Catholic Church. There
it is ; none can overlook its visible existence, let
us say from the time when Christianity emerges out
of the gloom of the sub-apostolic age down to the
period of the Reformation. And all down this period
of its continuous life this society makes a constant
and unmistakeable claim. It claims to have been
instituted as the home of the new covenant of salva
tion by the Incarnate Son of God. Is the claim which
this visible Catholic Church has made a just one ?
This is our present question : we are not asking yet
whether the Church has any particular form of polity
by divine institution, but whether the thing itself
the visible society is the handiwork of Christ. This probabilit
much we premise : that it would be nothing extra
ordinary if Christ did institute a Church. It is
reasonable to think l that, if He came to leave among

1 Cf. the measured words of Butler, Analogy pt. n. ch. i: "As Chris
tianity served these ends and purposes, when it was first published, by the
miraculous publication itself, so it was intended to serve the same purposes in
future ages by means of the settlement of a visible Church ; of a society distin
guished from common ones and from the rest of the world, by peculiar religious
institutions, by an instituted method of instruction and an instituted form
of external religion. Miraculous powers were given to the first preachers of
Christianity, in order to their introducing it into the world : a visible
Church was established in order to continue it, and carry it on successively
throughout all ages. ... To prevent [Christianity being sunk and forgotten
in a very few ages], appears to have been one reason why a visible Church
was instituted ; to be like a city upon a hill, a standing memorial to the

12 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

mankind the inestimable treasures of redemptive
truth and grace, He would not have cast them abroad
among men, but would have given them a stable home
in a visible and duly constituted society a society
simple enough in its principles to be capable of
adaptation to the varying needs of ages and nations
and individuals, simple enough to be catholic, but
organized enough to take its place amidst the institu
tions of the world with a recognisable and permanent
character.
witness of But, as a fact, does history record that He did act

history.

thus ? The affirmative answer to this question shall

be given first by exhibiting the impressive unanimity
with which the early Christians believed that He did :
secondly, by making it plain that the existence of
the visible Church was not due to external secular
influences : lastly, by supporting the position from the
evidence of the New Testament, especially of the
Gospels,
a) Early (l) It is plain that the visible society admits of

Christian .

belief - being differently represented, according as it is re
garded as the home of divine grace, uniting men by the
Spirit through Christ to God and to one another ; or as
the kingdom of truth, maintaining the witness of
i^rw., T*.*~ Jesus ; or as the organ of divine authority, guiding
and disciplining the lives of men. But it is equally
plain that such modes of representing the Church

world of the duty which we owe our Maker, to call men continually . . .
to attend to it, and by the form of religion ever before their eyes, remind
them of the reality ; to be the repository of the oracles of God ; to hold up the
light of revelation . . . and propagate it throughout all generations to the
end of the world." Cf. also the general argument of his Charge, to the Clergy
of Durham.

I.] The Foundation of the Church. 13

are not at all incompatible with one another, and all
of them equally postulate the visibility of the Church.

We proceed then to trace up the different lines of
tradition in the Church so as to show that the differ
ence of colour put upon Christian truth by the
varieties of spiritual temperament and the varying
claims of circumstance did not affect this central posi
tion. And as, of recent years, considerable originality
has been assigned to the " Augustinian theory " of
the Church, 1 we will make a beginning with the m the west:
Church of St. Augustin the Church of Africa. Now,
whatever novelty there may have been in Augustin s
presentation of the matter, 2 at least he did not origin
ate the idea of a visible Church. Let us take our
earliest representative of African Christianity, Ter- Tertuman.
tullian (at the end of the second century), and listen
to what he teaches on the subject, in argument with
the Gnostics, giving it as the one thing certain, what
ever may be matter for question.

" Christ Jesus our Lord," he says, 8 " so long as He

1 E.g. by Dr. Hatch I.e. pp. xii, xiii.

3 St. Augustin s doctrine of the Church is thus stated by Mr. Cunningham
(St. Austin p. 116): "The kingdom of God was not a mere hope, but a
present reality, not a mere name for a divine idea, but an institution, duly
organized among men, subsisting from one generation to another ; closely
inter-connected with earthly rule, with definite guidance to give, and a
definite part to take in all the affairs of actual life. To him the kingdom of
God was an actual Polity, just as the Roman Empire was a Polity too : it
was visible in just the same way as the earthly State, for it was a real
institution with definite organization, with a recognised constitution, with a
code of laws and means of enforcing them, with property for its uses, and
officers to direct it." This would represent what is meant by "the Augus
tinian theory." But in fact St. Augustin s relation to the idea of the
Church is a complex one. On the whole he intended to spiritualize rather
than materialize it : cf. Hermann Renter Augustinische Studien, esp. pp. 101,
150-1, 485 ff.

3 de Praescr. 20 : " Christus lesus, Dominus noster, permittat dicere

14 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

was living on earth, spoke Himself either openly to the
people or apart to His disciples. From amongst these
he had attached to His person twelve especially, who
were destined to be the teachers of the nations.
Accordingly, when one of these had fallen away, the
remaining eleven received His command, as He was
departing to the Father after His Resurrection, to go
and teach the nations, who were to be baptized into
the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. At
once, then, the Apostles (whose mission this title in
dicates), after adding Matthias to their number as the
twelfth in the place of Judas on the authority of the
prophecy in David s psalm, and after receiving the
promised strength of the Holy Ghost to enable them
to work miracles and preach, first of all bore witness
to the faith in Judaea and established Churches, and
afterwards going out into the world proclaimed the
same teaching of the same faith to the nations, and

interim, quisquis est, cuiuscunque dei filius, cuiuscunque materiae homo
et deus, . . . quamdiu in terris agebat, ipse pronuntiabat sive populo
palam sive discentibus seorsum, ex quibus duodecim praecipuos later! suo
allegerat destinatos nationibus magistros. Itaque uno eorum decusso
reliquos undecim digrediens ad Patrem post resurrectionem iussit ire et
docere nationes tinguendas in Patrem et in Filium et in Spiritum sanctum.
Statim igitur apostoli, quos haec appellatio missos interpretatur, assumpto per
sortem duodecimo Matthia in locum ludae ex auctoritate prophetiae quae est
in psalmo David, consecuti promissam vim Spiritus saucti ad virtutes et
eloquium, primo per ludaeam contestata fide in lesum Christum ecclesiis
institutis, dehinc in orbem profecti eandem doctrinam eiusdem fidei nationi
bus promulgaverunt. Et proinde ecclesias apud unamquamque civitatem
condiderunt, a quibus traducem fidei et semina doctrinae ceterae exinde
ecclesiae mutuatae sunt, et quotidie mutuantur, ut ecclesiae fiant. Ac per
hoc et ipsae apostoli cae deputabuntur, ut soboles apostolicarum ecclesiarum.
Omne genus ad originem suam censeatur necesse est. Itaque tot ac tantae
ecclesiae una est ilia ab apostolis prima, ex qua omnes. Sic omnes primae
et omnes apostolicae, dum una omnes probant unitatem. Communicatio
pacis et appellatio fraternitatis et contesseratio hospitalitatis, quae iura
non alia ratio regit, quam eiusdem sacramenti una traditio."

I.] The Foundation of the Church. 15

forthwith founded Churches in every city, from which
all other Churches in their turn have received the
tradition of the faith and the seeds of doctrine ; yes,
and are daily receiving, that they may become
Churches ; and it is on this account that they too
will be reckoned apostolic, as being the offspring of
apostolic Churches. Every kind of thing must be
referred to its origin. Accordingly, many and great as
are the Churches, yet all is that one first Church
which is from the Apostles, that one whence all are
derived. So all are the first, and all are apostolic,
while all together prove their unity : while the
fellowship of peace and the title of brotherhood and
the interchange of hospitality remain amongst them
rights which are based on no other principle than the
one handing down of the same faith."

Here we have a perfectly clear conception of the
one catholic Church, 1 founded in fulfilment of Christ s
intentions by His immediate ambassadors, of which
every local Church is the representative for a par
ticular area. Behind " the Churches," and prior to
them in idea is the one Church which each embodies. 2

1 Second century writers apeak of the Church as actually catholic so
strong is their sense that it is meant to be so i.e. they speak of the Church
as having spread universally. Cf. irdvTO. TO. Zdv-rj TO. vwb rbv ovpavbv KO.T-
oiKOvvra., aKotiffavra Kal TriffTetJcravTa . . . lK\-()dri&lt;ra.v (Hermas Sim. ix. 17) ;
}] KK\fiola . . . KO.T& rrjs & X??s olKOV^vf)S ews irepdruv TTJS yrjs 3ieffira.pfj.tvr)
(Iren. i. 10. i) ; "expansa in universum mundum" (ib. iv. 36. 2); rj Kara
TT\V oiKovfjLtvriv Ka.Oo\iK.T) tKK\i)ffla (Mart. Polyc. 8).

2 The thought of salvation in the Church is so prominent in Tertullian s
mind that he finds it in the Lord s Prayer. Speaking of the title " Father,"
he says (de Orat. 2) : " Appellatio ista et pietatis et potestatis est. Item in
Patre Filius invocatur ; Ego enim, inquit, et Pater unum sumus. Ne mater
quidem ecclesia praeteritur. Siquidem in filio et patre mater recognoscitur,
de qua constat et patris et filii nomen."

1 6 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

Thus the Church is to Tertullian s mind God s insti
tution for man s education and salvation. To the
Church belong the Scriptures ; so utterly in fact does
he refuse to separate the books of the Church from
herself that he declines, in theory at least, even to
argue as to the meaning of the Scriptures with those
outside the Church, because they do not belong to
them. So little does he conceive of the Christian
religion as an abstract doctrine written in a book ! l

It was, then, through membership in this one
apostolic Church, catholic and local, that African
Christians believed themselves to inherit the grace
of Christ. Communion with God depended on com
munion with His Church. " He cannot have God
cypnan__ for his father," Cyprian is fond of emphasizing, 2 " who
has not the Church for his mother." " Dost thou
believe " so runs the baptismal interrogation in St.
Cyprian s day "(in) the remission of sins and eternal
life through the holy Church ?" 3

1 de Praescr. 19: " Ergo non ad scripturas provocandum est, nee in his
constituendum certamen, in quibus aut nulla aut incerta victoria est, aut
parum certa. Nam etsi non ita evaderet collatio scripturarum, ut utramque
pattern parem sisteret, ordo rerum desiderabat illud prius proponi, quod nunc
solum disputandum est : quibus competat fides ipsa, cuius sint scrip-
turae."

2 Ep. Ixxiv. 7 : " Ubi et ex qua et cui natus est, qui filius ecclesiae non
est? ut habere quis possit Deum patrem, habeat ante ecclesiam matrem."
Cf. Ep. Iv. 24 : " Quisque ille est et qualiscunque est, Christianus non est
qui in Christi ecclesia non est." Ep. Ixxiii. 21 : " Salus extra ecclesiam
non est." Cyprian s conception of the bishop constituting the Church will
be brought out later.

3 Ep. Ixix. 7 : " Credis remissionem peccatorum et vitam aeternam per
sanctam ecclesiam ? " Ep. Ixx. 2 : " Credis in vitam aeternam et remissionem
peccatorum per sanctam ecclesiam ? "

Dr. Westcott (Historic Faith, Note iii. p. 186) does not notice the latter
form. Previously (p. 1 16) he lays stress on the idea that " we do not say we
believe in" the Church: we believe only "that it is." This distinction

I.] The Foundation of the Church. 17

There is no reason to think that such a question
would have startled or shocked the faithful in any
part of the Christian Church. Certainly Irenaeus, the irenaens

J C. A.D. 175.

bishop of Lyons, who represents the Church of Gaul
and the Churches of Asia where he had been brought
up, held the same belief in the Church and made the
same exclusive claim for it.

" In the Church," he says, " God placed apostles,
prophets, doctors, and the whole operation of the
Spirit, and all who do not have recourse to the Church
do not participate in Him, but deprive themselves of
life. . . . For where the Church is there is the Spirit
of God, and where the Spirit of God is there is the
Church and all grace." " God will judge all those who
make schisms. . . . No reformation can be wrought
by them which can compensate for the injury of the
schism. God will judge all those who are outside the
truth that is, who are outside the Church." " The
Church has been planted as the paradise in this
world : so then, of every tree of the paradise ye shall
eat, says the Spirit of God that is, of every Scripture
of the Lord." 1

comes from Rufinus ; cf. his Commentary on the Creed 36: " hac itaque
praepositionis syllaba Creator a creaturis secernitur et divina separantur
ab humanis." Cf. St. Augustin de Fide et Symbolo 21. But this would
apply neither to all the western Creeds (see, in Heurtley s Harmonia
Symbolica, Creeds xix, xxvi, xxvii, xxx, xxxvii-viii, and the early Spanish
Creed in Priscillian Tract, ii. p. 36), nor to the eastern form of the Con-
stantinopolitan Creed (the form of most authority in the Church) with the
earlier eastern Creeds (see Pearson On the Creed art. ix, notes 52, 53 ; and
Westcott I.e. p. 195). It is therefore surely impossible to lay stress on it.

1 Irenaeus conception of the organization of the Church is presented
later. The passages here quoted are iii. 24. I (quoted below, p. 120) ;

i y - 33- 7 : " AvaKptvei d TOI&gt;J TO. a-)(La /J.O.TO. &lt;?/xyafo/^four, Kevobs 6vras T^S
TOV 0eov dyd.Tn)S /ecu TO ISiov XwrtTeX^s ffKoirovvras, dXXd jttTj njc fvuffiv TTJS fckXipfas
(cat Sick fjuKpas Kal rets [Ti^oiVcw] airtas rb /j.tya KO.I tv5o$ov ff/*a. TOV Jipi&lt;r&lt;rov

i8 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

(recognition It might be asked how St. Irenaeus reconciles this

also of God s

exclusive claim which he makes for the Church with
a truth to which he also gives expression namely,
that God s revelation of Himself through His Son,
Who is the Eternal Word, the Light which lighten-
eth every man, is in a sense universal, and that in
order to the apprehension of this universal revelation
there is a universal capacity for faith which is exhi
bited in all moral obedience to God wherever found. 1
Irenaeus teaches this, with the Alexandrians and with
Justin Martyr. 2 With the last-named father he would,

/cai StatpoDj Tas KOI ocrov TO e^r auTOis dvaipovvras . . . o{i$e/j.la 5t
dijvarat 7rp6s afiruv Ka.rbpduxn s yevttrOai, T)\IKT&gt;) TOU &lt;rxioymr6s tanv 77
ludicabit autem et omnes eos qui sunt extra veritatem, id est qui
aunt extra ecclesiam."

v. 20. 2: "Fugere igitur oportet sententias ipsorum [haereticorum] . . .
confugere autem ad ecclesiam, et in eius sinu educari, et dominicis scrip-
turis enutriri. Plantata est enim ecclesia paradisus in hoc mundo. Ab
omni ergo ligno paradisi escas manducabitis, ait Spiritus Dei ; id est, ab
omni scriptura dominica manducate."

The connection in the mind of the early Church between schism and heresy
is very close. The fundamental idea of heresy is that of self-willed separatism
or particularism. Cf. Rothe Anfange dar christlichen Kirche 53 p. 563 f.
and pseudo-Athan. Diet, et Interpret. Parabol. Evang. qu. 38 (quoted by
Rothe I.e. p. 566) Hbdtv \4yerai atpeffis ; airb TOU alpeicrdai TI tdiov, /cat TOVTO
taKd\ovdeiv, This expresses the primitive idea.

1 Iren. iv. 6. 5, 7 : "Etadhoc Filium revelavitPater, ut per eum omnibus
manifestetur et eos quidem, qui credunt ei iusti, in incorruptelam et in aeter-
num refrigerium recipiat ; credere autem ei, est facere eius voluntatem. . . .
Nemo cognoscit . . . Patrem, nisi Filius et quibuscunque Filius revelaverit.
Revelaverit enim non solum in futurum dictum est, quasi tune inceperit
Verbum manifestare 1 atrem, cum de Maria natus ; sed communiter per
totum tempus positum est. Ab initio enim assistens Filius suo plasmati,
revelat omnibus Patrem, quibus vult et quando vult et quemadmodum vult
Pater ; et propter hoc in omnibus et per omnia unus Deus Pater et unum
Verbum Filius et unus Spiritus et una salus omnibus credentibus in eum."

" Justin Apol. i. 46 : TOP Xpurrbv TrpwroVo/cov TOU deou elvai ^diSdxO rifJifv
Ka.i trpof/j.i)vvffa.fifv \6yov ovra, oC trav 7^0? &fOptim&gt;f nertrxt. KOU. ol yttera \6yov
fittoffavTes HpiffTtavoi eicrt, K&V &6eoi evojj.lffdtjcfa.v, olov ev "EXXijat fiv 2coAc/3aT7/s
Kal "H.pdK\ciTos K&lt;d ol 6 /ioiot ai/rots, ev [3ap/3dpois 6 AfipacLfJ. Kal Avavias KO.I
Afap/at Kal MwavjX Kal HXlas /cat &\\oi TroXXoi, Siv rdy irpdj-fis i) ra 6t&gt;6/mTa
Kara\tytiv ft.a.Kpbv elvai ewia-Tdnevot ravvv irapaiTovfj-fffa. &&amp;lt;rre Kal ol

I.] The Foundation of the Church. 19

no doubt, recognise all who, even in heathen lands
as well as among the Jews, " lived or live with
right reason," as the " friends of Christ " the Eternal
Reason, and even as " Christians." How would he
reconcile such a position with the exclusive claim of
the Church ? Probably by holding that all who had
not had the opportunity of becoming members of the
Church while on earth would, if they had been true
to their light, be received into the Church in Paradise.
At any rate the reconciliation was not effected by the
idea of an invisible Church to which they belonged
an invisible Church containing the true servants of
God whether they belonged to the visible Church or
not. Neither the existence of good men outside
the Church, nor the presence of bad men inside it,
ever drove the Christian Fathers, whether eastern or
western, to this hypothesis. 1

dvev \6yov /fcwcrewres &xP r l a " roL KC " xfy&gt; T&lt; ? X/)I&lt;TT fj&lt;rav icai tftovelt TUIV fiera,
\6yov ^LO uvTtav ol d fiera \6yov (3t&lt;ixrat&gt;Tfs KOI fiiouvrts ~X.piffTta.voi KO.I d^o/Joi Kal
drdpaxot virdpxovffiv.

1 The Church on earth was regarded as subdivided into false and true
members the latter constituting the Kvpius eKK\T]ffia. of Origen, the corpus
Christ! verum of Jerome and Augustin. Neither of these (as Rothe,
Anfdnge etc. p. 618 n. 44, remarks) "agrees with the invisible Church
of the Protestants." The point of difference is specially this, that, whereas
the members of the invisible Church are regarded as belonging indif
ferently to any or no ecclesiastical unity, with Origen and Augustin the
conception is the opposite. The membership iu the true Church depends
upon membership in the one visible Church on earth. The true Church is
a subdivision of the actual Church its genuine members. For "non
omnes qui tenent ecclesiam, teuent et vitam actcniatn " (Augustin tie Bapt.
v. 20); "multi . . . sunt in sacramentorum communione cum ecclesia,
ct iam non sunt in ecclesia " (de Unit. Eccl. 74). See further Rothe Anfanye.
61, esp. pp. 612 S. and Stanton s Jewish and Christian Messiah p. 230:
"Let me premise that I think the distinction cannot be maintained,
which was first introduced by the theology of the sixteenth century
[ the idea appears pretty fully developed in Wiklif, footnote], between
a visible and invisible Church in this world, the latter consisting only of the
truly godly. Not only is such a distinction uncountenanced by Scripture,

2O Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

The Roman From Africa and Gaul we come to the great west-

Church

ern centre Rome. Certainly the idea of the visible

Church and its unity was prominent there at the time

victor when Victor, the bishop, attempted to excommunicate

C. A.D. 190.

the Churches of Asia for keeping Easter after their own
specially Johannine tradition. He endeavoured, says
Eusebius, 1 " to cut them off from the common unity "
and make them " utterly excommunicate. " He was
reproved by Irenaeus for introducing into the
Church the idea of a rigid uniformity, in place
of the common faith, as the bond of union. He is
reminded how, in the middle of the century, his pre
decessor Anicetus had kept his fellowship with the
Asiatic Polycarp, in spite of their difference as to this

but the very idea of a Church is that of a Society which has its officers and
its organisation. It ia a contradiction in terms to call a number of indivi
duals a Church who are not united together in a body. The moment they do
begin to iinite, by virtue of their common supposed characteristic of genuine
godliness, they cease to be invisible. There have been such attempts to form
a pure Church ; but history and the warnings of our Lord Himself have
taught us what to think of them." Of course the greater part of the Church
is to us invisible, but that is because its members are no longer on earth, and
they enjoy "perfect fellowship with one another, as well as with their
Lord." Cf. also William Law s Third Letter to the Bishop of Bangor, at
the beginning a powerful and racy passage. Of course the truth that the
Church is a visible society, containing evil as well as good, is involved in our
Lord s language in the parables of the Net gathering of every kind and the
Fiold of wheat and tares: it is involved also in St. Paul s whole conception
of the Church and of the saints, that is the Christians as bound to holiness
by the consecration laid upon them in virtue of being baptized members
of Christ, but not necessarily actiially holy. Still it was only when the long
repose of the last parts of the second century and the first half of the third
made the Christian profession popular and easy, that the full weight of
the problem came upon the Church. In part there was a disposition to
meet it by rigorous discipline, passing into an impatient refusal to tolerate the
mixed condition of the Church ; and this was a fruitful source of schism.
In part stress was laid upon the Church on earth being only an outpost of a
celestial society (cf. Tertull. de Bapt. 15 una ecclesia in caelis), an earthly
image of it (cf. Clem. Alex. Strom, iv. 8. 66 eiKwv TTJS ovpaviov tKK\rj&lt;ria.s &gt;)
eVryetoj), or a preparation-ground for it : and thus necessarily imperfect.
1 Euseb. H. E. v. 2.

i.] The Foundation of the Church. 21

particular custom " those who observed it, and those
who did not, keeping the peace of the whole Church."

But we may go back in the same Church at least l Hennas.
to the earlier part of the second century, to the days
of Hernias, the seer of the Shepherd. In his visions
the Church is represented as an aged lady, who
appears to Hermas, and " through whom he receives
visions and revelations." She is aged, it is explained
to him, because " she is the first creation of God, on
whose account the world was made."^ The Church is
here thought of as in a way existing from the begin
ning in the purpose of God, in the ideal world. But
this divine Idea has become a fact. The actual ^- L
Church, made up of those yet alive and of some who
have departed in the faith of Christ, is represented to
Hermas under the figure of a tower with a marvellous
unity, which is being built by the angels of God upon
the waters of baptism, the stones which are used for the
tower, and those which are rejected, representing all
sorts of men. 3 This actual Church which is in process
of being constructed is declared to be identical with
the ideal Church. What existed before in idea is now
real. 4 And this real, visible Church is the only way

1 See further on the date, in chap. vi.

2 Vis. ii. 4 : TV irpefffivTpa.v, Trap 1 fy Xa/3es TO f3i@\idiov, riva. 3o/ceZj elvai ;
716 &lt;f&gt;r]fju. TV 2i/3v\\av HXavaffat, &lt;j&gt;7]&lt;riv, owe tffTiv. Tis olv ecrriv ; &lt;pi)fj.L
H tKK\T)ffia, (f&gt;i]fflv. elirov atir^ Aiarl oSv irpeffjBvTtpa "On, tf&gt;r]crli , TT&VTW irptirri
fKTlaO r) Sia TOVTO TrpecrjBvTepa, Kal 8ia ra.^rf)v 6 /c6ay&gt;s KaTripriffOrj. Cf. Vis. iv.
I : al a.TTOKa\ij\f/fLs Kal rd opdfjutra & poi H5etev dia TTJS ayias eKK\r)&lt;rias avrov.

s Vis. iii. 2-8.

4 The tower which is the visible Church on earth is the ideal Church which
appeared to Hermas, fitv irvpyos 8i&gt; /SXeTrets olKo5ofj.otifj.fvov, eyu elfj.i, 77 eKK\i}-
trla, i) 6&lt;f&gt;6e tcrd ffoi Kal vvv Kal TO TrpbTtpov ( Vis. iii. 3). Cf. [pseudo] Clem, ad
Cor. 14. If Hennas Church of the divine Idea is spoken of "as a sort of
Aeon " (Rothe Anfdnge p. 612 n. 42) it must be remembered that the Idea is

22 Christian Ministry, [CHAP.

of salvation. " When the tower is finished, those who
have not yet repented can no longer find place, but
will be cast out." 1 There is another vision of the
building of the tower to the same effect. 2 In this it
is made plain that the Church in its present state is
imperfect. Many, who had been gathered out of all
nations " into the one body," have fallen away and
been cast out for awhile or for ever. Those who are
members of the Church at present are evil as well as
good ; many will have to be cast out ; and thus the
Church as a whole will at the last be purified into
complete holiness and unity. Still, as it is, the Church
represents God s will, God s purpose of redemption ;
and those who separate themselves from it, separate
themselves from the hope of salvation like the cove
tous or the extortionate. They are represented as
men diseased : "they who are covered with scabs are
they who denied their Lord and turned not to Him,
but have become dry and desert-like, and cleave not
to the saints of God, but isolating themselves, lose
their own souls. " ; How could imagery express more
strongly the idea of salvation through the Church ? 4
We may go back in the same Church to a yet

actualized to Hernias, as the Word is made flesh. This differentiates the
Church s system from the Gnostic ; the Valentinian Aeon fKK\rj&lt;ria is (by
contrast) only ideal. For the Jewish form of the doctrine of the eternal
Church see Book of Enoch c. 39.

1 Vis. iii. 5. There is, however, an inferior salvation implied for some
who do not find place in the tower, if they repent, and after a purgatorial
purification (ib. 7).

3 Sim. ix. This tower is built upon the great Rock, Christ.

3 Sim. ix. 26.

4 The commission to Clement to send the book to the other cities (els ras
Qw TroXeis) implies the sense that the local Churches are essentially connected
( Vis. ii. 4).

I.] The Foundation of the Church. 23

earlier date, and still in the Epistle of Clement we element
shall find, without poetry or vision, the sense of the
Church as vivid as possible. The Church in that
Epistle is a visible society, with the divine principle
of order stamped upon her, as upon the Church of
the old covenant, by God s authority, 1 and there is
a common tradition over the different local Churches,
for neglecting which that at Rome is bound to take
her sister at Corinth to task. The western temper
no doubt tended later (as will be seen) to colour the
idea of the Church. As the Church at Rome became
Latinized and came to inherit the secular preroga
tives of the Roman name in addition to her own
spiritual privileges, no doubt her influence gave a new
tone the tone of secular empire to Christian insti
tutions. Thus the doctrine of the Church becomes
materialized, but it is a complete mistake to suppose
that the conception of the Church, or of the visible
unity of the Church, was at all western in origin.

Ignatius of Antioch was a thorough oriental ; J* &* Eas

Ignatius

and he writes to Churches which inherit the fruits a A-D m
of the last years of apostolic influence when that
influence had its centre at Ephesus. Yet it is im
possible to conceive a teaching about the Church as
a visible society more intense, more passionate, than
that of Ignatius. Christ s authority is perpetuated
in visible societies with a visible organization, and
each of these societies, each Church, with its bishop

i Clem, ad Cor. 40-44 ; see further chap. vi. " The new law of the Church "\ ^ jj
Clement most characteristically connected with the two models of the I
political and military organization of the Roman state and the sacerdotal/
hierarchy of the Jewish theocracy " (Pfleiclerer Hibbert Lectures p. 232).

24 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

and priests and deacons, is an embodiment of what
is not local, but catholic. 1 " Where the bishop
appears, there let the people be, as where is Christ
Jesus, there is the catholic Church." " He who is
within the sanctuary is pure, he who is outside is
impure, that is to say, he who does anything apart
from bishop and presbytery and deacons is not pure
in his conscience." "If any one follows a separatist
he does not inherit the kingdom of God. "

The Church may be represented from different
points of view. It may be emphasized, as was said
above, as the home of a divine grace covenanted to its
members alone ; this is perhaps the thought specially
suggested by the scriptural metaphors of the body
of Christ and the branches of the Vine. It may
be emphasized from the side of authority, the Church
being the mistress of men to subdue and to rule them ;
and this is the thought specially dear to the Roman
The Aiex. crenius. It may be emphasized also from the side of

andrians ^

the revelation of truth, the Church being the school
of truth to train human characters under its discip
line ; and no doubt to the Alexandrians it is from this
point of view that Christianity is mostly, though not
of course exclusively, 3 thought of and loved. Christ
is the Truth. It is on the Church s truth that
the minds of Athanasius and Didymus are mainly

1 ad Smyrn. 8. " The bishop is the centre of each individual Church, as
Jesus Christ is the centre of the universal Church " (Lightfoot s note). For
further quotations and discussion see chap. vi.

" ad Trail. 7 : ad Philad. 3.

3 See, e.g., a fine passage in Origen (c. Cels. vi. 48) where the Church
is described as an organism, ensouled by the indwelling Word VTTO rov
vlov TOV 6fov \f/vxovfi,^i T]v rfjv irdcrav TOV Oeov eKK\ri&lt;7iai .

I. J The Foundation of the Church. 25

fixed ; l it is the divine philosophy superseding all the
fragmentary truth possible to the world apart from
Christ by including it in a completer, purer whole
fchat Clement and Origen love. But it is quite an
error to suppose that they were the less churchmen
on this account. We have in St. Augustin s Confes
sions an account of an old Platonic philosopher,
Marius Victorinus, trying to induce a simple-hearted
bishop to consider him a Christian on account of his
convictions, without requiring him to come into the
Church. Did walls, he asked, make Christians ? The
question was one better left without a direct answer.
But at any rate the philosopher was given to under
stand that he could only become a Christian by being
baptized into the Christian body. This ecclesiastical
temper w T as as much that of Clement and Origen as
of later Alexandrians.

Clement may indeed have had an idea of a "Church ciement c .

A.D. 190-200.

within a Church," a Church of the men of knowledge
who get beyond mere faith ; but men of faith and men
of knowledge are at one in common church member
ship, in common use of the sacraments, in common
obedience to " the Church s rule," " the apostolic and
ecclesiastical right rule of beliefs." 2 The faith is not

1 This is very beautifully illustrated by Didymus commentary on the
Psalms. The guidance and food of the soul is mainly the Church s truth,
as expressed in her exact dogmas, and his feeling towards this truth is re
peatedly expressed with the greatest genuineness and force. Later, in the
fifth century, the theology of Cyril has a quite different tone from the
theology of Leo. The first thought of the one is Truth, of the other
Government.

" Men of understanding are described as o&lt;roi UTT O.VTOV [Xpiffrou] aa.fy-r\vt\Qciaa.v
rSiv ypa&lt;j&gt;wi&gt; f^riyTjfftv KO.TO. rbv fKK\r)&lt;na&lt;TTiKov KO.VOVO. e/c5ex6juevot oia.ffwfovau
(Strom, vi. 15. 125); cf. 17 dTrotrr 0X1^77 ai iKK\i)ffMirruc^ 6p6oTo/j.ia rCjv

26 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

a philosophy ; it is embodied in the one visible
Church, true, ancient, catholic, and apostolic. This
only, in contrast to all the late-devised "schools" of
heresy which cannot be called Churches, is the home
of the elect, the one true virgin mother of human
souls. 1 " This being the case," he says, " it is plain
that these later-born heresies and those yet subsequent
to them are innovations, driven along distorted lines,
upon the most ancient and true Church. It has also,
I think, been made plain from what has been said that
the Church which is true and really ancient is one,
and into it the elect according to God s purpose are
gathered. . . . The One Church is associated with the
nature of the One God. In substance, in conception,
in origin, in excellence, we say that the ancient and
catholic Church is one only, having nothing like or
equal to herself."

Just in the same way the truth, which Origen set
himself with such noble zeal to expound and to put

(ib. vii. 16. 104). The heretic is a man who has "kicked at the tradition
of the Church and leaped off to the opinions of human heresies" (ib. vii.
1 6. 95) ; he neither enters the kingdom of heaven himself, nor allows those
whom he deceives to arrive at the truth.

1 Cf. Strom, vii. 17. (quoted below) ; vii. 15. 92 ; Paul. i. 6. 42 (on the
one virgin mother). For further quotations see Rothe Anfdnge pp. 584 f.,
593, 601, etc. ; and Dr. Bigg s Bampton Lectures, The Christian Platonists of
Alexandria, pp. 86, 153 n 2 , 98-100, etc.

2 Strom, vii. 17. 107 : T f2^ OVTUS ^x^ VT&lt;av &lt;rvjj.&lt;t&gt;avts ex rrjs irpoyeveaT arris Kal
dXijOfffTdr^s eKuXycrias TO.S fteTayfveffTepas ravras Kal ras eYi TOVTWV virofiefiriKvlas
T&lt; Xpt&gt; vl i&gt; KfKaivoTOfJiTJffdai irapax.apax.6dff as aipeVeis. eV rwv dp-rm&wv &pa &lt;pavepbi&gt;
ol/xcu yeyevrjcrdai, /J.lav elvat rrjv d\r)6ij eKK\T)ffiai&gt; TTJV ry SfTL dpxalav, et s 3\v oi
Kara irpo6f(riv (k /catoi fyKaraXtyovTai evbs yap ovros rod deov Kal evbs rov Kvpiov.
5ia TOVTO Kal rb &Kpws TI/MOV Kara rr)v /JLOVWCTLV firaiveirai /jLi/j.t]fj.a ov dpxrjs r^s /u.tas.
rrj yovv rov evbs (ptiaei ffvyK\rjpovraL lKK\tf]&lt;ria TJ /nia, ty els TroXXas KaTa.Tffj.veiv
fiia^ovTai aiptffeis. Kara re ofo inr&ffTaffiv /card re firivoiav Kara re apxty Kard re
ttoxty /J.6vriv elvat &lt;j&gt;a/jifv TTJV dpxaiav Kal Ka6o\tKT]i&gt; tKK\f)Giav. . . . dXXa Koi
T] tfcoXT] TW fKK\rjffias, Kaddirep i) apxij TTJS crwracrews, Kara Trjv fj.ovdda ecrrt
TrdvTa TO. aXXa inrfp^d\\ovffa Kal fjn&gt;]dv i?x ovffa oftoiov TJ itrov eavrfj.

I.] The Foundation of the Church. 27

into relation to the whole of knowledge, was no
abstract truth to be thought out by the free action
of the individual mind ; it was a truth committed to
a society and, though the sanctified reason could ex
plain, elucidate, accommodate it, it could not trans
gress or neglect " the rule of faith " without being
self-condemned. 1 " Let the preaching of the Church A.D. 223-231.
be preserved," he says at the beginning of the book
which most laid him open to accusations of heresy,
"handed down through the order of succession from
the Apostles, and remaining up to the present time in
the Churches : that alone is to be believed as truth
which is in no disagreement with the ecclesiastical and
apostolical tradition." 2 Origen s teaching upon the
Church is full and rich, and when he comments, for
instance, on the red cord which marked Bahab s house
for safety, he says with equal positiveness that there
is no salvation except through the blood of Christ,
and no salvation outside the Church. 3 Undoubtedly

1 See Bigg B.L. lecture v. init.

" de Princip. prooem. 2: "Servetur vero ecclesiastica praedicatio per
successionis ordinem ab apostolis tradita et usque ad praesens in ecclesiis
permaneus; ilia sola credenda est veritas, quae in nullo et ecclesiastica et
tipostolica discordat traditione."

3 in lesu Nave horn. iii. 5 : "Sciebat etenim quia nulli esset salus nisi in
sanguine Christi. ... Si quis ergo salvari vult veniat in hanc domum. . . .
Ad hanc veniat domum in qua Christi sanguis in signo redemptionis est . . .
Nemo ergo sibi persuadeat, nemo semet ipsum decipiat : extra hanc domum,
id est extra ecclesiam, nemo salvatur." in Matt. xii. n : ijre e/c/cXT/oio, ws
XpHrrou oi /co5oyUi7, roO oiKo5o/J,ri&lt;TavTOS eavTov TT\V oiKiav 0/&gt;oct /iUtt eirt TTJV Tr^rpav,
avewiSeKTos &lt;TTI Trv\Civ aSov, KaTicrxvovffuiv fj.ev Travrbs dvOpilnrou TOV fw TTJJ
ire Tpa.s /cat T?}S ^/c/cAijtn as, ovStv Se Swafjitvuv rrp6s avT-^v. Cf. his interpretation
of St. John i. 29: "He taketh away the sin of the world," i.e. "the world
of the Church," the world within the world the true KOCFUOS (in loann. vi.
ad fin. ). It should be added that Origen, like Augustin, recognised that the
Church had in some sense begun to exist from the beginning, cf. in Cant.
i. u, 12: "prima etenim fundamenta congregationis ecclesiae statim ab
initio sunt posita."

28 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

Clement and Origen alike endeavoured to mitigate
this doctrine of exclusive salvation within the Church,
so as to bring it into harmony with God s universal
purposes, with His recognised equity and good-will
towards all, and with the universal presence of the
Word to all men. 1 But with all this it is an un
doubted truth that they did, like all the other Fathers,
regard God s covenant in Christ as made with a visible
society, membership in which was of universal obliga
tion and alienation from which was death.
The apoio- Nor can it be maintained that the more philosophic

gists - 1

apologists of the second century were inclined " to
transform the Gospel into a monotheistic moral sys
tem." It has been said that in the recently recovered
Aruides. fragment of the Apology of the philosopher Aristides,
presented to the Emperor Hadrian about A.D. 125,
" Christianity is exhibited as the most absolutely
certain philosophy." 2 But an important consideration

1 E.g. (i) By generous recognition of the preparatory discipline of God
leading up to the Incarnation all over the world : see above, p. 18.

(2) By drawing a distinction between different points of Christian belief ;
oZ dj T& Kvpiwrara irapa.Trlir-ovTes are distinguished from ol irepl T&V ev /j.tpei
tr&lt;t&gt;a\\6(JLevoi. Only the former are ^eO&lt;rrat r&lt;p tivn (Clem. Strom, vi. 15. 124).
Cf. Origen c. Cels. v. 63.

(3) By distinguishing grades of salvation, and excluding virtuous disbe
lievers in Christ only from the highest eternal life. Origen in Bom. ii. 7 :
Iste licet alienus a vita videatur aeterna, quia non credit Christo, et intrare
non possit in regnum caelorum, quia renatus non est ex aqua et Spiritu, vide-
tur tamen quod per haec, quae dicuntur ab apostolo, bonorum operum
gloriam et honorem et pacem perdere penitus non possit. . . . Sed tamen in
arbitrio legentis sit, probare quae dicta sunt."

- Harnack, Contemp. Review (Aug. 1886), p. 229. The fragments of two
Sermones S. Arlstidis Philosophi have been edited from an early Armenian
version, with a Latin translation, by the Mechitarist Fathers. The first
Sermo has at least one interpolated word, corresponding to the Latin word
deipara, but is otherwise apparently genuine. The Emperor Hadrian is
assured that there are four stirpes (compertum est nobis quattuor esse
humani generis stirpes) or four nationes of men: barbarians, Greeks,

I.J The Foundation of the Church. 29

is here left oat of account. Christians are spoken
of as constituting a new "race" or "kind" of
men ; side by side with Greeks and barbarians and
Hebrews are Christians. The mere adherents of a
philosophic school could not be so described ; Chris
tians can be (however liable the expression is to be
misunderstood), because Christianity is essentially a
society, a body. To Justin Martyr Christians are " the J*t in
genuine high-priestly race of God," and the account - A - D - 148 -
of the sacraments which he gives the emperor in his
Apology, shows us how completely he conceived of
Christianity as a society. 1 There is, again, no more
beautiful description of the Church than that given
by another apologist, Theophilus of Antioch, when he Theopiuius
compares the " holy Churches " to fertile and well-
inhabited islands in the sea, which have fair harbours
of truth to welcome and give security to storm- tossed
souls. " To these they flee for refuge who wish to be
saved, and who are lovers of the truth, wishing to
escape the wrath and judgment of God." And there
are other islands, barren and dry and uninhabited

Hebrews, and Christians. Hadrian himself, some ten years later, uses simi
lar language (if his letter to Servian is genuine ; see Lightfoot s Ignatius
i. p. 464) : "hunc [nummum] Christiani, hunc ludaei, hunc omnes veneran-
tur et gentes. " Cf. Melito s expression for the Christians rb rGiv OeovejScSv
yevos (ap. Euseb. H.E. iv. 26), and the same word in the Ep. ad Diognet. i
(referred to as used by him) KO.IVOV TOVTO yevos T) eiriT-fiSevfMi, also iroXireta
(c. 5), though the author is explaining that Christians remain members of
their own different races and are not a people apart. Cf. Justin s apxt-fpaTiKw
TO &\T]0tvbv y^vos efffjtfv TOV 6eov (Dial. 116) and jug. ^vxfj ical ytup ywayuyrj /ecu
/tug tKK\Tjcriq. (ib. 63). It becomes an expression of popular hatred against
Christians that they are a genus tertium. See Tertull. Scorp. 10 : "genus
tertium deputamur." ad. Nat. i.S: " Romani, ludaei, dehinc Christiani;
ubi autem Graeci ? " Also Origen c. Gels. viii. 75 : ^/ue?y iv eK&ffrri ir6\ei &\\o
afar-quo. -irarpLSos, KrurOtv \6yu Qeov, t-mffTd.fj.evoi.
1 Apol. i. 65.

30 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

save of wild beasts, on whose harbomiess coasts ships
are only wrecked, and these " are the schools of error,
that is of the heresies, which destroy those who
approach them." 1
The heathen Such being the Christian conception of their own

idea of the

Christians, body, it was inevitable that the world outside also
should have regarded them as members of a society or
brotherhood. As a matter of fact it was in this way
that they became an object of suspicion. They seemed
a sort of secret society, with an unintelligible free
masonry of their own. Men suspected them of all
sorts of secret iniquities. And all this was due to
the closeness of their corporate life ; they seemed a
"people of profane conspiracy," "a secret race, avoid
ing the light, silent in public, chattering in corners,"
who "recognised one another by secret marks and
signs, and loved almost before they knew one
another," 2 calling one another by the suspicious name
of " brother." 3 So, like any other guild or sodality,
they appeared before the eyes of men as a body whose
privileges were conditional on membership. Exact
terms of membership were a special feature of contem-

1 Theophilus ad Autolycum ii. 14. In order to carry back the evidence of
the church conception to the earliest days, outside the area of Christian his
tory covered by the New Testament, it should be mentioned that the Didachr
conceives of Christians as constituting a visible society governed by a common
law. The visible society, the Church, knit together by social sacraments
(though these sacraments are conceived of in a Judaic, meagre spirit), is the
home of the revelation of knowledge and immortality given in Christ, and the
antechamber to the final kingdom. Cf. x. 5: "Remember Thy Church to
deliver her from all evil, and perfect her in Thy love, and gather her from
the four winds, the sanctified Church, into Thy kingdom which thou didst
prepare for her." Cf. ix. 4.

- This vivid picture is given in the Octavius of Miuucius Felix, cc. 8, 9.

3 " Sic nos, quod invidetis, fratres vocamus" (Octav. 31).

i.J The Foundation of the Church. 31

porary guilds. Their members constituted a sort of
republic apart. 1 Thus, though Christians might make
public explanation of their rites and doctrines to
avoid the misconceptions of the outside world, yet
these rites and doctrines were admittedly the private
property of their society, and no one could have
the Christian s God for his father who had not the ^
Christian s Church for his mother.

(2) But it has been suggested that Christianity grae social

owed its existence as a visible society to the fact that SSfiSne to y
in the age when it spread there was a special tendency awnwofti
to association in the air. Undoubtedly it was an age
of guilds. 2 " The need of association, of the strength
which comes of association was, at any rate, as great
in antiquity as to-day ; and among the peoples of
antiquity it is the Romans, perhaps, who had the
keenest sense of the need." 3 The religious associations
and trade guilds (sodalitates, collegia) were indeed
ancient institutions at Rome. But the principle of
association had received a great development, beginning
with the later years of the Republic and under the early
Empire. Thus every trade, every interest, came to
have its collegium with its organization more or less
elaborate, its officers, its specified terms of member
ship, its periodical feast. " But it was not necessary,
in order to form an association, to be members of the
same profession, to be neighbours even, or compatriots ;

1 See esp. Boissier (as below) p. 261.

2 See an admirable account Boissier La Religion Romaine bk. ii. ch. 3 :
Mommsen de Collegiis et Sodaliciis Romanorum : Hatch B. L. p. 26 f. My
quotations are from. Boissier.

3 Boissier ii. p. 248.

32 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

it was enough to experience isolation or weakness, to
feel the need of union to fight against misery or ennui.
This need was not rare, especially among the working
classes." 1 The tendency to use this freedom of asso
ciation for purposes of political faction led to its
being put under restraint. No association might be
formed without permission. 2 But notwithstanding-
such prohibition, associations were formed and spread.
" They filled Rome, they spread in the little towns,
they penetrated into the country, they covered the
richest provinces," they honeycombed all ranks of
society. 3 They existed where the authority to re
press should have been strongest even in the army.
Contemporaneously with the early spread of Chris
tianity they developed largely as burial societies in
part, because association in this form was allowed. 4
These burial guilds, in common with perhaps all col
legia, had a religious basis more or less nominal,
though the real purpose of association was of another
sort. 5 With some of the associations the religious
object, the promotion of some special cult, was the
primary and real bond of union. This had been the
case to a very great extent with the Greek guilds. 6

1 Boissier ii. p. 260.
- Hatch B. L. p. 27 n 2 .

3 Boissier ii. p. 250. But the spread was unequal.

4 This we know to have been the case in the first century. See Boissier ii.
p. 280. The inscription from Lanuvium, which is the main evidence of this,
is given at the end of Mommsen s de Collegiis. There were different classes
of burial guilds, some not having the name collegium, but socictas
(Boissier ii. p. 272).

5 Boissier ii. p. 268.

6 Olaaoi, Zpavoi, opyeuves. See Foucart s Les Associations Reliyieuses chez
les Grecs.

i.l The Foundation of the Church. *-&gt;

* O &lt;J

They had come into existence in the days before and
during the Macedonian supremacy, to cultivate some
form of oriental worship with greater freedom than
the State religion would tolerate. They had their
terms of membership, their priests and officers of
various sorts, generally elected annually, their sacred
book, their immutable law, their assembly to pass
decrees each one a microcosm of the State organiza
tion. These Greek guilds had been much less in
fluential, less respectable, and less prevalent than the
Roman. However, they lasted on, and formed an
element in that tendency to associate which (since
the inscriptions have come to be studied) we know
to have been a main characteristic of the otherwise
somewhat monotonous life of the early empire.

Such was the character of the period in which
Christianity spread. No doubt the Christian Church
appeared as one of these multifarious collegia. It
was regarded by Pliny in Bithynia as a collegium
illicitum whose very existence was illegal. Again,
" the first form, in which any Christian body was
recognised by the law, was as a benefit-club with
special view to the interment of the dead." No
doubt, again, the familiarity of the Greek and Roman
world with societies, with the idea of incorporation,
with terms of membership, its privileges and the
loss of them, greatly facilitated the spread of the
Christian Church. It was thus an element in what

1 Lightfoot s Ignatius i. pp. 17-21. The Jewish communities were also
classed with the Olaffoi ; cf. Joseph. Ant. hid. xiv. 10 : Tdios Katffap, 6 ^ue-
repos ffTpaTijybs /cat vTraroy, iv T$ Siardynari KU\VUV 0idcrous ffwdyeffOai Kara.
iro\iv, fnovovs TOIJTOVS QVK eKw\vffft&gt; oirre xp r nt j - ara nfttf^iftUf ovre &lt;rwdftirva troifiv.

34 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

we recognise as the divine preparation for the spread
of the Gospel ; just as the Roman empire itself was
another, and the general use of the Greek language,
and the diffusion of the religion of the Jews through
their dispersion, and the recognition in contemporary
philosophy of the idea of the divine Reason or Word.
But if the question be asked whether the influence
of these contemporary guilds may not have modified
the Christian religion in such a way as to be the cause
of its assuming the form of an association or system
of associations the Church and the Churches the
answer is a decisive negative. 1
(a) NO trace For, in the first place, any conception of real affi-

of such in- *

nity between the Church and the collegia was, as the
quotations above will have shown sufficiently, quite
foreign to the minds of the Christian writers. Ter-
tullian indeed suggests a contrast between them based
on the fact that Christians, and they alone, mutually
supported one another and had all things common ;
but there was no consciousness of resemblance. 2

1 In some later developments Christianity may have borrowed in detail
from contemporary clubs, e.g. the subdivision of monastic bodies into
decuriae and centuriae probably (see Boissier ii. p. 264 with reference
to Jerome s letter) ; again, some customs with reference to the dead and
the use of the term memoria in this connection (cf. /j.efj.6piov, fie^oplr^),
Boissier ii. p. 290. The term cnwoSos was used for the meetings of guildsmen :
cf. (refJLVoT&TT) ffvvoSos Foucartp. 202, sancta synodus (of an actors guild with
immoral reputation) Boissier ii. p. 267 f. But so obvious a term can hardly
be said to have been borrowed to express the meetings of bishops. Also
^KK\r]ffia, but (see next page, note 2 ) not in the Christian sense.

2 The collegia were only very subordinately or slightly charitable asso
ciations (see Boissier i. pp. 302, 303) ; the Greek fyavoi probably not at all.
" Les Cranes," says Foucart (p. 145), " n e"taient pas des societes de secours
mutuels." The stipes menstruae were contributions to benefit-clubs, not
like the weekly alms of the Christians ; see Tertull. Apol. 39. The point of
closest connection between the Church and the guilds lay in the common
meal ; the love-feast of the Christians had shown very early its affinities

I.] The Foundation of the Church. 35

Nothing in fact was less characteristic of the Christian
Church than those natural features of all association
which it shared with the guilds, nothing less expressed
the sentiments of its members towards their mother.
"The resemblances" between the Church and the
collegia, says M. Boissier, "are striking at the first
glance ; as soon as one approaches, the differences
are apparent." l

Secondly, the nomenclature of the Christian com- (?,&gt; Christian

. . i n forms

mumties suggests the minimum of connection. For Derive

Judaism.

in fact the Christian Church had its roots deep in
Jewish soil. It derived from Judaism its charac-

to the guild suppers (i Cor. xi. 17 f. ). But St. Paul meets this danger by
marking the essential difference in origin and aim of the Lord s Supper.
Historically, it was a development of the Paschal supper (St. Matt. xxvi. 7).

1 Boissier ii. p. 302.

- In the collegia and sodalicia we should hear of the album, or roll of mem
bers: the magistri: the quinquennales: thepatroni: thegradns: the
schola : the cena : theedituus : the quaestores. In the Greek Zpavoi or
diaffoi we should have the TT/XXTT arris, the tipxavres, the eTTf/xeX^TTys, the a.Kopoi, the
IfpoTTOioi, the ypafj.fj.aTe\js, the apxiepaviffrris, the ranlas. What an alien atmo
sphere to this is suggested by the Christian nomenclature ! It is the pagan
Lucian who speaks of Peregrinus as (tiacrapxTis of the Christian community.

The characteristic Christian terms are derived from Jewish use; e.g.
tKK\T]ffia has, primarily at least, the sense of the elect people as such the
Church, rather than the classical sense of the assembly, i.e. the people gather
ed together for a special purpose, and the former sense is based on Old
Testament use. Cf. Acts.vii. 38. Thus Vitringa (quoted by Trench New
Testament Synonyms p. 4): "^ fKK\rioia [ = ^np] designat multitudinem
aliquam quae populum constituit, per leges et vincula inter se iunctam, etsi
saepe fiat non sit coacta nee cogi possit." The Hebrew word Jjnp is explained

T T

thus (by contrast to niy&gt; ffwaywyj, coetus congregatus): "universam all-

cuius populi multitudinem vinculis societatis unitam et rempublicam sive
civitatem quandam constituentem. " Tulva-r-^piov again has (at first) the Old Tes
tament meaning of a divine secret communicated, rather than the pagan sense
of a mystery of initiation. So /3a7m&lt;jyu6s, ei/xapiffria, Tpairefa Kvpiov, eiriOfais
Xfip&v, tofj,o\6yriffts, xplfffjia, d5e\(f)ol, xaOfdpa, irpfffj3vTfpos, n-oi^v, TT/JO^TJT^J,
fvayye\i&lt;rT-fis, etc., are all terms of Jewish origin. So perhaps is eTrifficoiros, (see
App. Note K). The prominent Christian functions of prayer, fasting and
almsgiving descend from the Jewish stock, with the whole religious basis
of Christianity.

36 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

teristic nomenclature that is to say, from a source
much more ancient than the Roman empire or
Greek society. The origin of the social form of
Christianity is to be sought in the Jewish conception
of the Messianic kingdom and in the deliberate inten
tion of Him, who founded the Church, in claiming to
be the Messiah.

(3) witness (3) Does, then, the New Testament bear out the
Christ position that Christ appeared as the founder and

fnnnntti *. * J. JL

chinch. organizer of a visible society ? This question shall
be answered from the evidence of (a) the Gospels,
(ft) the Acts, (7) St. Paul s Epistles.

(*&gt; Evidence () The question may be approached with less alarm

of the . . 111

Gospels. because there is a remarkable unanimity among men
of the keenest historical insight in seeing in Jesus one
who above all things came to found a society, a king
dom. " To deny/ says the author of Ecce Homo,
" that Christ did undertake to found and to legislate
for a new theocratic society, and that he did claim
the office of judge of mankind, is indeed possible, but
only to those who altogether deny the credibility of
the extant biographies of Christ. If those bio
graphies be admitted to be generally trustworthy,
then Christ undertook to be what we have described ;
if not, then of course this, but also every other,
account of Him falls to the ground." " The city of
God, of which the Stoics doubtfully and feebly spoke,
was now set up before the eyes of man. It was no
unsubstantial city such as we fancy in the clouds, no
invisible pattern such as Plato thought might be laid
up in heaven, but a visible corporation whose members

I.] The Fottndation of the Church. 37

met together to eat bread and drink wine, and into
which they were initiated by bodily immersion in
water." 1 There are three lines of evidence which
seem to make the truth of this position clear :

First, there is the method of Christ. Nothing is (0 The

method of

more remarkable than the refusal of Christ to commit Christ:
Himself to men as He found them. There is some
thing at first sight repellent in the solemn words of
St. John : Jesus did not commit Himself to those who
first believed in His name, when they saw the miracles,
because He knew all men, and needed not that any
should testify of man, for He knew what was in
man. 2 That sad secret of human nature its lamen
table untrustworthiness the secret which in slow,
embittering experience has often turned enthusiasts
into cynics and made philanthropists mad Jesus
knew it to start with. And, knowing it, He would
not build His spiritual edifice on the shifting sands of
such a humanity. It was not that He distrusted the
capacity of human nature for the highest life. On
the contrary, He came to proclaim the brotherhood of
all men under the realized fatherhood of God but
not the brotherhood of men as they were. Except

1 Ecce Homo [i8th ed.] pp. 39, 128. On this subject of Christ s insti
tution of a visible Church, I should like to refer (among recent writers)
to the Dean of St. Paul s Advent Sermons ii and iii, and his Oxford House
Paper, No. xvii ; Mr. Stanton s Jewish and Christian Messiah ; Dr. West-
cott s Essay on The Two Empires in his Epp. of St. John; Mr. Holland s
Greed and Character ; and Dr. Milligan s Resurrection of our Lord lecture vi.
See also Archbishop Whately Kingdom of Christ Essay ii. init. and F. D.
Maurice Kingdom of Christ i. p. 285 f. These names represent (so far) a
remarkable consensus. Among older English writers no one contends more
powerfully for the church idea than William Law in his Letters to the Bishop
of Bangor ; see esp. Letter iii.

* St. John ii. 23-25.

38 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

ye be converted, He said, ye shall not enter into the
kingdom of heaven. Except a man be born again, he
cannot see the kingdom of God. 1 Man must have a
fresh start : he must be built upon a new foundation :
he must be regenerated, converted, if he is to be fit for
sonship and for brotherhood. So Jesus Christ set
Himself to give humanity a fresh start from a new
centre, and that centre Himself. To do this He with
draws from the many upon the few. To the multi
tude He speaks in parables, that seeing they may
not see, and hearing they may not understand. Only
a few, whom He sees capable of earnest self-sacrifice, of
perseverance, of enlightenment, are gradually initiated
into His secrets. These are the disciples. These
He trains with slow and patient care to appreciate
His Person. From the most ready of these He elicits,
after a time, by solemn questioning a formal confes
sion of His Messiahship a formal confession that He,
the Son of Man, is also the Christ, the Son of the
living God. 2 This thorough recognition of His claim
gives Him something to depend upon. He has got
down to the rock ; He can begin to build. 3 Blessed
art thou, Simon Bar- Jona ; and I say unto thee that
thou art B/ock-Man, and on this rock (the rock of this
human character acknowledging My Divine Sonship

1 St. John iii. 3 f . ; St. Matt, xviii. 3.

2 St. Matt. xvi. 1 6.

3 Holland Creed and Character pp. 46-49. All the idea of this para
graph is admirably expressed in the sermon The Rock of the Church.
" Pity, infinite pity, He gave [the crowds] but Himself He never gave ; He
could not commit Himself unto them. His work, His mission, His purpose
on earth how could they receive it ? how could they understand it ? ... How
can He build [the new house of God] on that loose and shifting rubble, on
that blind movement of the crowd, so vague and so undetermined ? "

I.] The Foundation of the Ctmrch. 39

and Mission) I will build My Church/ This gives us the
clue to His method. All along Christ had had in view
this foundation of the Church, and we see now what
He had been waiting for. It was till He had won out
of the hearts of His disciples that absolute devotion
to His own Person, that complete acknowledgment
of His claim, which would enable them to look away
from all else and become the stable nucleus of a new
society which was to represent His Name. Indeed,
the more we study the Gospels, the more clearly we
shall recognise that Christ did not cast His Gospel
loose upon the world the world which was so incap
able of appreciating it ; that would have been indeed
to cast His pearls before swine ; but He directed all
His efforts to making a home for it, and that by organ
izing a band of men called out of the world/ and
consecrated into a holy unity, who were destined to
draw others in time after them out of all ages and
nations. 1 On this little flock He fixed all His hopes.
He prayed not for the world, but for these whom God
had given Him out of the world. These in wonderful
ways He meant to link to Himself in an indissoluble
unity, as the branches to the vine, that they might
live as an organized body in the world, yet distinct
from it alive with His life, sanctified through His
truth, enlightened by His Spirit. Christ then by His
whole method declared His intention to found a
Church, a visible society of men which should be
distinct from the world and independent of it, even
while it should present before the eyes of all men

1 St. John xvii, and the whole of these last discourses.

4O Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

the spectacle of what their common life might be
come.
sti- Secondly, the intention of Christ to found a

tution of

mentsf cra " social organization is apparent in the solemn cere
monies which He instituted as tokens of discipleship
as well as channels of grace. The sacraments are
social ceremonies. Baptism had been in Jewish tradi
tion the ceremony of initiation into the ancient
Church. As used by John the Baptist, it had been
used in distinct relation to the coming of the king
dom/ As adopted by Christ, it was no doubt meant
to admit into His society, the kingdom which had
come, the Church of the new covenant. 1 And what
ever possible ambiguity attends the conception of
baptism in this respect, is removed by the other
sacrament. The Eucharist is nothing if not social.
Its whole natural basis as a common meal implies a
community. Christ, then, in making baptism and the
Eucharist the sacraments of His kingdom, just as
in making love of the brethren the characteristic of
His disciples, emphasized His intention to attach men
to Himself not as individuals but as members of a
brotherhood.

1 Dr. Hatch calls this an "unproved assumption" (B. L. pref. sec. ed.
p. xii). I should have thought that all possible doubt was set at rest by
the parallel institution of the Eucharist. That at least is the sacrament
of a society. But I cannot understand Dr. Hatch expressing a doubt that
baptism had the social significance. It was never an individual purification
amongst the Jews (see Edersheim s Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah
i. pp. 272-274) ; it was always in connection with the covenant which was
with a race. The baptism of a Jewish proselyte was his incorporation
with the race his new birth. See Sabatier La Didache p. 84 f . (an
excellent passage on the relation of Christian to Jewish baptism) ; Taylor
Teaching of the Twelve Apostles p. 55 f.; and Edersheim ii. app. xii (on the
antiquity of the practice). Cf. also I Cor. x. 2.

I.] The Foundation of the Church. 41

Lastly, and perhaps most conspicuously, the inten- () His
tion of Christ to found a society is prominent in the Messiah -
His whole claim to be the Messiah. The Messianic
king of the Old Testament is the centre of a Messianic
kingdom ; the suffering Servant of Jehovah, by whose
stripes men are healed, is no mere individual, but
also the embodiment and representative of the chosen
race. 1 Christ, then, when He came as the Messiah,
brought the kingdom. The kingdom of heaven is
at hand that is John the Baptist s message, that is
the first word of Christ s preaching. 2 But in Him it
was more than at hand. It had come upon men ;
it was among them. 3 John the Baptist had been
outside it, but now there were those who were inside
it, and who, though they were but little, were
greater* than John the Baptist on that very ac
count. 4 The kingdom had thus a definite limit in
time because it was to be a visible institution and
not a mere invisible association of good men. Christ
had indeed to purify and elevate the conceptions of
His disciples so that they might understand its
spiritual nature and object ; but though it was
spiritual, though it was not adapted to the carnal
wants of the Jews, though it was not of this

1 Stanton Jewish and Christian Messiah p. 122 f.

" But only the Jirst word, and then, too, with the addition given by
St. Mark TreirX^pwrai 6 Kaip6s (Stanton I.e. p. 218).

3 St. Matt. xii. 28; cf. St. Luke xvii. 21. Mr. Stanton seems to be right ia
interpreting ^PTOS vfj.uv, in the midst of you. The kingdom of heaven,
our Lord tells the Pharisees, is not to be found by close watching (irapa-
T-fip-rjffis). It will not be manifest to those who wait merely on external
observation. (Lo, here ! or Lo, there !) For it is among you and ye know it
not.

" St. Matt. xi. 11, 12.

42 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

world, 1 yet it was to be in the world a net to
gather of every kind till the end of the world/ a
visible society, that is, in which evil and good should
be mixed. 2 Christ then came to establish a king
dom of heaven or a kingdom of God. What
does this expression mean ? It means an organized
society of men in which the old barrier which sin
had interposed between heaven and earth has been
. done away, in which Jacob s ancient dream is a dream
no longer, for the angels of God ascend and
descend upon the new humanity, and God and
man are at one again. It is because Christ s new
society is thus heavenly that a divine sanction can
attach to its legislative decisions : thus what they
bind or loose on earth is to be bound or loosed in
heaven, and whose sins they forgive are to be for-
(The relation given, whose sins they retain to be retained. 3 Is

of the f J

wle kingdom then Christ s new society, the Church, simply identi
cal with the kingdom of God or of heaven ? To

1 St. Jolm xviii. 36.

2 St. Matt. xiii. 47. Cf. Stanton I.e. p. 220 f. Add Matt. xxii. 2 (the
Marriage of the Kiiig s Son). "Let us suppose," says William Law (Letter
iii. pp. 8, 9), "that the Church of Christ was this invisible number of people
united to Christ by such internal invisible graces, is it possible that a
kingdom consisting of this one particular sort of people invisibly good should
be like a net that gathers of every kind of fish ? If it was to be compared to
a net it ought to be compared to such a net as gathers only of one kind, viz. ,
good fish, and then it might represent to us a Church that has but one sort of
members. ... If any one should tell us that we are to believe invisible
scriptures and observe invisible sacraments, he would have just as much
reason and Scripture on his side as your Lordship has for this doctrine. And
it would be of the same service to the world to talk of these invisibilities
if the canon of Scripture was in dispute, as to describe this invisible Church,
when the case is with what visible Church we ought to unite."

3 St. Matt, xviii. 17-20 ; St. John xx. 22, 23. I am not raising the question
yet whether the gift in this latter passage is not given to the ministry. See
later, chap. iv.

I.] The Foundation of the Church. 43

answer this question a distinction must be drawn in
view of the double sense in which the kingdom
is said to come. In one sense the kingdom is
already come ; that is, it is established in spiritual
power and all its forces are at work. But, as St.
Augustin has expressed it, "non adhuc regnat hoc
regnum ; " for it has yet to grow like the mustard r
seed, to work its way like the leaven through all
the institutions of the world, it has yet to bear
its universal witness to all the nations ; * only
so at last can the kingdom come in glory. Thus
in one sense the kingdom already exists, in another
sense it has yet to appear. 2 In the first sense, then,
the Church is the kingdom of heaven, and St.
Peter has promised to him the keys not of the
Church/ but of the kingdom of heaven, which the
Church is ; in the second sense, the Church prepares
for the kingdom rather than is it. It represents
it in this age, and passes into it with the dawning
of the age to come. 3

1 St. Matt. xiii. 31-34 ; St. Luke xix. u ; St. Mark xiii. 10, etc.

- All this is expressed in the double use of all the characteristic Gospel
terms, as (1) of things already being enjoyed; (2) of things hoped for. We
are sows, yet we " wait for the adoption " ; we are redeemed, yet we wait for
"the redemption of our bodies" ; we are saved, yet only in the future will
our salvation draw nigh " ; it is now only nearer than when we believed. "
Here in fact the kingdom is in power not in glory or final fulfilment. But it
is because the present Church is a simple anticipation of the Church as it is
to be the same society at an earlier stage that even now it is called
heavenly. We have been " made to sit in heavenly places " : we have
" tasted the powers of the world to come " : the institutions of the Church
are "the heavenly things": and we "are come unto the heavenly Jeru
salem " (Eph. i. 3, 20 ; Heb. vi. 5, ix. 23, xii. 22). So Tertullian has been
quoted as speaking of the Church on earth as "in heaven."

3 Cf. Didache ix. 4 : " Let Thy Church be gathered together from the
ends of the earth into Thy kingdom. " Clem, ad Cor. 42 : oi dTnWoXot . . .
eva.yye\iv/J.fvo&lt;. rrjv /SafftXet ac rov Beov fj.e\\eii&gt; epxevQai- Cf. Church s

44 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

Christ, then, according to the evidence of the
Gospels, founded a community of men, a Church, to
be the pillar and ground of the truth which He came
to bring, to be the household in which His stewards
should dispense the food of God until He came again ; x
and in the great forty days, when He spoke to His
disciples of the things concerning the kingdom of
God, He spoke to them as the first representatives of
that visible society which was to be its earthly
counterpart.
(The church We must not suppose that the institution by

not exclu-

Christ of a Church with a definite limit and an ex
clusive claim is a narrowing of His love. 2 The claim
which the Church makes on every man simply cor
responds to his moral needs as Christ interprets them.
It is because He loves all that He established a Civitas
Dei, wide enough for all, in order to their spiritual
recovery. The Church would indeed represent a
narrowing of the divine love if any were by Christ s
will excluded from it. But it is open to all. And as
there are those to whom the gospel of the kingdom
has never come, or never come with its true appeal,
so we are assured that God s purpose is larger than

Advent Sermons p. 70: The kingdom of God "has its witness, its repre
sentatives in the universal Church of Christ. Nothing can be an adequate
representation" of that invisible kingdom of God ; it extends, even on earth,
beyond even the bounds of the universal Church. But His Church is the
designated and appointed recognition of His kingdom." Ib. p. 72 : The
Church is the religious body which He has called into being, to be the
shadow and instrument of His kingdom."

1 St. Luke xii. 41, 42.

3 See Holland Creed and Character serm. iv. The Secret of the Church,
esp. pp. 59, 60. " God s love in Christ found itself limited. . . . How? Not
by the Church, but by the crowd, by the block of blind and heedless
ignorance."

I.] The Foundation of the Church. 45

His Church on earth. 1 There are last in the know
ledge of God who shall be first in His acceptance,
because they practised all they knew.

(ft) When Christ speaks to St. Peter of the founda- (?) Eviden
tion of the Church, it is still in the future. The
Church only receives its commission to all nations
after His Resurrection. It comes into actual cor
porate life only with the Pentecostal gift. Thus, in
the Acts of the Apostles, the Church goes forth for
the first time a visible community, vitalized by
Christ s Spirit, to be the representative on earth of
the risen and ascended Lord. 2

That Christianity in the Acts is represented by
a community, there can surely be no doubt. The
souls "who were added" at Jerusalem "continued
steadfast in the Apostles teaching and fellowship."
They were members of a society more or less organ-

1 See esp. St. Matt. xxv. 31 f. Cf. Dr. Pusey s Responsibility of Intellect
in Matters of Faith p. 44 [ed. 1879] : "In those ever open portals there
enter that countless multitude whom the Church knew not how to win . . .
or, alas ! neglected to win them. ... In whatever hatred, or contempt, or
blasphemy of Christ nurtured, God has His own elect, who ignorantly worship
Him, whose ignorant fear or longing He Who inspired it will accept."

- "To [the Church] alone," says Prof. Milligan (Resurrection of our Lord,
second thousand, p. 218), "as the representative of the Risen Lord, is the
power entrusted by which [His] work may be successfully accomplished. We
know that this can be done by no other means than the agency of the Spirit ;
and it would seem that the gift of the Spirit is bestowed only through the
Church as the organ upon earth of the Risen and Glorified Lord in heaven.
We dare not indeed restrain the power of the Almighty ; but what we have
to do with is His plan ; and of that plan what has now been said appears to
be one of the most striking characteristics. ... It appears to be the teach
ing of the New Testament that, as it is the prerogative of Christ in His
glorified humanity to bestow the Spirit, so it is only through the Church,
as the representative of that glorified humanity, that the influences of the
Spirit are communicated to the world. " He emphasizes earlier the visible
unity which the Church was meant to have as the representative of the Risen
Christ (p. 204).

46 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

ized. They had all things common. Salvation was
in the community ; " the Lord added " to them " day
by day those who were being saved." l As the new
religion spread over Galilee and Samaria it was still
"the Church." 2 "The Church at Antioch," where
Christians got their new name, 3 is the same society
extending itself to a new city. So when St. Paul
went abroad, he founded " Churches " to prepare
men for the kingdom. 4 And the local Churches are
but branches of one stock. Behind the Churches is
the Church represented by the Apostles. This is
the truth which is impressed on the narrative of the
Apostolic Conference with its authoritative direction
to the Churches " It seemed good to the Holy Ghost
and to us to lay upon you no greater burden than
these necessary things." 5 This is only the exhibition
in act of the authority given by Jesus Christ to His
society over its members, to bind and to loose with
heavenly sanction.
vidence (7) The picture presented in the Acts is the same

of St. Paul s v r m r

Epistles. as that of which we become spectators in St. Paul s
Epistles. He writes to " the Church of God which is
at Corinth," and that Church is undoubtedly a visible
body, containing good and bad members alike. It is
a "temple of God," but a temple which sin can

1 Acts ii. 41-47.

2 Acts ix. 31 : " The Church through the whole of Judaea and Galilee and
Samaria had peace. " The baptism of the eunuch is an act of an exceptional
character.

8 Acts xiii. I ; xi. 26. On the significance of the exact form Christian!
see Simcox s Early Church History p. 62: on the analogy of Herodiani,
Pompeiani, etc., it suggests, not the disciples of a school, but the ad
herents of a leader or king.

4 Acts xiv. 22, 23 ; xv. 41 ; xvi. 5. 5 Acts xv. 28.

I.] The Foundation of the Church. 47

destroy ; * a chosen people, but one like that of the
old covenant, capable of like failure ; 2 it is " the body
of Christ " through sacramental participation in His
life, but there may be " schism in the body." 3
St. Paul then conceives of the local Church as a
visible community of mixed character, but with un-
mistakeable limits. The distinction between those
within and those without is very marked.* But
each local Church is only one representative of the
Church which is general. St. Paul governs each
particular Church in accordance with the evangelical
tradition of truth and life, which is common to all
and to which he is himself subject. 5 He passes back
imperceptibly, without any break in thought, from the
Churches to the Church ; 6 the Church in fact simply
(as far as this world is concerned) consists of the
Churches. Thus, when in the Epistle to the Ephe-
sians he is drawing out the spiritual significance of
the Church as " the body of Christ, the fulness of
Him who filleth all in all " when he is declaring it
to be one, in virtue alike of the one life which it

1 i Cor. iii. 17. - i Cor. x. 1-13.

3 i Cor. x. 16 ; xii. 12-28 It is of course plain why the imperfections of
the Church are dwelt on in connection with the local societies : they are
naturally matters of specially local concern and local treatment.

4 I Cor. v. 9-13 ; cf. xiv. 23 ; 2 Cor. vi. 14 f. Of course the brethren at a
particular place, as at Rome, when St. Paul wrote his Epistle to the saints
there, may not yet have been completely organized into a local Church. That
was, as it is now, a work of time. But a Christian, as such, is a member of
the Christian society, and, unless in exceptional circumstances, of an organ
ized local Church.

5 i Cor. xi. 2 " the traditions " ; i Cor. xv. 3 ; 2 Thess. iii. 6 ; i Cor.
vii. 17 "So ordain I in all the Churches" ; Gal. i. 7, 8 "Though we, or
an angel from heaven, should preach unto you any other gospel ... let him
be anathema."

6 i Cor. xii. 28, xv. 9; Gal. i. 13.

48 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

derives from Christ by the communication of the
Spirit, and of the one truth which apostles and
prophets delivered from Christ, and of the love
which binds, or ought to bind, its members in one 1
he is indeed describing the Christian society "from
an ideal point of view ; " that is to say, he is de
scribing all that the Church potentially is, as when
we too proclaim the Church one, holy, and
catholic. 2 Nevertheless it is the visible, actual
Church of which he is speaking, 3 the Church to
which Christ gave visible officers " some apostles,
some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and
teachers," for the building up of the body of Christ
into an ever more perfect unity. This visible organi
zation or hierarchy belongs plainly to a visible society,
exactly that same society which St. Paul similarly
describes in his Epistle to the Corinthians as " the
body of Christ," even as part of Christ, 4 the Church in
which "God set first apostles, secondly prophets, thirdly
teachers," 5 that is the general community which is

1 Eph. iv. 3-16: It is one body in virtue of the one Spirit whose
indwelling is Christ s indwelling ; it holds one faith (the one faith
mentioned in between the one Lord and the one baptism, both
objective, must be objective too). It ought to live, therefore, in the unity of
love (ver. 3), but the bond of love is a duty which may be neglected.
The inward unity of life, though dependent on outward facts (e.g. one
baptism ), is a reality, whether recognised in practice or not.

2 The Church has never yet so developed all the fulness within her as
to exhibit herself in her full catholic glory and holiness as the bride of
Christ. She is potentially more than she is actually. Potentially catholic,
for example, she still leaves outside her fold the mass of Oriental peoples.

3 See Pfleiderer s account of the Epistle to the Ephesians (Paulinism. ii.
pp. 190-193).

4 The Christ consists of the head and the members (i Cor. xii. 12).

5 i Cor. xii. 27-28. This passage (vv. 12-28) about the body of Christ,
taken with such passages as Gal. iii. 27 ("baptized into Christ") and
i Cor. x. 16,17 (about the Eucharist), seems to me to contain all the truth that

I.] The Foundation of the Church. 49

locally represented in the Churches of Corinth and
Ephesus. 1 St. Paul then means by the Church " a
visible society or aggregation of societies."

It is sometimes argued that St. Paul could not Clnm , h
have believed in salvation through the Church, because Inconsistent

withjustifi-

this contradicts his doctrine of the justifying effect of^,"" 1 *
individual faith. 2 But in fact there is no such con
tradiction. The Christian life is a correspondence
between the grace communicated from without and
the inward faith which, justifying us before God, opens
out the avenues of communication between man and
God, and enables man to appropriate and to use the
grace which he receives in Christ. There is thus no
antagonism, though there is a distinction, between
grace and faith. Now grace comes to Christians
through social sacraments, as members of one spirit-
bearing body. " By one Spirit are we all baptized
into one body " ; " we being many are one bread

/*. &gt;

is developed in the Epistle to the Ephesians ; nor can I see that there is any
thing in the expression "the Church, the pillar and ground of the truth "
( i Tim. iii. 1 5), which might not have occurred in the Epistles to the Ephe
sians or to the Corinthians.

1 Dr. Hatch calls it an unproved assumption that "the Church of which
St. Paul speaks as the body of Christ, the fulness of Him which filleth all
in all, be really, as the Augustinian theory assumes it to be, a visible society,
or aggregation of societies " (B. L. pref. sec. ed. p. xii). His view appears to
coincide with that of Bishop Hoadley, who was Law s opponent. The Bishop
held " as the only true account of the Church of Christ," in general, that it
was " the number of men, whether small or great," who were sincere Chris
tians i.e. the invisible society of the elect. This, he held, is what St. Paul
calls the Church. "It cannot be supposed," he pleads, "that a man s being
of the invisible Church of Christ is inconsistent with his joining himself with
any visible Church ; " but the first is essential, the second is voluntary.
Law deals with trenchant power with this utterly unscriptural distinction
between the universal invisible and particular visible Churches (Letter
iii. p. 6 f.).

- Pfleiderer Hibbert Lectures lect. vi.

5O Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

and one body, for we are all partakers of that one
bread." Thus the doctrine of the Church as the
household of grace is the complement, not the con
tradiction, of the doctrine of faith. Faith is no faith
if it isolates a man from the fellowship of the one body,
and the one body has no salvation except for the sons
of faith. Ignatius then with his strenuous insistence
on churchmanship can rightly, so far, " claim to be a
good Paulinist." 1 In fact St. Paul s teaching about the
Church is given nowhere with more practical force
than in the Epistles to the Corinthians, which belong
to that very group of Epistles in which he fights the
battle of faith. And both principles are brought
into play by him to vindicate against Judaism the
catholicity of the Gospel. Christianity is a catholic
religion, he argues in his earlier Epistles, because it
appeals to a faculty as universal as human nature
the faculty of faith : men are justified by nothing
of national or local observance like the Law ; " it
is one God Who will justify the circumcision by faith
and the uncircumcision through faith." Christianity
is catholic, he argues again in effect, in the Epistles
of the first captivity, because the Person of Christ is
a catholic, a universal Personality ; "by Him were all
things created by Him and for Him and in Him
all things have their consistence." Therefore also
His redemptive power transcends all local, national
distinctions ; "He hath made both (Jews and Gentiles)
one ... in one body." For the unity of that body,
in which on the basis of faith the Gospel offers sancti-

1 Pfleiderer I.e. p. 262 ; Ignatius ad Phil. 8.

i. ] The Foundation of the Church. 5 1

fication to mankind, is by its very essence as the body
of Christ universal in its capacity. But these two
grounds of catholicity are correlative, not antagonistic.

Once again, if there be such a thing as liberty in nor with the

freedom of

law or a " law of liberty," T the obligations of church the "? * ;
membership and the authority of a common rule of
truth are not in any way antagonistic to the freedom
of the spirit. The good citizen, whether of the earthly
or heavenly city, is free in the law by being at one
with the spirit of the law. Here again the same
St. Paul held to both sides of the antithesis, which
is represented by authority and freedom, by fellow
ship and individuality.

The doctrine of the Church is indeed only one i&gt;t agree-

able to the

expression of a principle as broad as human society ai r nmman 0f
the principle that man realizes his true self only bC
by relation to a community, that " he is what he is
only as a member of society." Aristotle said of old
that " the society (the city) is prior to the individual "
prior, that is, in idea, because it is essential to his
being really man, because man is by his very essence
" a social animal." 2 By isolating himself he hinders,
he narrows himself, he perishes : by merging himself
in the larger whole, he realizes his true individuality
and his true freedom. So when God sent redemption
upon the earth, He sent it in a community or kingdom.
Fellowship with God is to be won through fellowship
with His Son, but that not otherwise than through

1 St. James i. 25.

- On the Greek idea of the TroXis see Newman Politics of Aristotle i. p.
560: "a strongly individualized unity, which impresses its dominant ideas
upon its members; etc."

52 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

fellowship with His Church. "That ye may have
fellowship with us " that is why St. John writes his
Epistle l " and truly our fellowship is with the Father,
and with His Son Jesus Christ." Nor are we to sup
pose that this association is only a temporary and
painful expedient that we are to submit to be one
body for a while in order to live a more separate and
isolated life hereafter. No, as the life of perfected
humanity 2 is presented to us in the vision of the
Apocalypse, it is the life of a city indissolubly one. It
is the life of the one bride of Christ, the one humanity,
whose white robes are the distinctive, yet coincident,
"righteousnesses of the saints." ;
TWO miscon- Now that we have brought this investigation to a

ceptions of

of the wth conclusion, we are in a position to repudiate two ways

Church.

of conceiving the development of Christianity.

i. That it i. It has been represented 4 as if at the first stage

developed

v?onf indi- we must conceive of Christians rather as individual
believers who were led to unite in local associations.
This is accounted for by the "tendency to associa
tion," characteristic of the Roman empire of that
date. But association was not at first " a fixed
habit ;" it was not " universally recognised as a
primary duty;" it did not "invariably follow belief."

1 1 St. John i. 3. " Manifesto ostendit B. Johannes quia quicunque societa-
tem cum Deo habere desiderant primo ecclesiae societati debent adunari
(Bede, quoted by Westcott in loc.).

2 I am not wishing to deny that St. John is representing the Church as
she now is. Cf. Milligan The Revelation of St. John p. 228. But it is
certainly a picture of what she will not only be, but be wholly and manifestly,
hereafter.

3 Rev. xix. 8.

1 By Dr. Hatch (B. L. p. 29 f.), if I can understand him rightly. Dr.
Sanday interprets him otherwise (Expositor, Jan. 1887, p. 10 n 1 ).

I.] The Foundation of the Church. 53

Afterwards the local associations succeed in so assert
ing themselves over individual Christians that adhesion
to a community ceases to be voluntary ; a man is no
Christian unless he belongs to one. This is the state
of things which the Ignatian letters were intended to
promote. Still, however, Christians might be supposed
to unite in Churches how and where they pleased.
But later " this free right of association " vanishes ; l
each Church with its bishop and presbytery asserts
itself as the exclusive local " ark of the covenant."
All who would be within the pale must belong to this
one and none other. This is the successful conten
tion of Cyprian. Still later these authoritative local
Churches grow into closer and closer combination.
The idea of the Catholic and Apostolic Faith, due
to St. Irenaeus, 2 had already formed a bond of union
under a common authoritative Creed. Now, the
Churches become one great confederation of societies
in a unity which found expression in ecumenical
councils with their common authority. 3 Gradually,
meanwhile, the hierarchical gradations amongst the
various bishops develop on the lines of the imperial
system.

Now this mode of conceiving the progress of Chris- - tteor y

contrary to

tianity is in direct violation of the evidence. The th
only evidence produced for the supposed first stage
which preceded obligatory association consists in the
fact that the earliest church teachers found it neces-

1 Hatch B. L. pp. 103-106.

3 Ib. p. 96 : " Its first elaboration and setting forth was due to one mail s
genins."

3 Ib. pp. 97, I75-189-

54 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

sary to preach the duty of association, " if not as an
article of the Christian faith, at least as an element
of Christian practice." This is evidenced by the
warning in the Epistle to the Hebrews against forsak
ing the Christian assemblies ; 2 by St. Jude s denun
ciation of those who " separate themselves" ; 3 by the
passages in the Shepherd of Hennas 4 about those who
" have separated themselves " and so " lose their own
souls." What do such utterances really go to prove ?
A separatist tendency on the part of those who had
been Christians 5 a sin of schism, denounced like any
other sin. But the idea is nowhere discernible that
every Christian was not, as such, a member of the
Church, bound to the obligations of membership.
Schism is a sin in Scripture 7 as really as in Ignatius
letters. Next, the supposed right of free association
into Churches never existed. No doubt the tendency
to association in the Roman empire made (as has been
said) for the spread of the Christian Church. It made
the idea of a Church easier to men s minds. But
more than this the facts of the case will not allow us
to grant. Christ Himself constituted the Church and
gave it its authority, so that it came upon men as a
divine gift, with a divine claim, through the apostolic
preaching. " Jesus," says Mr. Stanton, "never speaks

1 Hatch B. L. p. 29. - Hebrews x. 25.

8 St. Jude 19. 4 See above, p. 22.

5 That they had been members of the Church is quite plain in the passages
quoted from Hennas.

6 Of course he might find himself in an isolated position away from
church privileges, as may happen to-day.

7 The heretic is the man of self-willed, separatist tendencies (Tit.
iii. 10). Cf. St. Jude 19 ; St. Matt, xviii. 17.

I.] The Foundation of the Church 55

of the kingdom as something which men could con
stitute for themselves; it must come to them." 1
From the beginning of Christianity it came to men
and took them up, one by one, out of their isolation
and alienation from God into its holy and blessed
fellowship. It was never a creation of their own by
free association. The idea is a figment. From the
first each local Church with its organization repre
sented the Divine will for man s salvation in one
body. Those who would share what Christ came to
give must be added to it. Once added to it, they
must remain in it, obedient children of the divine
mother, loyal citizens of the city of the saints. Thus
Cyprian s vigorous condemnation of schismatics who
broke off from the Church at Carthage or in Home in
volved no new principle at all, 2 nothing that was not
implied in Ignatius cry "one altar, one Eucharist,
one bishop " or in Clement of Rome s remonstrance
with the schismatical party at Corinth. Nor was
the Catholic Apostolic Faith an idea originated or
substantially developed by Irenaeus, though he gave
it a new and powerful application. Irenaeus is any
thing rather than a genius who originates. This idea of
the universal authoritative tradition of the Christian
faith, as it made possible in a later epoch the general
councils, as it inspired Clement in Alexandria quite
as much as Irenaeus in the West, so in earlier days

1 Jewish and Christian Messiah p. 218.

2 The Eastern Churches which were at first inclined to accept Novatian
would have accepted him as the bishop of Rome, not as one among a number.
The question was simply who was the bishop. See further in chap. iii.

3 ad Phil 4.

56 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

it made possible the Catholic Epistles, l and was
present in the Church since men first rallied to
the apostolic doctrine. Whatever development there
was, then, from the day of Pentecost till the Council
of Chalcedon did not touch the truth of the visible
Church or aggregation of Churches, which it always
presupposed, nor the corresponding obligation of mem
bership in it : it presupposed the doctrine of the visible
Church with its threefold unity in the life which it
derived from its Head, Christ, in the truth of the
apostolic tradition, and in the fellowship and inter
course of love.
2 u T H t .!i he 2. It remains to point out that this idea of the

church idea

de a v s eiop man Church, known as Catholicism, was not the creation
of western influences and cannot historically be
identified (as is sometimes 2 done) with Romanism.
Was there, then, nothing new in that western concep
tion of the Church which was finally expressed in the
mediaeval papacy ? Novelty there undoubtedly was,
but it was not in any sense the doctrine of the
visible Church. What then do the facts of history
allow us to describe as Catholicism and what as
Romanism ?

imt there is Church unity in the New Testament is expressed

an original

thfriilibif primarily in such metaphors as those of the body

Church

1 Harnack Texte u. Untersuch. ii band, heft 2. p. 105.

2 See for this idea, in a curiously unhistorical shape, Allen s Continuity of
Christian Thought pp. 100-105. Cf. Harnack s Dogmengesch. i. pp. 362-371
(Katholisch u. Romisch) ; also Kenan s Hibbert Lectures. The latter
assumes in support of his theory that St. Luke s writings (p. 132), the
Preaching of Peter the basis of the Clementine Homilies and Recognitions
(p. 134) and probably the Pastoral Epistles (p. 163) derive from the Roman
Church and represent its ideas. At least the Pastoral Epistles, like the
Ignatian (p. 1 70), exhibit what is characteristically the Roman temper !

I.] The Foundation of the Church. 57

of Christ or the Vine with its branches. What
primarily constitutes the unity of the Church is the
life of Christ derived to its members by His Spirit.
The Church is one on account of the spiritual presence \
which makes her the temple of God or the * Christ- /
bearer. None the less the Church is an external
reality, a visible society ; for the principle of the
Incarnation, which governs the Church, links the
inward to the outward, the spiritual to the material
there is one body as well as one Spirit.
Spiritual gifts are given by sacraments, and sacra
ments are visible and social ceremonies of incorpora
tion, or benediction, or feeding. Thus the Christian s
spiritual privileges depend on membership of a visible
society ; but the visible society exists not as an instru
ment of external secular authority, but as the divine
home of spiritual edification, for the building up of

* *

the body of Christ, for the perfecting of men into ,
one into the unity of the life of God. 1 ^ Therefore
the instrument of unity is the Spirit ; the basis of
the unity is Christ, the Mediator ; the centre of the
unity is in the heavens, where the Church s exalted
Head lives in eternal majesty human, yet glorified.
If it be the case, as Ignatius taught (and of course
that is still an open question in this discussion), that a

1 St. John xvii. 23. It is characteristic of the scriptural and fundamental
idea of church unity that it should be a progressive thing, progressing with a
spiritual advance ; not an external thing once for all imposed. See St. John
as above, St. Paul s Epistle to the Ephesians iv. 13 et s difdpartXeiov. See also
on the Shepherd of Hermas, above p. 2 1 . The unity of the Church becomes
constantly closer as the barriers which sin interposes between man and God,
and so between man and his fellows, are removed. Sin, on the other hand,
tends to mar the unity by schisms which may be more or less pronounced.

58 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

bishop is an essential element of the organization of
each visible Church, then he will be the centre and
symbol of local unity ; but, as the local Church exists
only in order to bring men into relation to Christ and
to the redeemed humanity which Christ is gathering
to Himself in the unseen world, so the catholic
Church, the society which each local Church repre
sents, has its centre of unity in Christ. 1 Only (so to
speak) the lower limbs of the body of Christ are on
earth. The Church is a society in the world, but not
wholly in the world, nor existing for the world s ends.
Thus the primary importance of its organization is
local. Each local Church exists to keep open (so to
speak) the connection of earth and heaven ; to keep
the streams of the water of life flowing ; to maintain
and teach and protect the creed which moulds the
Christian character. Of course the Christian Churches
have a necessary relation to one another. They con
stitute together one body ; they maintain one tradi
tion, and the test of it is found in their consent ; they
exhibited, they ought still to exhibit, an unbroken
fellowship. At the same time each has a relative
independence, 2 for the authority over all is that of a
common tradition, of which the witness lies in the
general consent (as expressed most fully in a general
council), coupled with the canon of Scripture. 3 Such
is the conception of the Church as existing for the

1 See the passage from Ignatius quoted before (p. 24) with the Bishop of
Durham s comment.

As St. Cyprian emphasized. See in chap. iii.

3 So the rule of faith is formulated by Irenaeus, i. 10. I, 2, and iii. 1-5,
Tertull. de Praescr. 27-36, Vincent. Commonit. 2, 9, 20, 23, 29.

i.J The Foundation of the Church. 59

ends of grace and truth, - which can be justly
described as Catholic. 1

Enough has been said to enable us to indicate by distinct from

. the Roman

contrast what may historically be called its Roman ^
development. The scriptural and catholic concep
tion admitted of development in this sense, that,
saving the original principle, the relations between
the different Churches admitted of elaboration as
facilities for communication increased under imperial
recognition, or as the authority of the common tradi
tion was forced into prominence by the disintegrating
effects of Gnosticism and other heresies. But the
Roman development gave a new colour to the idea of
the Church, not indeed by the introduction of any
wholly novel element, but by distorting the idea of
its function and unity. It has been already noticed
how the Roman Church inherited the imperial con
ceptions of empire and government. The injunction

" Tu regere imperio populos, Bomane, memento,
Parcere subiectis et debellare super bos"-

might have been spoken to the popes as well as to
the emperors. At Rome, then, to a slight extent

1 On this conception of the Church see a typical passage in St. Augustin
Enarr. in Psalm. Ps. Ivi. I : " Quoniam totus Christus caput est et corpus
. . . caput est ipse salvator noster, passus sub Pontio Pilato, qui nunc postea
quam resurrexit a mortuis, sedet ad dexteram Patris : corpus autem eius est
ecclesia ; non ista aut ilia, sed toto orbe diffusa ; nee ea quae nunc est in
hominibus qui praesentem vitam agunt, sed ad earn pertinentibus etiam his
qui fuerunt ante nos et his qui futuri sunt post nos usque in finem saeculi.
Tota enim ecclesia constans ex omnibus fidelibus, quia fideles omnes membra
sunt Christi, habet illud caput positum in caelis quod gubernat corpus suum ;
etsi separatum est visione, sed annectitur caritate." Cf. the excellent
account of the Church in Mr. Mason s The, Faith of the Gospel ch. vii. 9,
10 and ch. viii.

60 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

perhaps even from Victor s days to a more palpable
extent from the fifth century, the idea of the Church
becomes in a measure secularized. The Church be
comes a great world-empire for purposes of spiritual
government and administration. The primary con
ception of her unity becomes that of unity of govern
ment, the sort of unity which most readily submits
itself to secular tests and most naturally postulates a
visible centre and head : the dominant idea becomes
that of authority. All the needs of the early mediaeval
period tended to add strength to this tendency, for
what the world wanted was above all things order,
discipline, rule. Thus the conception of government
tends to overshadow earlier conceptions of the Church s
function even in relation to the truth. Compare the
Roman Leo s view of the truth with that of the
Alexandrian Didymus or Athanasius, and the con
trast is marked. Both the western and eastern
writers insist equally on the truth of the Church
dogma ; but to the eastern it is the guide to the
knowledge of God, to the western it is the instru
ment of authority and of discipline. Once again, the
over-authoritativeness of tone which becomes charac
teristic of the Roman Church makes her impatient
of the more slow and laborious and complex methods
of arriving at the truth on disputed questions which
belonged to the earlier idea of the rule of faith.
The comparison of traditions, the elaborate appeal to
Scripture, these methods are too slow and sometimes
(as the revelation in this world is incomplete x ) yield no

1 Of. I Cor. xiii. 9-12.

I.] The Foundation of the Church. 61

decisive result : something is wanted more rapid, more
imperious. It is no longer enough to conceive of the
Church as the catholic witness to the faith once for
all delivered. She must be the living voice of God,
the oracle of the Divine will. Now, as the strength
and security of witness lies in the consent of indepen
dent testimonies, so the strength of authoritative,
oracular utterance lies in unimpeded, unqualified
centrality, and Christendom needs a central shrine
where divine authority speaks.

Thus an essentially different idea of the Church s
function finds expression in the general councils and
in the papacy. At least a differently balanced idea
of the function of the episcopate finds expression in
the catholic conception of the bishop as securing the
channels of grace and truth and representing the
divine presence, and in the Roman conception of an
external hierarchy of government centering in the
papacy. The conflict between the two conceptions
begins perhaps even in the days of Victor or Stephen ;
it bears fruit in the Great Schism and in the further
schisms of the Reformation. 1 Of course the Roman
doctrine of church unity does not annihilate the other
and older conception. The bishop remains still in the
Roman Church what he was from the beginning, but
another idea has been superadded, and it is this
superadded idea which differentiates the Romanized
from the primitive and undivided Church. With
this superadded conception we shall not be further

1 It is not suggested that the Roman claims were more than one among
several causes of these schisms.

62 Christian Ministry. [CHAP. I.

concerned in this argument. We have only to do
with the fundamental doctrine of the visible Church
as the body of Christ, which is inseparably associated
with the doctrine of the faith and the sacraments, and
which we are now in a position to assume was a con
ception held from the first, and which runs up for its
primary authority to the will of Christ the King.

CHAPTER II.

APOSTOLIC SUCCESSION.

JESUS CHRIST, we are now in a position to assume. Did Christ

institute a

founded a visible society, which, as embodying God s ministr * ?
new covenant with men and representing His good
will towards them, was intended to embrace all
mankind. As that society has existed in history, it
has exhibited a more or less broad and marked dis
tinction between clergy and laity, priests and people,
pastors and their flocks. Such a distinction would,
it may be argued, inevitably grow up on the same
principles which regulate the division of labour in
other departments of human life. The question then
arises : Is the Christian ministry simply, like a police
force, a body which it has been found advantageous
to organize and may be found advantageous to re
organize ? Did Christ in instituting His society leave
it to itself to find out its need of a differentiation
of functions and develop a ministry, or did He, on
the other hand, when He constituted His society,
constitute its ministry also in the germ ? Did He
establish not only a body, but an organized body, with
a differentiation of functions impressed upon it from
the beginning ?

It may be urged that the former alternative is ^ ^we

64 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

more in accordance with what we should expect, 1 for
it will exhibit the Christian ministry as of a piece with
the ordinary products of social evolution. Such a
presumption might be met in a measure, antecedently
to the question of historical evidence, by the considera
tion that founders of great institutions, where they
successfully observe and correspond to the conditions
of their time, are able, to a certain degree at least, to
anticipate the results of evolution and impress upon
their foundations from the first an abiding form. 2
But it is a more satisfactory consideration that the
Church is naturally of a piece with the Incarnation,
the fruits of which it perpetuates, and that, as was
pointed out in the last chapter, has a finality which
belongs to its very essence. It is not that the re
ligion of Christ, as final and supernatural, has no
progress or development in it ; it is not a code of
rules covering all possible occasions of the future.
But it is a religion which in its principles and essence
is final, which contains in itself all the forces which
the future will need; so that there is not!) ing to be
looked for in the department of religion beyond or
outside it, while there is everything to be looked for
from within. This essential finality is expressed in
the once for all delivered faith, in the fulness of

1 As by Hatch B. L. pp. 17-20.

- This is conspicuously the case with Islam. Mahommed incorporated
pre-existing elements of Arab and Jewish belief of the Christian faith also
in a debased form; it may be said with truth that there was no originality
in the theology of Islam. But its founder incorporated the elements that
came to hand into a book, and on the basis of his book founded a religion
which with its motives, its institutions, its obligations was a new thing in
the world and yet had a remarkable completeness ab ovo. That is to say,
it was as complete as its fundamental idea would allow of its being.

if.] Apostolic Succession. 65

the once for all given grace, in the visible society
once for all instituted ; and it is at least therefore a
tenable proposition * that it should have been ex
pressed in a once for all empowered and commissioned
ministry.

That it is much more than a tenable proposi
tion that it is a proposition which states a fact of
history it will be the business of succeeding chapters
to show. What it is proposed to do now is to clear but the P rm.

ciple of the

up the idea of the Christian ministry to explain ^

what is meant by it, and why it is a reasonable idea pilmed"
before we go on to test, with as rigorous a criticism
as can be applied, its basis in history.

Why adopt such a method ? it will be said. Why
explain first what you are going to look for, and then
proceed to look for it ? Why not let the principle,
whatever it may be, emerge simply from the facts ?
The answer is perhaps a twofold one. First, that
the method here proposed corresponds to the method
by which we actually in most cases arrive at convic
tions. We do not start afresh ; we take the tradi
tional belief, the traditional position, and test it.
This is the normal method of human progress. If
the traditional belief will not bear the light of facts,
it has to be modified, or even reversed ; we have to
go through the process which a modern writer calls
the correction of our premises. But we give, and
rightly give, a prerogative to an accepted position, so
far at least as to start from it. Secondly, it may

1 See Hatch B. L. [sec. ed.] pref. p. xii, where the coherence of ideas it
recognised.

66 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

be answered that the method of hypothesis is one of
the most normal methods of scientific inquiry. The
scientific investigator is not asked to approach the
facts without antecedent ideas, without anticipations,
without desires ; to ask this of him in the field of
nature or of history is, in most cases, to ask an impos
sibility. What we have a right to expect is that the
facts shall be looked at with severe impartiality and
be allowed their legitimate weight to support, or con
travene, or modify the original hypothesis. And
further, the scientific investigator, when he makes
public demonstration of the results of his investiga
tions, is not expected to re-enact all the process he has
himself gone through. He asks the right question at
once ; he propounds at once the right hypothesis, and
proceeds to verify it. That is what it is proposed to
do here. There have been several theories or, to
speak more accurately, modifications of one theory of
the Christian ministry, which, as having more or less
authority in tradition, have some prerogative claims to
be examined, but which will not, as they are, stand
the verifying test of facts. Underlying them there is
a theory that will. There is, that is to say, a number
of more or less perverted conceptions of what the
Christian ministry has always essentially meant, as
well as a true one. In what follows an attempt will be
made to distinguish the true idea from its perversions.
Any one who undertakes to vindicate for any
Christian truth or institution its claim to perman
ence or authority its claim, that is, to be an integral
part of the Christian revelation is confronted on the

II.] Apostolic Succession. 67

threshold of his undertaking with a difficulty. The
idea or institution has been abused, or overlaid with
what exaggerates or disfigures it. He has to attempt
what makes a considerable claim on mental patience,
to draw distinctions between the abuse of a thing and
its use, between the permanence of a thing in its
fundamental principle and its permanence with the
particular set of associations which in this or that
epoch have clustered round it. This is remarkably
true of the institution of the Christian ministry and
the associated idea of the apostolic succession. It is because its

* perversions

maintained, though not perhaps with very much truth, SMer- e
that superseded elements of Judaism survived and
discoloured more or less the conception of the ministry
in the Church : it is much more certain that in the
early Middle Ages this, with every other Christian
institution, ran a great risk of becoming incrusted
with associations left by the dying forms of paganism.
Again, the ambition of the clergy and the spiritual
apathy and ignorance of the mass of the laity have
led to its assuming false claims and a false prominence.
Feudal and other passing forms of political society
have adopted it and more or less perverted it to their
own ends, so that, when their day was over or their
support withdrawn, it has been left with its hold on
human life weakened, because its true nature was
overlaid and forgotten. Once again, it has lived in
the security of uncritical epochs and based its claims
on careless statements, and the steady rise of an
exacter examination of facts has seemed to shake its
foundations.

68 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

Thus the conception of the ministry needs purging
before it can be vindicated. 1 " There is a short way,"
says St. Cyprian, "for religious and simple minds to
lay aside error, or to find and elicit the truth. For,
if we go back to the head and origin of the divine
tradition, human error ceases : the real nature of the

1 The learned Oratorian Morinus, in his work de Sacris Ordinationibu*
(A.D. 1686), offers a good example of a Christian student purging an idea in
order to vindicate it. At the time when he wrote there were several false
conceptions current on his subject. Notably, it was held that the essential
matter (or rite) of ordination lay in the tradition of the instruments,
i.e. the giving to the ordinand the characteristic vessels of his ministry. This
scholastic doctrine had gained expression in a formal papal decree, though
Morinus does not mention this. Eugenius iv. had written thus in his De-
cretum de Unione Armeniorum (the decree which affirmed the doctrinal
basis of union with the see of Rome for the benefit of the Armenians, who
were seeking reunion at the time of the Council of Florence A.D. 1439) :
" Sextum sacramentum est ordinis, cuius materia est illud per cuius tra-
ditionem confertur ordo, sicut presbyteratus traditur per calicis cum vino
et patenae cum pane porrectionem. Diaconatus vero per libri evangeliorum
dationem. . . . Formasacerdotii talis est : Accipe potestatem offer endi sacri-
ficium in ecclesia pro vivis et mortuis, in nomine Patris et Filii et Spiritus
sancti : et sic de aliorum ordinum formis prout in pontifical! Romano late
continetur" (Labbe Collect. Condi, xviii. p. 550). Here, it will be seen,
there is no mention at all of the laying-on of hands, and this represented
for some centuries the authoritative doctrine. The absence of the porre ctio
instrumentorum, with the accompanying words, from our ordination of
priests had been made the standing objection against the validity of our
orders (cf. Estcourt Question of Angl. Ord. pp. 260-1). This was due,
as Morinus remarks (p. iii. ex. i. i. i), to the fact that the " doctores
scholastici" were "Graecarum ordinationum ignari et antiquae Latinorum
traditionis incuriosi." He was at pains to make an appeal to antiquity. He
investigated and reproduced in his work types of early Oriental ordinations
from ancient Greek and other Eastern MSS, and demonstrated the absence
of the ceremony in question from these rites. Yet Oriental ordinations were
confessedly valid. He then reproduced the earliest types of Western ordi
nations from Latin MSS, and demonstrated that in the West the ceremony
with its accompanying words was a later addition unknown in the first
thousand years of the Church s history. He then asserted the principle that
only that could be essential which had been the practice both in East and
West and the constant practice from the first, i.e. the laying-on of hands
with accompanying prayer. Thus he purged the tradition. It is the frank
inquiry which characterizes his work, and his genuine belief in historical
evidence and its value as a corrective of current teaching, which has given
his work the high place among works on ecclesiastical subjects which it
deservedly holds.

II. J Apostolic Succession. 69

heavenly mysteries is seen, and whatever was hid in
darkness and under a cloud is opened out into the
light of truth. If a canal which used to give a copious
supply of water suddenly fails, men go to the fount to
find the reason of the failure whether the water has
dried up at the spring, or has been intercepted in mid-
course ; so that, if this happened through a defect in
the canal preventing the flow of the water, it may be
repaired and the water gathered for the supply of the
city s wants may reach them in the abundance and
purity with which it left the fount. This is what, on
the present occasion, the priests of God should do,
keeping the divine precepts, so that, if the truth in
any matter has been weakened or impaired, we may go
back to the original of our Lord and His Gospel or to
the apostolic tradition, and let the principles of our
action take their rise there, where our order has its
origin. " *

Whether the idea, now to be expounded repre
sents the original of our Lord and the apostolic
tradition, will be the question afterwards. We take
it now only as an hypothesis, and it is this. Let it be The idea of

the apostolic

supposed that Christ, in founding His Church, founded t s e c
also a ministry in the Church in the persons of His
Apostles. 2 These Apostles must be supposed to have

1 Ep. Ixxiv. jo.

2 "By the Church on earth," says Mohler (Symbolism pt. i. ch. 5
36), " Catholics understand the visible community of believers, founded by
Christ, in which, by means of an enduring apostleship, established by Him and
appointed to conduct all nations, in the course of ages, back to God, the works
wrought by Him during His earthly life for the redemption and sanctifica-
tion of mankind are, under the guidance of His Spirit, continued unto the
end of the world."

70 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

had a temporary function in their capacity as founders
under Christ. In this capacity they held an office by
its very nature not perpetual the office of bearing
the original witness to Christ s resurrection and mak
ing the original proclamation of the Gospel. 1 But
underlying this was another a pastorate of souls, a
stewardship of divine mysteries. This office insti
tuted in their persons was intended to become per
petual, and that by being transmitted from its first
depositaries. It was thus intended that there should
be in every Church, in each generation, an authorita
tive stewardship of the grace and truth which came
by Jesus Christ and a recognised power to transmit
it, derived from above by apostolic descent. The men,

1 See Pearson Determinatio Theol. i (in his Minor Tkeol. Works i.
pp. 283, 284, and quoted by Dr. Liddon in A Father in Christ [sec. ed.]
pref. pp. x-xii) : " Ordinem episcopalem fuisse in ipsis apostolis institutum
ac per successionem ab ipsis propagatum. Ad hanc assertionem explicandam
sciendum est, concessam fuisse apostolis duplicem potestatem, temporariam
unam et extraordinariain, ordinariam alteram diuque permansuram. Prior
potestas duplicem respectum habuit, ad Christum et ad ecclesiam. Respectu
Christi facti sunt apostoli peculiares testes resurrectionis eius : respectu
domus Dei facti sunt lapides in fundamento, h.e. ad praedicandam fidem
haud pruis, re velatam, ad fundandas ecclesias, ad colligeiidum populum Deo
instituti et instruct!. Posterior potestas erat regendi ecclesias iam fundatas,
praedicandi verbum fidelibus collectis, administrandi sacramenta populo Dei,
ordinandi ministros ad ecclesiastica munia, peragendi omnia ad salutem Chris-
tianorum necessaria. Quod erat in iis temporarium, id erat pure et peculia-
riter apostolicum ; quod autem erat ordinarium et perpetuum, idem erat in
eisdem prqprie episcopale. Acceperunt totam potestatem a Christo : quie-
quid erat in eis personale, cum ipsis mortuum est ; quicquid erat omnibus
ecclesiae temporibus necessarium, ipsorum, dum viverent, manibus transmis-
sum est. Dixit Christus apostolis Sicut misit me Pater, ita et ego mitto
vos. Sicut ipse habuit a Patre mandatum docendi populum et ministros
ad hoc necessaries necessaria auctoritate instructos deputandi, ita et apo
stoli habuerunt idem officium et mandatum cum eadem potestate ministros
eligendi et ita successive usque ad consummationem saeculi continuata suc-
cessione. Est itaque apostolus episcopus extraordinarius, est episcopus
apostolus ordinarius ; atque ita episcopatus fuit in apostolis a Christo insti-
tutus, in successoribus apostolorum ab apostolis derivatus."

ii. J Apostolic Succession. 71

who from time to time were to hold the various offices
involved in the ministry and the transmitting power
necessary for its continuance, might, indeed, fitly he
elected by those to whom they were to minister. In
this way the ministry would express the representative
principle. 1 But their authority to minister in what
ever capacity, their qualifying consecration, was to
come from above, in such sense that no ministerial act
could be regarded as valid that is, as having the
security of the divine covenant about it unless it

was performed under the shelter of a commission,

.
received by the transmission of the original pastoral

authority which had been delegated by Christ Him
self to His Apostles.

This is ^what is understood by the apostolic suc
cession of the ministry. /""It will be seen how, thus con- it com*

spends to the

sk ceived, the ministry corresponds in principle to the incarnation,

Incarnation and the sacraments, and, indeed, to the
original creation of man. In all .these cases the

.. material comes from below. Christ s humanity is of
" 4*.\ i

real physical origin of the -stock of Adam. The

material of the sacraments is common water, " bread

of the earth," common wine. " Of the dust of the
ground the Lord God formed man." But this material,
which is of the earth, is in each case assumed (though
. not in each case in the same sense) by the Spirit
from above. The Divine Son assumes the humanity,
and makes it redemptive. A consecration from above
comes upon the sacrament; "the bread which is of

1 Proper election was requisite, " not for the authority itself but for the
success of the exercise of it : " cf. Denton s Grace of the Ministry p. 183.

&gt;

72 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

the earth," which man offers for the divine accept
ance, " receiving the invocation of God, is no longer
common bread, but Eucharist made up of two things,
an earthly and a heavenly." 1 "God breathed into
man s nostrils the breath of life." In each of these
cases we have the material offered from below and
the empowering consecration from above. It is just
these two elements, then, that are present to con
stitute the ministry. Those who are to be ordained
are, like the Levites, the offering of the people ; but
they receive, like Aaron and his sons, their consecra
tion from above. 2
eipie It is a matter of very great importance as will

of succession &lt;

unt e than 01 " appear further on to exalt the principle of the
leministry. apostolic succession above the question of the exact
(6

1 Iren. iv. 18. 5.

2 In the Dissertation on the Christian Ministry, appended to his com
mentary on the Philippians, (on which see Appended Note A,) Dr. Light-
foot maintains that the priests of the Old Testament were only the "dele
gates of the people " "the nation thus deputes to a single tribe the priestly
functions which belong to itself as a whole" (Dissert, pp. 182, 183). Surely
dormitat Homerus. His reference is to the ]aying-on of hands by the
people upon the Levites (Numb. viii. 10). But whatever significance this act
had, it had surely nothing to do with the ordination of the priests, the sons
of Aaron. These had been consecrated to their office " before this laying-on
of hands upon the Levites took place, and with far different ceremonies, by
Moses himself, without any intervention of the people whatever" (Willis
Worship of the Old Covenant p. 112). Thus, if the Levites represent the
self-consecration of the people, the lay -priesthood, (Numb. viii. 10-20,)
Aaron, who is to " offer the Levites before the Lord" (ver. n) Aaron, to
whom, with his sons, God is said to have " given the Levites as a gift to do
the service of the children of Israel" (ver. 19) Aaron, and his sons the priests,
represent the ministers of the covenant instituted by God Himself, whose
prerogative was so jealously guarded, even against the sons of Levi, in the
matter of Korah (Numb. xvi). " Moses himself, as the representative of the
unseen King, is the consecrator" (Diet. Bible, s.v. PRIEST, ii. p. 917). [I am
speaking of the whole Old Testament, as the writers of the New Testament
knew it, without discussing the question of the date of different portions of
the Law.]

Apostolic Succession.

form of the ministry, in which the principle has
expressed itself, even though it be by apostolic order
ing. What is meant is this : the apostolic succession
has taken shape how uniformly the next chapter
will show in a threefold ministry, consisting of a
single bishop in each community or diocese with
presbyters and deacons, the bishop alone having the
power of ordaining or conferring ministerial authority
on others, the presbyters constituting a co-opera
tive order which shares with him a common priest
hood, and the deacons holding a subordinate and
supplementary position. But this is rather the out
come of a rjrinciple than itself a principle, at any rate
a primary or essential principle. 1 No one, of whatever
part of the Church, can maintain that the existence
of what may be called, for lack of a distinctive term,
monepiscopacy is essential to the continuity of
the Church. Such monepiscopacy may be the best
mode of government, it may most aptly symbolize
the divine monarchy, it may have all spiritual expe
diency and historical precedent on its side nay, more,
it may be of apostolic institution : but nobody could
maintain that the continuity of the Church would be
broken if in any given diocese all the presbyters were
consecrated to the episcopal office, and governed as a
co-ordinate college of bishops without presbyters or
presbyter-bishops. 2 A state of things quite as abnor-

1 See Church Principles, by W. E. Gladstone, pp. 244, 245, 252, 253.

2 "The things proper to bishops," says Bishop Bilson (Perpet. Govt. of Christ s
Church ch. xiii), " which might not be common to presbyters, were singularity
in succeeding and superiority in ordaining." But of these two things the
latter is really that which forms the vital distinction between the orders.

74 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

mal as this existed for many centuries in the Celtic
Church of Ireland. Something equivalent to this
very arrangement has been commonly believed in the
West to have existed in the early Church.

Why was the violation of the ordinary arrange
ment of the ministry regarded in these cases as a
matter of only secondary importance ? Because the
principle of the apostolic succession was not violated.
There have always (it is here supposed) existed in
the Church ministers, who, besides the ordinary
exercise of their ministry, possess the power of trans
mitting it ; they may, so far, be one or many in each
community ; but, when they ordain men to the holy
offices of the Church, they are only fulfilling the func
tion intrusted to them out of the apostolic fount of
authority. There are other ministers, again, who
have certain clearly understood functions committed
to them, but not that of transmitting their office.
Should these ever attempt to transmit it, their
act would be considered invalid. For this is the
church principle : that no ministry is valid which is
assumed, which a man takes upon himself, or which
is merely delegated to him from below. That
ministerial act alone is valid which is covered by a
ministerial commission received from above by suc
cession from the Apostles. This is part of the great
principle of tradition. " Hold the traditions," reiter
ates the Apostle. The whole of what constitutes
Christianity is a transmitted trust a tradition which
may need purging, but never admits of innovation,
for nihil innovandum nisi quod traditum is a

II.] Apostolic Succession. 75

fundamental Christian principle. For instance, the
truth revealed in Christ is adequate to all time.
It is fruitful of innumerable applications and adap
tations to the new wants of each age. It may need
setting free and purifying from accretions from time
to time, but not more. What breaks the tradition
is heresy the intrusion, that is, of a new and alien
element into the deposit, having its origin in personal
self-assertion. This conception of heresy is involved
in the very idea of a revelation once for all made.
Now, what heresy is in the sphere of truth, a viola
tion of the apostolic succession is in the tradition
of the ministry. Here too there is a deposit handed
down, an ecclesiastical trust transmitted ; and its
continuity is violated, whenever a man takes any
honour to himself and assumes a function not com
mitted to him. Judged in the light of the Church s
mind as to the relation of the individual to the whole
body, such an act takes a moral discolouring. The
individual, of course, who is guilty of the act may
not incur the responsibility in any particular case
through the absence of right knowledge, or from other
causes which exempt from responsibility in whole or
in part ; but judged by an objective standard, the
act has the moral discolouring of self-assertion. The
Church s doctrine of succession is thus of a piece with
the whole idea of the Gospel revelation, as being the
communication of a divine gift which must be received
and cannot be originated, received, moreover, through
the channels of a visible and organic society ; and
the principle (this is what is here emphasized) lies at

76 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

the last resort in the idea of succession rather than in
the continuous existence of episcopal government
even though it should appear that this too is of apo
stolic origin, and that the Church, since the Apostles,
has never conceived of itself as having any power to
originate or interpolate a new office. 1
its import- It will be easy to see that the existence of an

a nee

apostolic succession serves several important ends.
(0 as a bond (i) It forms a link of historical continuity in a

of union i i

soc1e s t pi - itual society intended to be universal and permanent.
Nations have many bonds of union. There is the
unity of blood and language and common customs :
there is the unity of a common government over men
inhabiting a common territory. Such bonds of union
are lacking to a universal spiritual society such as
the Church claims to be. Embracing all peoples and
languages, admitting and consecrating the greatest
varieties of local custom and taste, inhabiting no com
mon territory but spread over all the earth, 2 how
should the Church preserve or exhibit its identity and
continuity as a visible society without some such

1 The words of the Anglican Art. xxm. are : " Non licet cuiquam sumere
sibi munus publice praedicandi aut administrandi sacramenta in ecclesia, nisi
prius fuerit ad haec obeunda legitime vocatus et missus. Atque illos legitime
vocatos et missos existimare debemus, qui per homines, quibus potestas
vocandi ministros atque mittendi in vineam Domini publice
concessa est, in ecclesia cooptati fuerint et asciti in hoc opus."

2 We know how familiar a boast this is with early Christian writers.
Cf. e.g. Ep. ad Diognet. 5 : " Christians (of the new race which has just
come into the world, c. i) are distinguished from the rest of mankind
neither by land, nor by language, nor by custom-,. They have neither
cities of their own, nor exceptional language, nor remarkable mode of life.
But inhabiting Greek or barbarian cities as the lot of each determined, and
obeying the local customs in dress and food and general conduct of life, the
character of their own polity which they exhibit is everywhere wonderful and
confessedly strange." Cf. Iren. i. 10. 2.

ri.] Apostolic Succession. 77

instrument and evidence of succession as is afforded
by the ministry as traditionally conceived ? No
doubt it may be urged, and with partial truth, that
the real unity of the Church lies in the Spirit, which
lives in her, and the truth she holds and teaches ; but
that truth was committed to a society, as what Iren-
aeus calls "its rich depository," 1 and that Spirit
has a body and how can the outward organization,
which enshrines and perpetuates the inner life, main
tain or exhibit its identity without some such bond as
the apostolic succession of the ministry affords ? 2

(ii) The ministerial succession serves the end of oo as declar
ing men s

impressing upon Christians that their new life is aJ^gjfSS
communicated gift, and from this point of view it is f
naturally associated with the sacraments. A Chris
tian of apostolic days was taught by St. Paul to
look back to the day of baptism as the moment of
his incorporation into the life of Christ. 3 He had
received the gift of the Spirit by the laying on of
apostolic hands. 4 He was fed with the Body and
Blood of Christ through the effectual signs of
bread and wine. 5 This sacramental method went to

1 Iren. iii. 4. i : "quasi in depositorium dives."

3 For an interesting statement of the function of the episcopal succession
from this point of view, see F. D. Maurice s Kingdom of Christ pt. ii.
ch. iv. 5 ; also Gladstone Church Principles ch. v. esp. pp. 193, 194 : "If
it were attempted to insist on succession in doctrine as the sole condition of
the essence of a Church, any such proposition would be self-contradictory,
inasmuch as that which would be thus perpetuated would not be a society at
all, but a creed or body of tenets." What is required is "succession of
persons," as well as " continuous identity of doctrine."

3 Gal. iii. 27 ; Rom. vi. 3 ; i Cor. xii. 13.

4 Acts viii. 17-20, xix. 6; cf. Rom. i. n.

5 i Cor. x. 16, 17. I do not see how it is possible to deny that the New
Testament does attach inward gifts to external channels, i.e. is sacramental.

78 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

impress upon his mind the idea of his dependence
upon grace given from without. True, this grace
given from without could only be appropriated,
incorporated, used, by the inward faculty of faith.
This is the Christian principle of correspondence.
As, when Christ was on earth healing men s sickness,
the virtue which went out of Him could only be
liberated to act in effective power on those who had
faith to be healed, and thus men s faith made
them whole, though the means of their healing was
the virtue of Christ s body which came from without ;
so is it with His permanent spiritual agency. He
saves in virtue of an inward faith but by the instru
mentality of a gift given from outside. This outward
bestowal of grace was no peculiarity of the apostolic
age, though the symbolic miracles which at first called
attention to it passed away. It is impossible to deny
that the early Christians, in East and West, believed
in the sacraments as the covenanted channels of
grace. 1 It is, indeed, part of God s condescending

1 I may refer, in confirmation of what is said above, to the way in which
the Fathers, at the end of the second century, emphasize the sacramental
principle as of a piece with the principle of the Incarnation against the
Gnostic depreciation of what is material. See a vigorous passage of Tertul-
lian (de Resurr. Cam. 8), emphasizing how, at each stage of the spiritual
life, the inward gift is mediated through the material body and that, of
course, implies through a material sacrament. "As the soul is attached
to God, it is the flesh which enables it to be united. The flesh is washed
that the soul may be cleansed : the flesh is anointed that the soul may be
consecrated : the flesh is marked with the Cross that the soul may be pro
tected : the flesh is shadowed with the imposition of hands that the soul may
be illuminated by the Spirit : the flesh is fed with the Body and Blood of
Christ that the soul may feed upon the fatness of God." Cf. de Bapt. 2,
quoted on p. 179. This is no advance upon the principle of Irenaeus. To
Irenaeus the bread and wine are consecrated to become the Body and Blood
of Christ, and so to impart eternal life even to man s body (iv. 18. 5) : "the
mixed cup and the bread which has been made receives the word of God,

ii.] Apostolic Succession. 79

compassion that He should thus embody in visible
form His divine gift. So is it made most easily intel
ligible and accessible to the ignorant. 1 So was it
most easily and forcibly impressed on men that Christ
had come, not merely to show them what in any case
they are if they will be true to themselves, but to
make them what apart from Him they cannot be.

and the Eucharist becomes the Body [and Blood] of Christ, and the substance
of our flesh grows and gains consistence from these. How, then, can they
say that our flesh is not susceptible of the gift of God, which is eternal life
our flesh, which is nourished by the Body and Blood of the Lord, and
which is His member " (v. 2. 3). Irenaeus contemporary at Alexandria,
Clement (as there can, I think, be no doubt, though his exact view of the
Eucharist is hard to grasp or state) certainly believed that the sacraments
convey to us the life and being of Christ ; cf. Paed. i. 6. This would appear
in Dr. Bigg s references B. L. pp. 105, 106. But we may go back earlier.
The simple account, which, earlier in the second century, Justin Martyr
gives of the meaning of the Christian sacraments (Apol. i. 61, 65-67),
carries conviction that Irenaeus and Tertullian are stating no new doctrine.
We go back to the beginning of the century, to Ignatius, and we find the
same stress on the sacraments in the earliest stage of controversy with
Gnosticism. "The heretics," he writes (ad Smyrn. 7), "abstain from the
Eucharist and prayer, because they confess not that the Eucharist is the
Flesh of our Saviour Jesus Christ, which suffered for our sins, which by His
goodness the Father raised up. They, therefore, who speak against the gift
of God die by their disputing." [Dr. Lightfoot would interpret this in the
light of Tertullian s "Hoc est corpus meum : id est figura mei corporis."
But Tertulliaii s language about the Eucharist as a whole makes it quite
certain that he believed it to be a real gift of the Flesh and Blood of Christ,
and not merely a figure. The sacraments are figures, symbols, types,
signs, but they are effectual signs, they effect what they symbolize. ] The
earliest language about baptism also is very emphatic in making it the instru
ment of the new birth and its accompanying purification. See Hennas Vis.
iii. 3, Sim. ix. 16, aud Barnabas Ep. n. The only early Christian writings
which seem to take a low view of the sacraments are very Judaic, e.g. the
(Ebionite) Clementines and the Didache, which, though not Ebionite, has
no hold on the doctrine of the Incarnation and of the grace which flows
from it.

1 It is instructive to contrast in this respect Christianity with Neo-
Platonism. Communion with God oneness with God was regarded by
the philosophers as attainable only through intellectual self-abstraction from
the things of sense and an ecstatic rapture possible but to a very few
select natures. In the Church it was believed to depend upon a simple
act, possible to the most ignorant. "Take, eat; this is My Body." "He
that eateth My Flesh dwelleth in Me, and I in him. "

8o Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

" Except ye eat the Flesh of the Son of Man, and
drink His Blood, ye have no life in you."

Aristotle represented man as self-sufficient
not indeed as an individual, but as a member of an
organized society, the city of Greek civilization. If
he needed to come into contact with God, that was
rather at the circumference of his life and as the
remote goal of its highest efforts. Christianity, on
the contrary, represents man as fundamentally and
from the first dependent upon God. It proclaims
that man s initial step of true progress is to know his
utter, his complete dependence, that the essence
and secret of all sin is his claim to be independent,
to be sufficient for himself. Thus Christ, when He
came to restore men to their true selves and to God,
did all that was necessary to emphasize that their
restoration must be by the communication of a gift
from outside, which they had not and could not have
of themselves. This is the essential message of Chris
tianity, and is what differentiates its whole moral
scheme from its very foundations. But in the second
part of the Aristotelian position Christianity recog
nises a divine truth, of which man had never lost his
hold : man still must realize his true being in a
society, the city of God. Only in the divine house
hold of the Church can he be fed with his necessary
portion, the bread of life.

1 F. W. Robertson (Sermons, 2d series, pp. 55, 56) attempts to make
baptism merely an announcement of what is, instead of a creative or re-creative
act : but this is to do violence to the whole body of Scriptural and ecclesias
tical language. The Church is the new creation, and the sacraments are
practica or efficacia signa.

ii.] Apostolic Succession. 81

Yet if it be important to impress upon men s minds,
permanently and persistently, as a part of a catholic
system, their dependence upon gifts bestowed from
outside, it must be admitted that there is no way of
making, the impression more effective than by the
institution in the Christian household of a steward
ship, which should represent God, the giver, dis
tributing to the members of the divine family their
portion of meat in due season ; and it is quite essential
that such stewards should receive their authorization
by a commission which makes them the repre
sentatives of God the giver, and not of men the
receivers. " It is the doctrine of the ministerial suc
cession by commission from the Apostles, which makes,
and which alone makes, this required provision for
representing to us, along with the matter of the
revelation, and as needful to its due reception,
this lively idea of its origin." *

(iii) The apostolic succession seems to corre- ( Ui ) f meet-

\ " ing the moral

spond, as nothing else does, to the moral needs of the ?h e
ministers of Christ s Church. 2 " How shall they
preach," said St. Paul, " except they be sent ? " He
himself had been sent by an immediate mission from
Christ as direct, as visible (so he believed) as that
which empowered the other Apostles. When he
exhorts Timothy to make " full proof of his ministry,"
it is by recalling his mind to an actual external com
mission received, with its actual and accompanying
gift. " There is not in the world," says Bishop Taylor,

1 Gladstone Church Principles p. 208.

2 See Dr. Liddon s sermon The Moral Value of a Mission from Christ.

82 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

" a greater presumption than that any should think
to convey a gift of God, unless by God he be
appointed to do it." 1 Such appointment or com
mission, to be valid, must be of an authority not
unquestioned, indeed, for St. Paul s was questioned,
but not justly open to question, as representative
of Christ. Men are needed for Christ s ministry
who have ready wills and clear convictions, men,
that is, with a sense of vocation ; but they must be
also men of humility, distrustful of their own impulses
and powers, like the prophets of old. The very thing
that such men need is the open and external com
mission to support the internal sense of vocation
through all the fiery trials of failure and disappoint
ment, of weariness and weakness, to which it will
be subjected nay, to be its substitute when God s
inward voice seems even withdrawn maintaining in
the man the simple conviction that, as a matter of
fact, a dispensation has been committed to him.

The idea of the apostolic succession is, then, we
may claim, in natural harmony both with the moral
needs of men and with the idea of the Church. Such
a succession of ministers would serve, as nothing else
could serve, both as a link of continuity in the society,
and as an institution calculated to represent to men s
imaginations the dependence of the Christian life
upon God s gifts, and as a means for supplying a satis
fying commission to those called to share the ministry,
nntitis On the other hand, objections are raised against it

objected to J

*JS tol which may best be considered before we approach

t rounds :

1 Ductor Dubitant. in his Works [ed. 1822] xiv. p. 26.

II.] Apostolic Succession. 83

the discussion of the historical evidence, especially
as the consideration of them will serve to put
more clearly before our minds what the exact concep
tion is which is to be subjected to the test of history.
The most important of them may be summarized
under five heads :

(1) the doctrine of the apostolic succession is

sacerdotal :

(2) it postulates what is so incredible that bad

or unspiritual men can impart spiritual gifts
to others :

(3) it is incompatible with the true ideal of liberty :

(4) the chances against its having been actually

preserved are overwhelming :

(5) it is exclusive in such a sense as to be fatal to

its claim.
(1) The doctrine of the apostolic succession is or it is

sacerdoUL

sacerdotal. This we admit in one sense and deny in
another. It is necessary for us in fact to draw a dis
tinction between what we regard as legitimate and
what as illegitimate sacerdotalism. 1 For the term is
associated historically with much that is worst, as well
as much that is best, in human character. Priesthood
has been greatly abused. But must not the same be
said of liberty or of State authority ? Must not it be
said of religion itself, in common with all the greatest
and most ennobling truths ? What would become of
us if we should agree to abandon every idea and

1 Dr. Liddon University Sermons, 2nd series, p. 191 : "A formidable
word, harmless in itself, but surrounded with very invidious associations."
See the whole passage.

84 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

institution which has become corrupt, or been exagger
ated, or made to minister to ambition and worldli-
ness ? Life would be a barren thing indeed ! There
is surely no better task for the wise man than to set
himself to vindicate the truths which lie behind per
sistent and popular errors and abuses to the reality
and power of which, indeed, the very popularity and
persistence of the abuses bear witness.
The minis- The chief of the ideas commonly associated with

terial priest-

everSsn ot sacerdotalism, which it is important to repudiate, is
that of a vicarious priesthood. 1 It is contrary to the
true spirit of the Christian religion to introduce the
notion of a class inside the Church who are in a closer
spiritual relationship to God than their fellows. " If
a monk falls," says St. Jerome, " a priest shall pray for
him ; but who shall pray for a priest who has fallen?"
Such an expression, construed literally, would imply
a closer relation to God in the priest than in the
consecrated layman, and such a conception is beyond
a doubt alien to the spirit of Christianity. There
is " no sacrificial tribe or class between God and
man." " Each individual member [of the Christian
body] holds personal communion with the Divine
Head." 2 The difference between clergy and laity
" is not a difference in kind" 3 but in function. Thus
the completest freedom of access to God in prayer
and intercession, the closest personal relation to Him,
belongs to all. So far as there is gradation in the

1 See Maurice Kingdom of Christ ii. p. 216.

- Dr. Lightfoot Dissert, on the Christian Ministry p. 181.

3 Liddon I.e. p. 198.

IL] Apostolic Succession. 85

efficacy of prayers, it is the result not of official
position but of growing sanctity and strengthening
faith. It is an abuse of the sacerdotal conception,
if it is supposed that the priesthood exists to cele
brate sacrifices or acts of worship in the place of the
body of the people or as their substitute. This con
ception had, no doubt, attached itself to the massing
priests of the Middle Ages. The priest had come to
be regarded as an individual who held, in virtue of
his ordination, the prerogative of offering sacrifices
which could win God s gifts. Thus spiritual advan
tages could be secured for the living and the dead by
paying him to say a mass, and greater advantages by
a greater number of masses. Now this distorted sort
of conception is one which the religious indolence of
most men, in co-operation with the ambition for
power in spiritual persons, is always tending to
make possible. It is not only possible to believe
in a vicarious priesthood of sacrifice, but also in
a vicarious office of preaching, which releases the
laity from the obligation to make efforts of spiritual
apprehension on their own account. But in either
case the conception is an unchristian one. The
ministry is no more one of vicarious action than
it is one of exclusive knowledge or exclusive spiritual

relation to God. What is the truth then ? It is that but repre
sentative ;

the Church is one body : the free approach to God in
the Sonship and Priesthood of Christ belongs to men
as members of one body, and this one body has
different organs through which the functions of its life
find expression, as it was differentiated by the act

86 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

and appointment of Him who created it. The recep
tion, for instance, of Eucharistic grace, the approach
to God in Eucharistic sacrifice, are functions of the
whole body. " We bless the cup of blessing," "we
break the bread," says St. Paul, speaking for the
community : "we offer," " we present," is the language
of the liturgies. 1 But the ministry is the organ the
necessary organ of these functions. It is the hand
which offers and distributes ; it is the voice which
consecrates and pleads. And the whole body can
no more dispense with its services than the natural
body can grasp or speak without the instrumentality
of hand and tongue. Thus the ministry is the instru
ment as well as the symbol of the Church s unity,
and no man can share her fellowship except in accept
ance of its offices.

1 i Cor. x. 16. It is remarkable that Hugh of St. Victor (Summ. Sen tent.
tract, vi. c. 9, quoted by Morinus de Sacr. Ord. p. iii. ex. v. 1.4) gives as the
current reason for denying that heretics or schismatics could consecrate the
Eucharist the fact that in the Eucharist the priest speaks for the whole
Church : " Aliis videtur quod nee excommunicati nee manifesto haeretici con-
ficiunt [corpus Christi]. Nullus enim in ipsa consecratione dicit offero, sed
offerimus, ex persona totius ecclesiae. Cum autem alia sacramenta extra
ecclesiam possint fieri, haec nunquam extra, et istis magis videtur assenti-
endum." The idea of the representative character of the priesthood in
the ministry of the eucharistic sacrifice finds beautiful expression in the
prayers (ascribed traditionally to St. Ambrose) which are used in the West as
a Preparatio ad Missam: " Profero etiam," the celebrant prays, "(sidigneris
propitius intueri) tribulationes plebium, pericula populorum, captivorum
gemitus, miserias orphanorum, necessitates peregrinorum, inopiam debilium,
desperationes languentium, defectus senum, suspiria iuvenum, vota virginum,
lamenta viduarum. " He is the mouthpiece of the needs of all sorts and
conditions of men. As the necessary mouthpiece for the expression of
these needs in the eucharistic celebration, the representative priest is in
a certain sense a go-between, a mediator. Thus this same prayer has earlier
these words: "quoniam me peccatorem inter te et eundem populum tuum
medium esse voluisti, licet in me aliquodboni operis testimonium non agnos-
cas, officium saltern dispensationis creditae non recuses, nee per me indignum
eorum salutis pereat pretium, pro quibtis victima salutaris dignatus es esse et
redemptio. "

II.] Apostolic Succession. 87

Why is this conception unreasonable ? The people on the

analogy of

of Israel of old were " a kingdom of priests, and anJJ^jj^
holy nation " (Exod. xix. 6). But that priestliness
which inhered in the race had its expression in the
divinely ordained ministry of the Aaronic priesthood. 1
The Christian Church is in an infinitely higher sense
" a royal priesthood, a holy nation." : But why should
that priesthood exclude, and not rather involve, a it is not

inconsistent

ministry through which it finds official and formal ex- ^^ e
pression and that not by mere expediential arrange- L
rnent, but by divine ordering ? 3 Take the notion
of the general priesthood of all Christians as it finds
expression, for example, in Justin Martyr in the
earlier part of the second century. 4

" Just," he says, " as that Joshua, who is called by p taught

f by Justin,

the prophet (Zech. iii. 1) a priest, was seen wearing
filthy garments . . . and was called a brand plucked out
of the burning because he received remission of sins, the
devil also, his adversary, receiving rebuke, so we, who
through the name of Jesus have believed as one man

1 It is maintained without any adequate ground (Diet. Bible s. v. PRIEST
HOOD) that the Levitical priesthood was the substitute in a sense for the
general priesthood, instead of its expression that the special priesthood
was appointed because the people refused to realize the priesthood which
belonged to them all so that it was in this sense a pis aller, a 5ei/re/&gt;os TrXoPs.
There is no evidence for this. The same chapter which recognises the general,
recognises also a special priesthood (? of the first-born), Exod. xix. 22-24.

- /3a&lt;Ti\eioi&gt; lepdrev/jia, I Pet. ii. 9. pacriXeia, tepe?s T$ Of$, Rev. i. 6. St.
Peter is quoting and St. John referring to the words in Exodus.

3 I do not wish to press the argument too far. Single Christians are often
spoken of as priests, and not merely as belonging to a priestly race. This
is natural enough. For undoubtedly all Christians have an individual union
with God and freedom of approach to God, which (so to speak) individualizes
that in them which can be rightly called priesthood. I only use the argument
to prove this that a ministerial priesthood is in no contradictory relation to
a general priesthood.

4 Dial. c. Tryph. 116, 117.

88 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

in God, the Maker of all, have been stripped through
the name of His First-begotten Son of the filthy gar
ments of our sins ; and being set on fire by the word
of his calling are the genuine high-priestly race of
God, as God beareth witness Himself, saying that
in every place amongst the Gentiles men are offer
ing sacrifices acceptable to Him and pure, and God
receives from no man sacrifices, except through His
priests. So, then, of all the sacrifices through this
name, which Jesus the Christ delivered to be made,
that is (the sacrifices) at the Eucharist of the bread
and of the cup, which in every place of the earth are
made by the Christians, God by anticipation beareth
witness that they are acceptable to Him."

Here is indeed a vivid consciousness of the priest
hood, which belongs to the Church as a whole 1 but
finds expression in a great ceremonial action the
Eucharist an action which belongs not to the in
dividual but to the whole body, and is celebrated by
the " president of the brethren." : How, then, is this
priesthood interfered with, if we should find reason to
believe that Christ Himself ordained ministers of this
mystical action such as did actually exist in Justin

1 It should be noticed that the idea of priesthood always seems to involve
that of approach to God on behalf of others. The Christians are high
priests on behalf of the world. They are the "soul of the world" (Ep.
ad Diognet. 6). They can plead effectually, so the apologists urged, for the
empire and mankind (Tertull. Apol. 30). This function of the Church St.
Paul presses on St. Timothy. The Church is not to confine her intercessions
to her own body "I exhort that prayer, etc. be made for all men," "for
God will have all men to be saved ; " " He is the Saviour of all men," though
"specially of them that believe" (i Tim. ii. 1-4 ; iv. 10).

2 irpoff&lt;t&gt;tpTa.t rip TrpoeffTuiTL TWV d8e\&lt;f&gt;wv &pros xal Tror-fipiov (Apol. i. 65). He
offers the prayer and Eucharist, and the people say Amen. This president
is no doubt the bishop. So Harnack (Expositor, May 1887, p. 336).

ii.] Apostolic Succession 89

Martyr s days to be the mouthpieces of the Church
in its celebration ?

No one, again, is more identified than Irenaeus irenaeu*,
with the principle of the apostolic succession. He
regards it undoubtedly as of the essence of the Church.
Her mark, her character, is " according to the suc
cessions of the bishops." 1 Yet he does not hesitate to
say that in some sense " every just man is of the
priestly order," and " all the disciples of the Lord are
priests and Levites " that is, they have the freedom
of the old priesthood, not its ministry. 2 If it be said
that Irenaeus is admittedly unsacerdotal/ that is,
that he does not apply the term priesthood to the
Christian ministry, 3 it may be pointed out, further,
that writers, who confessedly are sacerdotal in their and late

writers.

conception of the ministry, still continue down into
the Middle Ages to speak also without hesitation of
the general priesthood. 4 For the official hierarchy

1 iv. 33. 8 : " character corporis Christ! secundum siiccessiones episco-
porum. "

2 iv. 8. 5 and v. 34. 3 ; see Lightfoot Dissert, p. 252. The point in both
passages is that our Lord in justifying the conduct of His disciples when they
broke the Sabbath (St. Matt. xii. 1-5) claimed for them and for David in
virtue of their righteousness the freedom of priests, who profane the
Sabbath and are blameless. Again, inasmuch as, like the Levites, our
Lord s disciples had no inheritance, they could, like the Levites, claim
support. Thus " they were allowed when hungry to take food of the grains."
In both cases the priesthood which belongs to good men or disciples lies in a
certain freedom, not in any power of ministry.

3 See further in chap. iii. I have endeavoured there to point out that the
idea of a gradual growth in sacerdotalism in the early Church hardly corre
sponds to the facts. There is a change rather in language than in principle.

4 Thus Origen (for whose admittedly sacerdotal view of the ministry see
further in chap, iii.) in some passages " takes spiritual enlightenment and not
sacerdotal office to be the Christian counterpart to the Aaronic priesthood "
(Lightfoot Dissert, p. 255); cf. in loann. i. 3: "Those who are devoted to
the divine word, and are dedicated sincerely to the sole worship of God,
may not unreasonably be called priests and Levites according to the differ-

go Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

offered no bar to its recognition, provided that the
general priesthood was not supposed by those church-

ence in this respect of their impulses tending thereto. . . . Those that excel
the men of their own generation perchance will be high-priests " (Light-
foot s trans. ); see also in Lev. iv. 6, vi. 5, ix. i, 8, xiii. 5. He uses such
language, however, with qualifications " secundum moralem locum, " " secun-
dum spiritalem intelligentiam, " (in Lev. i. 5, ii. 4, ix. 6, xv. 3) i.e. he
draws a distinction between the moral and ministerial sense of priesthood ;
see Dr. Bigg s note, B. L. p. 215 note 1 . He adds that "in Num. ii. i
. . . priests, virgins, ascetics are said to be in professione religionis.
in Ie*u Nave xvii. 2 shows that there was a strong tendency in Origen s
mind to restrict the language concerning the priesthood of the Christian to
those religious. " So also among the scholia on the Apocalypse ascribed to
Victorinus of Petau (but not by him in their present form) occurs the fol
lowing on c. xx : " Qui enim virginitatis integrum servaverit propositum et
decalogi fideliter praecepta impleverit . . . iste vere sacerdos est Christ! et
millenarium numerum perficiens integre creditur regnare cum Christo et apud
eum recte ligatus est diabolus."

For a recognition of the general priesthood among later sacerdotal
writers, cf. Leo the Great Serm. iii. i: "ut in populo adoptionis Dei,
cuius universitas sacerdotalis atque regalis est, non praerogativa
terrenae originis obtineat unctionem, sed dignatio caelestis gratiae gignat
antistitem." Serm. iv. i: " In imitate igitur fidei atque baptismatis indis-
creta nobis societas et generalis est dignitas, secundum illud beatis-
simi Petri. . . . Vos autem genus electum, regale sacerdotium." August.
de Civ. Dei xvii. 5. 5: "Sacerdotium quippe hie ipsam plebem dicit,
cuius plebis ille sacerdos est mediator Dei et hominum homo Christus lesus. "
Quaest. Evan;/, ii. 40. 3 : " Sacerdotium vero ludaeorum nemo fere fidelium
dubitat figurain fuisse futuri sacerdotii regalis, quod est in ecclesia,
quo consecrantur omnes pertinentes ad corpus Christi summi et
veri principis sacerdotum. Nam nunc et omnes unguuntur quod tune regibus
tantum et sacerdotibus fiebat, . . . ipsi nondum accepto baptismatis sacra-
mento nondum spiritaliter ad sacerdotes pervenerant. " See the same idea in
a collect of the Gelasian Sacramentary (Bright Ancient Collects p. 99). Hence
we get a priesthood ascribed, as by St. Irenaeus, to each Christian (though
of course as a member of the one body) in virtue of baptism and unction. St.
Jerome (adv. Lucifer. 4) writes : "sacerdotium laici id est baptisma."
So Isidore of Seville (de Ecd. Off. ii. 25) writes : "Postquam Dominus noster
verus rex et sacerdos aeternus, a Deo Patre caelesti mystico unguento est
delibutus, iam non soli pontifices et reges sed omnis ecclesia unctione
chrismatis consecratur, pro eo quod membrum est aeterni sacerdotis
et regis. Ergo quia genus regale et sacerdotale sumus, ideo post lavacrum
ungimur, ut Christi nomine censeamur. " Cf . Alcuin [Albinus Flaccus] Ep.
ad Oduinum, ap. Hittorp. de Div. Cath. Ecd. Offic. [Colon. 1568] p. 100 :
" Sacro chrismate caput pungitur . . . ut intelligat se diadema regni et
sacerdotii dignitatem portaturum. " Rabanus Maurus de Inst. Cler. i. 29,
ap. Hittorp. p. 322 ; Walafrid Strabo de Reb. Ecd. 16, ap. Hittorp. p. 401 of
the common pi iesthood of all in the Eucharist, the generate sacerdotium ;

ii.] Apostolic Succession. 91

men who recognised it (as in fact it was not) to carry
with it the power of ministry. It may be worth
while to quote a passage which seems to push to its
extremest point the right of the priesthood, which is
common to all in virtue of their baptism and confir
mation.

" From that day and that hour in which thou
earnest out of the font thou art become to thyself a
continual fountain, a daily remission. Thou hast no
need of a doctor, or of the priest s right hand. As
soon as thou descendedst from the sacred font thou
wast clothed in a white robe and anointed with the
mystic ointment ; the invocation was made over thee,
and the threefold power came upon thee, which filled
the new vessel (that thou wert) with this new doc
trine. Thenceforth it made thee a judge and arbiter
to thyself; it gave thee knowledge to be able of thy
self to learn good and evil to discern, that is, between
merit and sin. And because thou couldest not, whilst
thou art in the body, remain free from sin, it placed
thy remedy after baptism in thyself, it placed re
mission in thine own judgment, that thou shouldest
not, if necessity was urgent, seek a priest ; but thyself,

Ivo Carnot. ap. Hittorp. p. 469. St. Thomas Aquinas Sum. iii. q. 82. art. r :
"laicus iustus unitus est Christo unione spiritali per fidem et charitatein
non autem per sacramentalem potestatem : et ideo habet spiritale sacer-
dotium ad offerendum spiritales hostias."

The consideration of such passages as these will serve to show that sacer
dotalism is not incompatible with an even zealous recognition of a lay priest
hood. The only form of expression which seems to have passed away was that
by which all Christians were called in some sense priests and Levites, and even
"high-priests" (Origen). But th^y were not so called, either by Origen or
Irenacus, in any sense which suggests ministerial powers. The point of
comparison lies in nearness to God and constant service (Origen), or in a
certain sort of freedom and privilege (Irenaeus).

92 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

as a cunning and clear-sighted master, migiitest
correct thine error within thee and wash away thy
sin in penitence, and so hardness might cease, despair
be over, apathy at an end. The fountain never fails ;
the water is within, the washing is in thine own judg
ment, sanctification is in activity, remission in the
dew of tears." 1

Such language sounds unsacerdotal, but it comes
out of the sacerdotal Church of the West in the sixth
century, as it would seem. It could have been used in
any age previous to the time when confession was
made compulsory. But the writer of these words would
not have dreamt of admitting that this freedom of the
Gospel belonged to a man, except as a member of the
Church, baptized and anointed and a communicant,
and therefore dependent on the ministry of her clergy.

Thus the principle of the ministry must not be
assailed either on the ground that it " interposes a
sacerdotal caste between the soul and God," or on the
ground that it connives at the spiritual indolence of
men, by offering them official substitutes to do their
religion at second hand. 2

1 S. Laurentii Horn, i de Poenit. in BiU. Max. Vet. Pair. ix. p. 466 h. This
and the following sermon of Laurentius (probably of Novera, c. A.D. 507 ; see
Diet. Chr. Biog., s. v. LAURENTIUS (15) surnamed Mellifiuus) are full of
the thought of various activities of the will as opening the way of restoration
from sin and making despair foolish : " Homo, noli dimdere : res in promptu
est, vita in manu est : virtus in voluntate est : victoria in arbitrio est : si
voluisti, vicisti" (I.e. pp. 468-9). The activity emphasized is sometimes
penitence and tears ; sometimes almsgiving, "aqua et ablutio et remissio in
eleemosyna largientis est"(ib.); sometimes fasting (p. 474 g). These avail
against any abundance of sins.

2 A word must be said to vindicate the true sacerdotalism from interfering
with the unique Priesthood or High-Priesthood of Christ. Surely the
representatives of a king do not interfere with his monarchy, and a Christian

ii.] Apostolic Succession. 93

The ministerial principle, then,- the sacerdotalism me true
which cannot be disparaged or repudiated means just
this : that Christianity is the life of an organized
society in which a graduated body of ordained minis
ters is made the instrument of unity. The religious
life, so far as it concerns the relations of man to God,
has two aspects. It is first an approach of man to
God. And in this relation each Christian has in his
own personal life a perfect freedom of access. But he
has this because he belongs to the one body, and this
one body has its central act of approach to God in the
great memorial oblation of the Death of Christ. Here
it approaches in due and consecrated order ; all are
offerers, but they offer through one who is empowered
to this high charge, to offer the gifts for God s
acceptance and the consecration of His Spirit. In
the second place, religion is a gift of God to man a
gift of Himself. What man receives in Christ is the
very life of God. Here again, each Christian receives
the gift as an endowment of his own personal life ; his

minister is in a relation to Christ infinitely more dependent than that of any
representative of an absent king to him who sends him. If we were con
sistent, such a notion of the jealousy of Christ as militates against a
ministerial priesthood would make us fifth-monarchy men, because kings
as much interfere with His unique Kingship as ministers do with His Ministry.
Nor is it very consistent to accuse the ministerial priesthood at once of inter
fering with the incommunicable Priesthood of Christ and also with the
priesthood which He has communicated to all His members. The Church
indeed must have a priesthood, not although Christ has one, but because He
has. What He is, the Church is in Him. All He is in His Human Nature,
the Church is ; in Him the Church has a priesthood therefore, because Christ
is High Priest. The only question is as to the distribution of functions in
the Church, and whether Christ has willed to delegate a special sort of
authority to a special class of men to be exercised in His name for the good
of the whole body and this is a question of evidence, with which we are
not here dealing.

94 Christian Ministry. LCHAP.

whole life may become a life of grace, a life of drink
ing in the Divine Spirit, of eating the Flesh of Christ,
and drinking His Blood. But the individual life
can receive this fellowship with God only through
membership in the one body and by dependence upon
social sacraments of regeneration, of confirmation, of
communion, of absolution, of which ordained mini
sters are the appointed instruments. A fundamental
principle of Christianity is that of social dependence.

In all departments of life we are dependent one on
another. There is a priesthood of science minister
ing the mysteries of nature, exercising a very real
authority and claiming, very justly, a large measure
of deference. There is a priesthood of art, ministering
and interpreting to men that beauty which is one of
the modes of God s revelation of Himself in mate
rial forms. There is a priesthood of political influ
ence, and that not exercised at will, but organized

* o

and made authoritative in offices of state. 1 There is a
natural priesthood of spiritual influence belonging
(whether they will it or not) to men of spiritual power.
It is to this natural priesthood that God offers the
support of a visible authoritative commission in sacred
things to feed His sheep. The Christian ministry
is at once, under normal circumstances, God s provi-

1 "If it be granted, as it well maybe, that proper qualifications are a
hundredfold more requisite for the Christian ministry than for any other
office, this would not remove nor lessen the obligation not to dispense with a
divine commission, supposing it to have been granted and still attainable,
any more than the highest legal knowledge or perfect integrity of character
would dispense with the necessity of a commission from the source of
temporal power to render the decisions of a magistrate of state binding and
effectual " (Denton Grace of the Ministry p. 23).

II."] Apostolic Succession. 95

sion to strengthen the hands of the spiritual men, the
natural guides of souls, by giving them the support
which comes of the consciousness of an irreversible
and authoritative commission : and it is also God s
provision for days when prophets are few or want
ing, that even then there may be the bread of life
ministered to hungering souls, and at least the simple
proclamation of the revealed truth, so that even then
* men s eyes may see their teachers.

(2) But it will be said : Such a doctrine would be( 2 &gt; Unspint.

v ual men

credible enough if the priests of the Gospel had been, ^pa?t
or were at present, in the main men of spiritual gifts.-"
power, or even universally good men. But how is it
conceivable that men of evil or utterly unspiritual
lives, such as too many of the clergy have been, can
be God s instruments to impart His spiritual gifts to
others ? Surely spiritual gifts must come from
spiritual persons.

Church history records how strongly this obiec- But we are

f o &gt; forced to

tion has often appealed to men, but it is one which ^twefn sh
rather admits of being strongly felt than consistently and office
argued. It would have of course much more force if
it were possible reasonably to deny that, on the whole,
in Christian history spiritual office and spiritual char
acter have tended to converge ; that, on the whole, the
ministry has been a spiritualizing force in society.
As it is, it may be briefly met with a threefold
answer. First, we reply, with Pope Stephen and
St. Augustin of old, 1 that the unworthiness of the

1 See Diet. Chr. Biog. s.v. CYPRIAN i. p. 752. Of course the force of this
argument depends on the recognition that there are such things as Scicra-

96 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

ministers hinders not the grace of the sacrament,
because the Holy Spirit, and not they, is the giver of
the grace ; they neither give it being nor add force
to it. Secondly and so far as the argument relates
to the intention of Christ in founding His Church
we reply that He clearly recognised that moral un-
worthiness does not interfere with official authority.
The Scribes and Pharisees who sat in Moses seat
who held, that is, the succession from Moses were to
be obeyed, even where they were least to be imitated ;
and all the twelve had equally the authority and
powers of the apostolate, though one of them was
a devil. Thirdly, we reply that the possibility of
ministers unworthy of their office is involved in the
very idea of a visible society in which good and bad
are to be mixed together. There is really no more
difficulty in believing that bad men can share the
functions of the ministerial priesthood than that
bad men share the priesthood which belongs to all
Christians and which differs from the other, as has
been said, not in kind but in application and
degree. Yet the whole method of appeal used by the
apostolic writers to unworthy Christians, is to address
them not as men who lack the prerogatives and
spiritual powers of the Christian life, but as men who
do not walk worthily of the vocation with which
they were called. There is really again no more
difficulty in recognising in a bad priest a steward of

mental channels of grace. The personal defects of the minister gain a wholly
new importance in religious bodies where sacraments, creeds, and liturgies
are unrecognised, i.e. where all his usefulness depends on his personal char
acter and capacities.

II.] Apostolic Succession. 97

divine mysteries than in a bad magistrate a steward
of the divine justice, a minister of God for good. 1
" There is this difference," says an old writer, 2 " be
twixt the ecclesiastical ministers or magistrates and
ministers or magistrates of state ; if these offend, the
whole world can distinguish between their persons
and their functions ; no disparagement falleth upon
any but the offenders. But if ecclesiastical persons
become obnoxious, then they confound their persons
and their functions, and transfer the shame of the
faults of some even upon all, yea upon the whole order
itself."

(3) Now we approach another objection: The (3) it is

inconsistent

apostolical succession is associated with bygone ideas m odern e ideai
of authority, with the divine right of kings, and a
state of society which is gone for ever ; it is incom
patible with the true ideal of liberty.

It is astonishing how frequently, and from what But the.

Church is

. . .

opposite quarters, we meet with the identification of j 1 ^*

Christianity with that phase of Christianity which is mediaeval

* * m absolutism,

characteristic of the Middle Ages. At that period
we become witnesses of a process which is at least of
absorbing interest. The untamed, undisciplined races
which formed the material of modern nations are sub
jected to the yoke of the Church (mostly at the will
of kings or chiefs), as to an external law which is
to train, mould, restrain them. The one need of such
an age is authority, discipline, rule. The Church
becomes largely a schoolmaster to bring men to

1 Eom. xiii. 3-6.

2 Isidore of Pelusium Epist. ii. 52 (paraphrased by Hickes Dignity ofEpiac.
Order in his Treatises [Oxon. 1847] " P- 288).

98 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

Christ a law preparing for a Gospel. She has,
under these circumstances, to do with children in
mind. The one faculty which is in full exercise is
faith, in the form of a great readiness to accept
revelations of the supernatural world and to respect
their ministers the sort of faith which wants nothing
but dogmatic clearness and a sufficiently firm voice of
authority. 1 Christianity thus becomes, by a one-sided
development, a great imperial and hierarchical system.
Such a state of things is not permanent. Men s
faculties develop into free exercise, and constitute
their separate departments according to an inevitable
law, as knowledge grows and life becomes more com
plex. Other natural priesthoods arise in art, in
science, in medicine, in politics, in trade, in law
and become the successful rivals, in their own spheres,
of the spiritual hierarchy. The Church, to all ap
pearance, suffers loss, though in regions which were
not properly her own at all, at least in such sense as
to justify her in dictating terms to the pioneers in
each on their own subject-matter. Thus the area in
which religious authority speaks and faith accepts
becomes limited. More than this : authority itself
tends to change its character ; it ceases to be absolute
in religion no less than in politics ; and this change
affects the Church, not only as a dogmatic authority,
but as a government. It affects her hierarchical

1 The saintly writers, like St. Bernard, who lived in these vaunted ages
of faith, do not suggest a too favourable view of them. They help us to
see that an unspiritual credulity, such as characterized those times, is no
nearer Christian faith, in its full sense, than a good deal of modern scep
ticism.

IT.] Apostolic Succession. 99

system. Mere imperialism will no longer suffice, at
least for the most vigorous or intelligent races, in the
Church, any more than in the State. Democracy, the
representative system, is in the air as much as free
inquiry and has to be reckoned with.

But in politics this transition does not mean a and true

liberty is

repudiation of the principle of authority. " What ESLn
the world thirsts for at present," said Joseph Mazzini, authority.
who was surely no friend to despotism, " is autho
rity." 1 What has come about is a change in the con
ditions of authority, in the character which it must
assume. This holds true in the Church also ; there,
too, authority must cease to be absolutism and faith
mere acceptance. Authority, however, is not less real
because it is limited, or faith less zealous because it is
rational and inquiring. 2 But then it is said : You are
really abandoning the principle ; you are only trying
to cloak your surrender by keeping a name, emptied
of its power. The authority of a Church or hierarchy
really ceases when it cannot dictate its own terms,
when it has to submit to criticism. To this objection
there seems to be a complete answer, and one which

1 See his Thoughts upon Democracy in Europe, cf. " On the Duties of Man,"
chap, viii : " Liberty is not the negation of all authority : it is the negation of
every authority which fails to represent the Collective Aim of the nation."

2 " Is a limited, conditional government in the State such a wise, excellent,
and glorious constitution ? And is the same authority in the Church such
absurdity, nonsense, and nothing at all, as to any actual power ? If there be
such a thing as obedience upon rational motives, there must be such a thing
as authority that is not absolute, or that does not require a blind, implicit
obedience. Indeed, rational creatures can obey no other authority; they
must have reasons for what they do. And yet because the Church claims
only this rational obedience, your Lordship explodes such authority as none
at all" (Law s First Letter to the Bishop nf Banyor in his Works [ed. 1762]
i. pp. 30, 31).

ioo Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

needs to be forced on the consideration of men.
Christianity did not come into existence in the West
or just in time for the Middle Ages. Christianity
spread in a Greek world in a society of the most
developed sort, containing all the elements of intellec
tual development in free activity. If we want to
know the original character of Christian authority and
Christian faith, we should study Greek church life
from St. Paul to the fifth century, or, at any rate,
early church life before Western Christianity took
the peculiar colour of Romanism.
Government We are concerned here, however, not with Chris-

in the early . . i i i i r*

represent^ 3 tianity as a dogma, but with the social life and
government of the Church. In this department
then, when we look back to the life of the early
Christian communities, what a beautiful picture of
freedom, of representative institutions, of the corre
lation of rights and duties, we find for our contempla
tion. The sacred ministry receives indeed its autho
rity from above, and acts in God s name, as God s
representative ; but the man who is to minister is
the elect of the people, and is their representative
also. Thus the Apostles ordained the first deacons,
but the Church elected them. " Look ye out,
brethren, from among you seven men of good report,
whom we may appoint over this business/ So spoke
the Apostles to the first Christians. " And the
saying pleased the whole multitude : and they chose
seven men : whom they set before the Apostles : and
when they had prayed, they laid their hands upon
them." So in the subapostolic age Clement speaks of

n. J Apostolic Succession. 101

the presbyter-bishops as ordained from above, 1 but
with the, consent of the, whole Church, and in such a way
as to suggest that, under certain circumstances, they
were not exempt from the judgment of the Church.
Other documents of the first age speak in the same
way of the election of bishops by the community. 2
Nor does this method of popular election, or control
over election, appear only in the dim shadow of the
subapostolic age : counteracted at all times by other
influences, 3 it yet lasted on as the ideal of the Church
for centuries. The emperor Alexander Severus " was
fond of praising the careful way in which the
Church posted the names of all whom she destined
for the priesthood, so that any, who knew evil
of them, might object." 4 He would have it made
a model in the appointment of provincial governors.
We know, again, that the bishop to be elected over
any Church was to be thoroughly known in the
Church one who had passed through the inferior
grades of the ministry. " That custom is to be dili
gently observed," says Cyprian, "as of divine tradi
tion and apostolic observance, which is maintained
amongst us also and almost over all provinces, that,

1 Clem, ad Cor. 40 and 44. More will be said on this.

2 Didache xv. I : -xfipoTOv-qtraTe odv eavrois tiruTKOTrovs Kal SLdKAvovs. Of.
also the curious and very ancient Apost. Ch. Ordinances 16 : "If there be
a paucity of men, and in any place there be a number less than twelve of
those who can vote for a bishop. "

3 As in the first period by prophetic nomination ; see Clem. Alex. Quis
Dives 42 : " St. John would go about here to appoint bishops, . . . there to
ordain to the clergy some one of those pointed out by the Spirit."

4 Mason Diocletian Persecution pp. 84, and Ssn. 1 "dicebatque grave esse,
cum id Christian! et ludaei facerent in praedicandis sacerdotibus qui ordi-
nandi sunt, non fieri in provinciarum rectoribus quibus et fortunae hominum
committerentur et capita " (Ael. Lampr. Alex. xlv. 7).

IO2 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

with a view to the due celebration of ordinations, the
neighbouring bishops of the same province should
come together to the community for which a ruler is
to be ordained, and the bishop should be chosen in
the presence of the people who have complete
knowledge of each man s life and conduct by his
conversation among them." 1 This popular check on
ordinations he requires no less for the presbyterate
and the diaconate. So, again, it is regarded by Pope
Julius as monstrous that " Gregory, a stranger to
the city, who had not been baptized there and was
not known to the community in general and had not
been asked for by presbyters or bishops or people,"
should be obtruded on the Church of Alexandria,
"whereas the ordination of a bishop ought not to
have taken place thus lawlessly and contrary to the
ecclesiastical canon, but he should have been ordained
in the Church itself (over which he is to rule), out of
the priesthood, out of the actual body of the clergy,
and not, as now, in violation of the canons which come
from the Apostles." 2 Again Leo the Great, the
founder of the papacy, writes : " He who is to pre
side over all must be elected by all." " Before a
consecration must go the suffrages of the citizens,
the approbation of the people, the judgment of persons
of distinction, the choice of the clergy that the rule
of apostolic authority may be in all respects observed,
which enjoins that a priest to govern the Church
should be supported not only by the approval of the

1 Ep. Ixvii. 5 ; see Bingham Ant. ii. 10. 2.

2 ap. Athan. Apol, c. Ar. 30.

II.] Apostolic Succession. 103

faithful, but also by the testimony of those without."
" No metropolitan should we allow to ordain a priest
(bishop) on his own judgment without the consent of
clergy and people : the consent of the whole com
munity must elect the president of the Church:"
only where division makes unanimity impossible the
metropolitan may decide the election in favour of the
man who has the best support. "No reason can
tolerate that persons should be held to be bishops"
(so he says on another occasion to the African clergy)
" who were neither chosen by the clergy, nor demanded
by the laity, nor ordained by the provincial bishops
with the consent of the metropolitan." 1 Quotations
to this effect might be greatly multiplied, and from
later sources. The Latin rites of ordination are
framed in recognition of this representative system. 2
This then was undoubtedly the ideal of the bishop s
election in the early Church. 3 The bishop was to be
really the persona of the Church he ruled.

This, moreover, he was enabled to be in some real
sense in virtue of the very small community over
which he presided. Through the greater part at
least of the Roman empire each town community had
its bishop, and the country-bishop supplemented his
authority in the surrounding district, first in the
East and later in the West. The bishop of Rome

1 Leo Epp. x. 4-6; xiii. 3 ; xiv. 5 ; clxvii. I.

2 See App. Note C. Cf. also Bp. Woodford The Oreat Commission,
pp. 126-132.

3 On the extent and limits of its observance see Bingham Ant. ii. 10. 3-7 ;
also Diet. Chr. Ant. s.v. BISHOP. Mr. Haddan, the author, remarks how
vaguely the words suffragium testimonium iudicium consensus art
used (i. p. 214). Vague unformulated rights are more easily overridden.

1O4 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

was in an extraordinary position in the middle of the
third century, because he had under him as many as
forty-six presbyters, seven deacons, and seven sub-
deacons, besides those of minor orders. 1 Ordinarily
the numbers would have been very much smaller.
Thus the bishop, according to the early ideal, was
by no means the great prelate ; he was the pastor of
a flock, like the vicar of a modern town, in intimate
relations with all his people. 2
and not Nor was he in theory absolute even within the

absolute.

limits of his parish or diocese. For, in the first
place, he was himself subject to the laws which he
administered. When St. Chrysostom is referring to
the custom of holding the Gospel over the head of
the bishop who is being ordained, he says that it is
to remind him that "if he is the head of all, yet he
acts under these laws (of the Gospel), ruling all and
ruled by the law, ordering all and himself ordered :"
it is a symbol of the fact that he is " under authority." 3
At first indeed this authority had no visible sanction;
St. Cyprian claims repeatedly for the bishop that he
is " responsible to none but God." Later it came to
be embodied in provincial and ecumenical councils.
Secondly, within his own diocese he shared his rule
with others. No doubt his power was not subject to
formal limitations ; but round him there was the
council of his presbyters, "the Church s senate;" 4
and St. Cyprian tells us that he made it a fixed rule

1 Euseb. H.E. vi. 43.

2 The facts are well known: see Bingham Ant. ii. 12, Hatch B.L. lect.
viii. The principle is exemplified in the Apost. Ch. Ordinances 16.

3 Bingham Ant. ii. n. 8. 4 Bingham Ant. ii. 19. 7.

IL] Apostolic Succession. 105

from his consecration " to do nothing on his own
private judgment, but everything with the counsel of
his clergy and the consent of his laity." * The whole
conception indeed of the diocesan synod was the basis
of a great representative system which culminated at
last in the ecumenical council. 2 Thus the ideal of
church government in early days was not at all
absolute. If the guilds of the Roman empire repre
sented, as they did, the elements of free life and
spontaneous movement through all the classes of
non-Christian society down to the lowest, the prin
ciple of liberty and spontaneity was at least as pro
minent and real in the supernatural society of the
Church. It was by no means necessarily an im
perialist institution, though its officers were of divine
authority and apostolic descent.

But the effect of establishment in the East was
to tend to assimilate the Church to the empire inP erialism -
ideas and methods no less than in gradation of digni
ties. In the West the essentially imperialist temper
of Home moulded the institutions of Christendom, and
gave them a new direction and new characteristics.
Thus in the fifth century Socrates remarks that "the
episcopate of the Romans, like that of the Alexan
drians, had already for some time advanced beyond
the limits proper to the priesthood to the point of
despotism." 3 So it was that episcopacy passed into

1 Ep. xiv. 4. See other references in Bingham Ant. ii. 19. 7, 8.

" Cf. art. CYPRIAN in Diet. Chr. Biog. i. p. 753 : "the assembly repre
sentative : each bishop the elect of his flock."

3 irtpa TTJS lf&gt;uffvvi}S eiri SwacrTfiav ijdr} Trd\ai Trpoe\dou&lt;rrjs (H.E. vii. II).
He is speaking of Celestine suppressing the Novatian body in Rome. Cf.
vii. 7.

to im-

io6 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

a new phase. The authority of kings and popes over
whelmed the democratic elements in the Christian
polity. If they survived, they survived rather as
names and forms than as realities. But names and
forms still bear witness beyond their present power to
a principle which is not dead.

Thus the mediaeval and modern prelate, Anglican
or Roman, is not the only, or the original, type of
bishop. He differs a good deal from the bishop of
the earliest period not indeed in fundamental,
spiritual principle, but in outward appearance and
rank. 1 We need not necessarily deplore the change.
The age of barbarism and the age of feudalism had
each its own needs, and the Church adapted herself
to them. But there is a protest, based on the facts
of church history, which it is essential to make :
it is against all language such as would imply that
Christianity had no history before it became domi
nated by imperialism and embedded in feudalism.
The catholic principle is not Romanism merely or
Byzantinism, nor is it identified with the Anglican
episcopate of monarchical and aristocratic days. It
has its roots deeper down in human nature than any
notneces- o f these. If, then, the imperialism which coloured
church theology and church organization is becoming
a thing of the past, there is nothing in church prin
ciples to prevent our saying : Let it die. The
powers that be the actually existing authorities
of the new age are ordained of God. Meanwhile

1 Dr. Hatch describes the change in B.L. lect. viii and Growth of Ck.
Instit. See also Rosmini Five Wounds of the Holy Church ch. v.

II.] Apostolic Succession. 107

let us disentangle the essential and permanent creed,
the essential and permanent organization, from the
passing phase of civilization in which it has become
embedded ; let us make clear what church principles
essentially are. We shall not be afraid of the * de
mocratic temper within the Church, so far as it is a
return upon the Church s earliest spirit or an appli
cation of it. There is however one essential principle
of all politics, secular and spiritual, which must be
kept steadily in view : political rights are only the
correlative of political duties done. This is always
the church principle. Whatever rights the Christian
layman should have, it must be as a Christian lay
man, i.e. as subject himself to the divine authority
of the Gospel and to the Church, the common mother
of clergy and of laity. For it is only as subject to
discipline that we can take any part in the exercise
of it, and the lesson which Chrysostom finds in the
ceremony of episcopal consecration applies to the
layman in his degree, at least as much as to the
bishop in his : the layman is bound by the layman s
ordinances.

(4) It has been contended by Lord Macaulay wit can-

\ / &lt;f J not have

and the contention was not a new one that, how- maintained

. . , unbroken.

ever much the Church may nave insisted on apo
stolic succession, as a matter of fact the chances are
overwhelming against its having been preserved.
" Whether a given clergyman be really a successor of
the Apostles depends on an immense number of such
contingencies as these ; whether, under King Ethel-
wolf, a stupid priest might not, while baptizing

io8 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

several scores of Danish prisoners who had just made
their option between the font and the gallows, inad
vertently omit to perform the rite on one of these
graceless proselytes ; whether, in the seventh cen
tury, an impostor, who had never received consecra
tion, might not have passed himself off as a bishop on
a rude tribe of Scots ; whether a lad of twelve did
really, by a ceremony huddled over when he was
too drunk to know what he was about, convey the
episcopal character to a lad often." 1

Such an argument has nothing to recommend it
&gt;ld; except the vigour of Lord Macaulay s style. Indeed,
if we take it on its own level, its force is gone when
once it is borne in mind that failures of baptism do not
enter into the question of the permanent succession,
except where the person whose baptism was omitted
or irregular subsequently became a bishop ; and that
invalidating irregularities in episcopal ordinations,
when they exist, would not have the effect which the
objection supposes, because succession comes of
interlacing lines, each bishop having as a rule been
consecrated by three of his order. 2 In fact it has

1 Essay on Gladstone on Church and State. Chillingworth cannot be
quoted in this sense, because in his argument (Relig. of Prot. ch. ii. 67) he
is taking into account that "very dungeon of uncertainty," the Romanist
doctrine of intention.

3 The three consecrators were required originally not to secure validity (in
case one of the bishops was, by some accidental omission of a necessary rite,
no real bishop at all), but as a guarantee of general provincial recognition.
The other consideration is perhaps too materialistic to have entered into the
mind of the early Church. When things were duly done according to
Christ s ordinance, they were regarded as certainly having His certificate.
But when validity came to be conceived under more materialistic conditions
at a later period of theology, it was natural to suppose that each bishop who
joined in the act of consecration gave additional security that it was valid.
They were cooperatores and not merely testes. The point is, however,

IL] Apostolic Succession. 109

been mathematically argued that, even if we make the
absurd supposition of one consecrator in twenty at
any particular moment in history having been, through
some accident, himself not validly consecrated, the
chances will be 8000 : 1 against all three consecrators
in any given case being in a like position, and the
chances against a bishop consecrated under such cir
cumstances, who would thus be no bishop, being com
bined with coadjutors similarly incapacitated to con
tinue the succession, are "as 512,000,000,000 to
unity." x

But a much better answer to such a suggested and we are

responsible

difficulty lies in the consideration that, if we have thanobe re
reason to believe that Christ intended to institute a
self-perpetuating ministry in His Church, He makes
Himself responsible for its possibility, and His power
is not limited by such material conditions. " Leaving,
then, all hidden things to Him to whose sole cogni
zance they belong, we may securely depend on His
goodness and justice, that so long as His sacred
appointments are maintained, as far as lies in our
power, we shall never suffer through any secret
blemish or incapacity of His ministers. " :

(5) But, it will be exclaimed, however reason- w it would

unchurch

able the idea of a ministerial succession may be how- JSfiJSS?
ever adaptable in principle to new conditions of society
and thought in fact it has become so unreasonable
and so stereotyped, so fatally conservative of what was

discussed: see Estcourt Question of Angl. Orel. pp. 110-114. I do not pursue
the question, because I do not lay stress on the argument in the text.

1 Gladstone Ch. Princ. pp. 235, 236.

2 Archbp. Potter : quoted by Denton Grace of the Ministry p. 258.

no Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

shown to be false and corrupt, at epochs of past history
that great Christian nations, or great bodies of Christian
men, have broken away from its organization. Are
these, then, which have no succession, or a succession
which you declare invalid, to be " unchurched " to be
declared outside the pale of the covenant and left in
unrecognised isolation ? This question is always
being asked in tones of passionate appeal or indignant
remonstrance. As we shall have occasion to recur to
Preliminary the problem the less need be said here. Suppose,

answer. * *

however, an impartial investigation to convince us
that a ministerial succession was really part of
Christ s intention and belongs only to the episcopal
Churches in a legitimate sense, it will surely be our
duty to maintain it and be faithful to it. Nor, if we
are at all familiar with the disappointing side of
church history, shall we be greatly surprised that
its corruptions have bred revolt. These corruptions
are, no doubt, so many apologies for the revolters. It
is conceivable that they may reach the point of excus
ing revolt in particular cases and throwing the blame
of it on the representatives of authority. If that
were so, or so far as it was so, we shall abstain from
condemning individuals or races, but we shall not
abandon principles. Men are dealt with according to
their opportunities ; and as God s love is not limited
by His covenant, so He can work through minis
trations which are not valid that is, ministrations
which have not the security of the covenant. But
though God can do this, we have no right to claim it
of Him. If He is not bound to His sacraments, we

if.] Apostolic Succession. 1 1 1

men, up to the limits of our knowledge, 1 certainly
are. However excusable many may be in ignorance
of divine institutions, we shall not be excusable if we
are faithless to them for fear of hurting other men s
feelings or disturbing existing arrangements. Such
conduct would be most false charity, most real
treachery. Bishop Butler 2 reminds us "how great
presumption it is to make light of any institutions of
divine appointment ; " and he emphasizes to us " the
moral obligation, in the strictest and most proper
sense," which attaches to any command "merely
positive, admitted to be from God." And if anything
could increase this obligation, it would be the sense
that we are living through an age of change. It is
when there is a general shaking of existing estab
lishments of all that has been merely recognised and
customary that religiously-minded men are likely to
be driven back upon those institutions which can give
the completest guarantee of security and permanence.
With this much preface, giving (it may be hoped)
a clearer idea of what the principle of the ministry
and of the apostolic succession may really be said to
mean, we turn to the witness of history.

1 When we speak of essentials in religion, it is of course important to
recall that God is a father and equitable, and that His action is not tied to His
covenanted channels. There is a useful distinction drawn by Roman Catholic
theologians between things necessary to salvation necessitate medii, i.e.
absolutely and in all cases, and things necessary necessitate praecepti, i.e.
obligatory upon all who are within the hearing of a divine ordinance. Only
the right disposition of will is (we may say) essential in the first sense.
This may exist under all conditions of ignorance. All else is necessary in
proportion as we come vinder the responsibilities of nearness to God s revela
tion of Himself (cf. Newman s Parochial Sermons vol. vi. pp. 170, 171
Faith the Title for Justification ).

2 A nalogy part II. ch. i.

CHAPTER III.

THE WITNESS OF CHURCH HISTORY.

in h chnreL 8try ^ HE conception of the Christian ministry described in
the last chapter is confessedly no mere ideal. It
represents what has been, beyond a doubt, a fact of
primary importance in the Christianity of history.

In many respects, indeed, if we were to trace back
the genealogy of the ministry in the Church, we should
find that it has passed through strange vicissitudes,
and from time to time has wonderfully changed its
appearance. It may be well to call attention to this
at once, so that variations of aspect, which are even
startling, may serve to make more emphatic the prin
ciples and facts which have been throughout per
manent and unchanging. 1

iariabi e e of -^ or exam pl e &gt; the episcopate of the first period,

when, speaking generally, every town Church had
its independent episcopal organization and country
bishops arose to superintend the scattered flocks of
the rural districts, was a very different thing from the
episcopate of the mediaeval epoch, when the great
dioceses of Teutonic Europe were formed, when
bishops became great feudal lords, and the feudal
character at times almost superseded the spiritual,

1 Cf. Dr. Liddon A Father in Christ p. 26 f.

TIT.] The Witness of Church History. 113

Very different again was the organization of the Celtic
Church of Ireland (and thence of Scotland), where the
presbyter-abbots were the real ecclesiastical rulers and
the succession of abbots the important succession, while
the episcopate, indefinitely multiplied, had its place
only as the necessary instrument of spiritual genera
tion, or the appropriate decoration of sanctity, in
entire subordination to the monastic authority.

Again, there have been vast changes in the relation
of the bishops to secular society, and in their relation
to one another. There has been the slow develop
ment of the metropolitan system on the lines of the
imperial organization ; the upgrowth of the papacy ;
the rise of national Churches ; the schisms of the
eleventh and sixteenth centuries. There have been
Erastian epochs, whether under the Byzantine and
Frankish emperors or under English kings, and
epochs, on the other hand, when a king 1 could com
plain that "absolutely the only persons who reign
are the bishops," or when a pope could claim, as in
the famous bull Unam Sanctam, to have the sword of
secular authority committed to him as well as that
of ecclesiastical government.

Again, there have been days when bishops adminis
tered, and submitted to, a rigorous discipline, such
as finds expression in the early Spanish council of
Elvira, and days of the collapse of discipline, such as
gives the tone of something like despair to the lamen
tations of Basil and Gregory of Nyssa in the Arian

1 Chilperic (Greg. Tur. H. F. vi. 46) ; but the context, as well as the
circumstances, take away from the force of this.

ii4 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

period in the East, or such as Isidore and Gregory of
Tours describe in the West.

There have been, once again, great changes in the
idea of episcopal election, as it passes out of the
primitive method which made the bishop the real
representative of the community in the midst of
which he had grown up, behaving himself well
in the inferior offices/ to become the prerogative in
fact, if not in name, of metropolitans, or popes, or
kings.
has been These have been immense changes. In part they

governed

S r fixe g &lt;irrin have been inevitable and beneficial ; in part the re
cognition of them should be a stimulus to the
Church to recover in idea, and so at last in fact, a
primitive standard which ought never to have been
abandoned. But all through these changes there
have been certain fixed principles 1 of supreme im
portance, which have been uniformly maintained, and
which all the changes in outward circumstance only
serve to throw into stronger relief, and it is with
these alone that we are here concerned. These fixed
principles represent what the Church has continuously
believed with reference to the ministry, and con
sistently acted upon (let us say to start with) since
the middle of the second century down to the period
of the Reformation. They may be expressed
thus :

1 A sermon of Dean Stanley s "The Burning Bush" (quoted in Remarks on
Dr. Light/oofs Essay on the Christian Ministry, by C. Wordsworth, Bishop of
St. Andrews, pp. 2-6) illustrates how these fixed principles can be ignored.
He describes, for instance, the mediaeval abbeys and the great universities
as "fragments of presbyterianism imbedded in the midst of the episco
pate " (p. 4). Their relation to the papacy is quite forgotten.

in.] The Witness of Church History. 115

( 1 ) that Christ instituted in His Church, by sue- such * 8 the

* requirement

cession from the Apostles, a permanent Ministry of gucc p es^n c
truth and grace, of the word and sacraments, as e
an indispensable part of her organization and con
tinuous corporate life :

(2) that while there are different offices in this
ministry, especially an episcopate, a presbyterate, and
a diaconate with functions and mutual relations
fundamentally fixed, though containing also variable
elements, there belongs to the order of Bishops, 1 and
to them alone, the power to perpetuate the ministry
in its several grades, by the transmission of the
authority received from the Apostles, its original
depositaries ; so that, as a consequence, no ministry
except such as has been received by episcopal ordina
tion can be legitimately or validly exercised in the
Church :

(3) that the transmission of ministerial authority,
or Ordination, is an outward act, of a sacramental

1 I reckon the bishops as a distinct order, discussing, however, such a
position as that of Ambrosiaster or Jerome on the subject and such considera
tions as are involved in the supposed peculiarities of the early Alexandrian
ministry. The later tendency to reckon the episcopate as constituting with
the presbyterate only one ordo sacerdotum (Catech. Cone. Trident, ii.
7. 25) was due partly to the desire to emphasize the pre-eminent dignity of
the sacerdotium; partly to the desire to reduce church orders to the mystical
number of seven ; partly to the wide influence of Jerome in the West. It has
its parallel in early days when the bishop was sometimes reckoned with the
presbytery. But so long as bishops are regarded as having special functions
of their own, which presbyters cannot validly perform, and are ordained
with a special ordination (Catech. Cone. Trident. I.e.) the exact ordering
of grades is rather a matter of nomenclature. See on the variations Diet.
Chr. Ant. ii. pp. 1474-5 s.v. ORDERS, HOLY. Morinus, however, among more
recent Roman theologians (A.D. 1686) says of those who reckon eight orders
of the ministry, major and minor, by counting the episcopate as a distinct
order: "huic sententiae plurimum favent rituales omnes tarn Graeci quam
Latini et universa prope ecclesiae traditio " (de S. Ord. p. iii. ex. i. 2. 26),
and his authority is deservedly very high.

ii6 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

character, in which the laying-on of hands, with
prayer, is the visible sign. It will appear also

(4) that the Church, without change of principle,
and merely by the clearing-up of ideas, came to reckon
the effect of ordination as indelible, and to recognise
as a Priesthood the ministry of bishops and pres
byters, which it conferred.

The general recognition of these principles during
the period specified will hardly be matter of dispute.
" In the latter part of the second century of the Chris
tian era, the subject [of the apostolic succession] came
into distinct and formal view ; and from that time
forward it seems to have been considered by the great
writers of the catholic body a fact too palpable to be
doubted, and too simple to be misunderstood." The
agreement, however, as to what has historically been
accepted in the Church on the subject of the ministry
is not nearly complete enough to render argument
Evidence unnecessary. We proceed then, first of all, to review

the evidence for the existence of the threefold ministry,
fromTS after the middle of the second century, 2 with the ac
companying principle of the apostolic succession, and
the limitation to bishops of the right of ordination.
as appealed I. The basis shall be laid in the testimony of Iren-

to by Iren-

aeus. Irenaeus had been born in Asia Minor not later
than A.D. 130. 3 He tells us that in early youth he had
sat at the feet of Polycarp, " who had been appointed by

1 Gladstone Church Principles p. 189.

2 The reason for not at first going back behind about A.D. 150 will appear
afterwards.

3 For this and other details of St. Irenaeus life see Diet. Chr. Biog. iii.
p. 253 f.

in.] The Witness of Church History. 117

Apostles a bishop for Asia in the Church of Smyrna "
a venerable old man, whose appearance and ways of life
were, he assures us, indelibly imprinted on his memory
and that he had listened to his discourses in public
and private, 1 and that he had also had opportunities
of instruction by Asiatic " elders," amongst whom
some at least had been disciples of Apostles. Thus
imbued with the traditions of the Asiatic Church, in
which especially St. John s influence was a living
reality, he passed as a young man, probably before
Poly carp s martyrdom (c. A.D. 155), from Asia to
Rome. How long he remained there we do not know ;
but at the latest in the year 177, when the persecution
fell upon the Churches of South Gaul and the aged
bishop Pothinus was one of many victims, Irenaeus
was a presbyter of Lyons, and he succeeded the martyr
in his episcopal see. Previously, however, he had
visited Rome, in order " to promote the peace of the
Church " by bearing communications from the Galilean
confessors to Eleutherus, the bishop, on the subject of
the Montanist controversy. 2 True to his name of
* peaceful, 3 he again intervened, as has been already
mentioned, in the dispute between Victor of Rome
and the Asiatic Churches in the matter of keeping
Easter, to rebuke Victor for his hasty breach of
ecclesiastical unity on the ground of an indifferent
matter of custom, not of the faith.

1 See his epistle to Florinus in Euseb. H. E. v. 20.

2 Euseb. H. E. v. 3, 4 : Diet. Chr. Biog. Hi. p. 937 s.v. MONTANUS. It
is possible that there was at this time no other episcopal see in Gaul than that
of Lyons and that Irenaeus was consecrated at Rome. Eusebius speaks of
the irapolmat Kara. Ta\\iav As Eiprji/atos (irecrKdirti.

1 1 8 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

The value of Thus much account of the man has been given in

his witness.

order to emphasize his remarkable connection alike
with the apostolic traditions which lingered in that
last home of the apostolic band, the Churches of Asia,
and with the sentiments of the contemporary Churches
both of East and West. Irenaeus was fitted by circum
stances, as well as by character, to be what he pre
eminently claims to be, the staunch maintainer of
apostolic tradition. Of course the " tradition of the
elders " l to which he so frequently refers is not in
fallible. 2 Elders may have made mistakes, or Irenaeus
memory may have been treacherous as to this or that
point of their record, in spite of his assertion that he
recalled the scenes of his youth when he was in the
company of Polycarp in all their details with more
precision than recent events. The value of tradition
depends very much on the exact point for which it is
alleged. But a mistake or failure of memory, not hard
to account for in details of tradition, cannot invalidate
his testimony on matters of such primary importance
as the character and traditional reputation of the
church ministry, or, to take another example, the
authority of the four Gospels during the period
covered by his own eastern and western experience.
On such matters a mistake is hardly possible.

1 ap. Euseb. H. E. v. 20 (the epistle to Florinus).

2 He gives us, on the authority not only of Papias but also of other
"elders" who remembered St. John to have related it among our Lord s
discourses, the fabulous prophecy ascribed to Him of the Millennium
Vines (v. 33. 3, 4). He bases also on the authority of these same elders " all
the elders who had intercourse with John, the disciple of the Lord, in
Asia " as recording St. John s teaching, the statement that our Lord was
over forty years old (ii. 22. 5).

in.] The Witness of Church History. 119

We take Irenaeus, then, for our primary witness as to
the apostolic succession. He is combating Gnosticism
in his great work Against the Heresies, written prob
ably during his episcopate ; and in view of the imagina
tive idealism of the Gnostic teachers, he rests his case
in the main on the historical revelation. He is there
fore not so much occupied in developing a Christian
science over against the science falsely so called
of his opponents this was rather the work of the
Alexandrians as in emphasizing what the rule of
faith has been in the Churches as derived from
the apostolic preaching. 1 In the consent of all the
Churches he finds the security of the tradition. The
case was put by his more epigrammatic disciple
Tertullian in the question : "Is it probable that so
many Churches of such importance should have hit
by an accident of error on an identical creed ? " 2 There
is, then, ever before Irenaeus eye. the picture of the HIS appeal

to the

universal Church, spread over all the world, handing
down in unbroken succession the apostolic truth :
and the bond of unity, the link to connect the gene
rations in the Church, is the episcopal succession.
Irenaeus use of language, indeed, about the bishop
is not quite determinate ; 8 the venerable title of
presbyter, the ancient or elder/ is still used in

* rVc2&lt;n? dXij^Tjs i] rCiv djrocrT6\u;/ SiSct^T) KO.I rb apxaiov TTJS
K0.ro, iravrbs TOV KdfffJLOv (iv. 33. 8).

2 " Ecquid verisimile est, ut tot ac tantae [ecclesiae] in unam fidem errave-
rint? " (de Praescr. 28.)

3 That is, he calls the bishops also presbyters. See iii. 3. 2 (compared with
iii. 2. 2) ; iv. 26. 2, 4, 5 ; Ep. ad Viet. ap. Euseb. H.E. v. 24. So the Anony
mous Presbyter who writes against Montanism (ap. Euseb. H. E. v. 16)
speaks of the church authorities at Ancyra, bishop no doubt included, as
"the presbyters." So (as will appear) Clem. Alex., Origen, Firmilian.

I2O Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

an inclusive sense for the Church s rulers. But the
idea is quite determinate. He regards the bishops in
every Church as succeeding in an especial sense to the
Apostles. They represent in every place by apostolic
succession the catholic faith; they have the "gift of
the truth " and the apostolic authority of government ; l
they are the guardians also no doubt of the grace by
which Christians live, of which as much as of the truth
the Church is the " rich treasury." 2 But it is mainly
as preserving the catholic traditions that Irenaeus
regards the apostolic succession. From this point of
view he makes it without hesitation one of the

i "Charisma veritatis certum " (iv. 26. 2) ; " quos et successores [apostoli]
relinquebant suum ipsorum locum magisterii tradeutes " (iii. 3. i).

a " Depositorium dives" (iii. 4. i). Cf. iii. 24. i, where he speaks of the
Church as possessing "earn quae secundum salutem hominum est solitam
operationem, quae est in fide nostra ; quam perceptam ab ecclesia custodimus
et quae semper a Spiritu Dei, quasi in vase bono eximium quoddam depositum
iuvenescens et iuvenescere faciens ipsum vas in quo est. Hoc enim ecclesiae
creditum est Dei munus, quemadmodum ad inspiiationem plasmationi, ad hoc
ut omnia membra percipientia vivificentur : et in eo disposita [? deposita]
est communicatio Christi, id est Spiritus sanctus, arrha incorruptelae et
confirmatio fidei nostrae et scala ascensionis ad eum. In ecclesia enim,
inquit, posuit Deus apostolos, prophetas, doctores et universam reliquam
operationem Spiritus, cuius non sunt participes cmnes qui non currunt ad
ecclesiam. . . . Ubi enim ecclesia, ibi et Spirit s Dei, et ubi Spiritus Dei,
illic ecclesia et omnis gratia ; Spiritus autein veritas. Quapropter qui non
participant eum, neque a mammillis matris nutriuntur in vitam, neque
percipiunt de corpore Christi procedentem nitidissimum fontem." We observe
here in what close and inseparable connection he puts the gifts of grace and
truth. The gifts of grace he connects specially with the sacraments, regenera
tion with baptism (v. 15. 3), incorruption with the Eucharistic gifts (iv. 18. 5 :
ws yap airb yfjs &pros, 7rpo&lt;rXa;uj3aj 6/teJ os rr\v ?KK\rjffLV TOV 6eou, ofiK^ri KOIVOS
Apros lerlv, d\\ evxapiffTia, e/c duo Trpay/j-dTuv crvveffrriKvIa, tiriyelov re /cat
ovpaviov ourws /cat ra craj/aara -tip-Siv /j.eTa\afj.^dvovTa rijs euxa/HOT/aj /JLTIK^TI fit/at
&lt;0aprd). It cannot, I think, be reasonably doubted that Irenaeus would have
regarded the episcopate as entrusted with the ministry of the sacraments,
no less than of the truth, though it was not his present business to lay stress on
this ; cf. his words to Victor (ap. Euseb. H. E. v. 24) : " Anicetus allowed
Polycarp to celebrate the Eucharist in the Church at Rome " (ira.pex&lt;*&gt;pi)&lt;rfv
TTJV evxapurrlav). Already in Clement s epistle (c. 44) the "offering of the
gifts " is the characteristic function of the bishop

ill.] The Witness of C/mrck History. 121

I rimary essentials of Christianity. " The true know
ledge " (so he calls the Christian religion) " is the
doctrine of the Apostles, and the ancient system of
the Church in all the world : and the character of the
body of Christ, according to the successions of the
bishops, to whom they [the Apostles] delivered the
Church in each separate place : the complete use
(moreover) of the Scriptures which has come down to
our time, preserved without corruption, receiving
i either addition nor loss ; its public reading without
falsification ; legitimate and careful exposition accord
ing to the Scriptures, without peril and without
blasphemy : and the pre-eminent gift of love." l Again,
" The way of those who belong to the Church is encom
passing the whole world, because it holds the tradition
firm from the Apostles, and enables us to see that the
faith of all is one and the same, while all teach one
and the same God the Father, and believe the same
dispensation of the Incarnation of the Son of God, and
acknowledge the same gift of the Spirit, and meditate
the same precepts, and preserve the same form of that
ordination which belongs to the Church, and expect
the same coming of the Lord, and await the same
salvation of the whole man, both soul and body." 2

33- 8: " rV&lt;2&lt;7is dX?j(?7)s i] rdv airoffr6\uv

rias ffvffTr)fj.a /caret Travrbs rov /c6cr/iou : et character corporia Christi
secundum successiones episcoporum, quibus illi earn, quae in unoquoque loco
est, ecclesiam tradiderunt : quae pervenit usque ad nos custoditione sine
fictione scripturarum tractatio plenissima, neque additamentum neque abla-
tionem recipiens ; et lectio sine falsatione et secundum scripturas expositio
legitima et diligens et sine periculo et sine blaspliemia : et praecipuum
dilectionis munus. " Cf. i. n. I (itftos x a P aK7 "np) 5 2 4- 7&gt; 2 %- l -

2 v. 20. i : " Eorum autem, qui ab ecclesia sunt, semita circumiens
mundum universum, quippe firmam habens ab apostolis traditionem, et videre
nobis donans omnium unam et eandem esse fidem, omnibus unum et eundem

122 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

These summary statements of what constitutes
Christianity are valuable as showing that to Irenaeus
Christianity is not an idea but an institution, a
catholic Church, and in the Church the essential link
of continuity is the apostolic succession. To it there
fore he makes his great appeal against the Gnostics. 1

Deum Patrem praecipientibus, et eandem d!spositionem inca.nationis Filii
Dei credentibus, et eandem donationem Spiritus scientibus, et eadem medi-
tantibus praecepta, et eandem figuram eius quae est erga ecclesiam ordina-
tionis custodientibus et eundem exspectantibus adventum domini, et eandem
salutem totius hominis, id est animae et corporis, sustinentibus." ( Ordi-
natio translates r&lt;fts, i.e. ecclesiastical order, in iii. 3. 3.)

1 iii. 3. 1-3: " Traditionem itaque apostolorum in toto mundo manifesta-
tam in omni ecclesia adest respicere omnibus qui vera velint videre ; et
habemus annumerare eos qui ab apostolis instituti aunt episcopi in ecclesiis
et successores eorum usque ad nos, qui nihil tale docuerunt neque cognoverunt,
quale ab his deliratur. Etenim si recondita mysteria scissent apostoli, quae
seorsim et latenter ab reliquis perfectos docebant, his vel maxime traderent
ea quibus etiam ipsas ecclesias committebant. Valde enim perfectos et irre-
prehensibiles in omnibus eos volebant esse, quos et successores relinquebant,
suum ipsorum locum magisterii tradeutes ; quibus emendate agentibus fieret
magna utilitas, lapsis autem summa calamitas. Sed quoniam valde longum
est in hoc tali volumine omnium ecclesiarum enumerare successiones,
maximae et antiquissimae et omnibus cognitae, a gloriosissimis duobus
apostolis Petro et Paulo Romae fundatae et constitutae ecclesiae earn, quam
habet ab apostolis traditionem et annuntiatam hominibus fidem, per succes
siones episcoporum pervenientem usque ad nos, indicantes confundimus
omnes eos, qui quoquo modo vel per sibiplacentiam vel vanam gloriam vel
per caecitatem et malam sententiam praeterquam oportet colligunt. Ad
hanc enim ecclesiam propter potentiorem [?potiorem] principalitatem necesse
est omnem convenire ecclesiam, hoc est eos qui sunt undique fideles, in qua
semper ab his, qui sunt undique, conservata est ea quae est ab apostolis
traditio. 6e/j.(\iwcravTes o7v Kal olKoSonritravres ol fJLo.K6.pioi diro&lt;TTO\oi TTJV
fKK\T/fflav, Atvtf) TTJV Trjs firiffKOTrjs \eiTovpyiav tveytlptfflU TOVTOV TOV Mvov
IlaOXos tv rats Trpbs T!i/j.69tov ^Trto-roXats fJtffivrjTai. StaSe xeTai 5 avrbv
/xera TOVTOV 5 rplrui TOTTI? a.irb run dtrocrT6\uv TTJV finer KOirrjv /cXijpoOrai
6 Kal fupaKws TOVS /ua/captovs dirocrT6\ovs /cat tri /x.jSe^X7?Ku)s ai)TotJ /cat (TI t-vav\ov
T& Kripvyna rCiv diroffT6\uv Kal T^V irapdSocriv irpo 6&lt;t&gt;da.\/j.uv fyuv, ov pdvos en
yap iro\\ol \nre\fiirovTo rbre a.ifb TWV airoaTbXbiv deSiday/j.^vot . . . rbv St
KX-fi^evra TOVTOV 5ta5^x eTa * Ei/dpeoros* Kal rbv EvdpeffTOV AXefavS/soj* fid oCrws
?KTOS dirb TWV diroffTbXuv Ka.OicrTa.Tcu. tZvffTos. /iera 5^ TOVTOV TeXe&lt;r^&gt;6/)os, 8s
/cat ev56fws ffj-aprvprjcrev HireiTa Yyivos, elra Ilios, ped ov Avf/cijros. SiaSe^a^vov
TOV AviKrjTOv Swr^poy, vvv 5uSfKaT&lt;i&gt; TOirtf Tbv T^S {irurKotrfjs dirb T&V 6.woaTb\ijiv
car^x K\Tjpov EXciJ^epos. T^avry rdfci. Kalr^ avrfj StaSoxi? [Euseb. 5t5ax^, Lat.
successions] rj TC dirb TUJV d7ro&lt;rr6Xw^ ev rfj e/c/cX^cr/a TrapdSocns Kal rb TTJS d\ij&fias
Kripvy/j.a KarrivTi]Ktv (I

in.] The Witness of Church History. 123

" All who wish to see the truth have it in their power both in west

and East,

to fix their eyes on the tradition of the Apostles,
which is manifested in all the world ; and we can re
count the number of those, who were appointed by the
Apostles as bishops in the Churches, and their suc
cessors down to our own time, who neither taught nor
had any knowledge of the wild notions of these men.
For had the Apostles known any mysteries which they
taught to the perfect in private and unknown to the
rest, they would have delivered them to those surely
before all others to whom they intrusted the very
Churches themselves. For they desired them to be
eminently perfect and utterly without reproach, whom
they left behind as their actual successors, handing on
to them their own position of presidency." Thus he
appeals to the successors of the Apostles. Then,
" because it would be tedious in a volume like this
to enumerate the successions of all the Churches,"
he gives that of the greatest of all, the Church of
Rome a Church to which he attributes a specially
representative character l and records how Peter and
Paul intrusted the ministry of the episcopate there to
Linus, and how he in turn was succeeded by Anencletus,
Clement, Evarestus, Alexander, Xystus, Telesphorus
the martyr, Hyginus, Pius, Anicetus, Soter, and
finally in his own day Eleutherus. Thus " there has
come down to us with the same order and the same

1 It seems most probable that the words of disputed meaning should be
translated "for to this Church, on account of its special pre-eminence
all Churches must needs come together, that is the faithful from all sides j
and in her the apostolic tradition has been always preserved by those who
are from all parts." I think Langen (Gesch. der Romischen Kirche i. pp.
170-174) has made this interpretation good. But it does not concern us here-

124 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

succession the tradition from the Apostles in the
Church and the preaching of the truth." With this
tradition of truth " coming down to us through the
succession of the bishops," Irenaeus proceeds to
" confound " his opponents, corroborating, however,
the tradition of the West, according to his essential
principle, with the apostolic tradition of the Church
of Smyrna and "all the Churches of Asia." 1

What we have quoted will be enough to illustrate
his method of appeal. The results of it he con
stantly presses on the men of his time. " We must
obey those who are the elders in the Church, those
who, as we have shown, have the succession from the
Apostles ; who, with the succession of the episcopate,
have received also the sure gift of truth according to
the will of the Father : but as for the rest, who leave
the original succession and come together wherever
it may be, them we must hold in suspicion, whether
as heretics of a wrong opinion, or as men who make
division through pride and self- pleasing, or again as
hypocrites." 2 " Where one is to find [the true elders],
Paul teaches, when he says, God set in the Church
first apostles, secondly prophets, thirdly teachers/

1 iii. 3. 4 : KCU IIoXi;/cap?ros . . . virb d.TrooTiXwj KaraffTadds et s rrjv Aviav
v rr) ev S/w/pi/r; eiCK\7)&lt;ri&lt;f. tTrlaKoiros . . . ravra StSa^ay del, & /cai irapa. rOiv
d7ro&lt;rr6Xu&gt;f f/j.a6fv, 3. KO.I ij e/acX^crta Trapa5i5w(Tiv, & xa.1 /j.6va ecrrlv d\t}6ij.
/uaprupoDcri TOUTOIS at Kara rrjv Afflav e/c/fX^crtat iracrai.

2 iv. 26. 2 : "Quapropter eis qui in ecclesia sunt presbyteris oboedire
oportet, his qui successionem habent ab apostolis, sicut ostendimus ; qui cum
episcopatus successione charisma veritatis certum secundum placitum Patris
acceperunt ; reliquos vero, qui absistunt a principali successione et quocunque
loco colligunt, suspectos habere vel quasi haereticos et malae sententiae, vel
quasi scindentes et elatos et sibi placentes, aut mrsus ut hypocritas quaestus
gratia et vanae gloriae hoc operantes."

in.] The Witness of Church History. 125

Where, then, the gifts of God are placed, there he
should learn, the truth, with those who have the
Church s succession from the Apostles and maintain
a sound and irreproachable mode of life and uncor-
ruptness of speech." *

The position of Irenaeus is thus very clear and accepted by

Tertullian,

definite. It is accepted by his more brilliant but less c- A D - 200;
stable disciple, Tertullian, who reproduces his argument
with striking vigour in his work, called Praescrip-
tiones (or Preliminary Pleas ) against the Gnostic
teachers. In it he has a double question to ask these
pretenders to represent Christianity. First do they
hold the rule of faith ? Secondly have they an apo
stolic succession ? " Let them produce the account of
the origins of their Churches ; let them unroll the line
of their bishops, running down in such a way from
the beginning that their first bishop shall have had
for his authorizer and predecessor one of the Apostles,
or of the apostolic men who continued to the end
in their fellowship. This is the way in which the
apostolic Churches hand in their registers : as the
Church of the Smyrnaeans relates that Polycarp was
installed by John, as the Church of the Romans
relates that Clement was ordained by Peter. So
in like manner the rest of the Churches exhibit the
names of men appointed to the episcopate by Apostles,
whom they possess as transmitters of the apostolic

1 ib. 5 : " Ubi igitur tales inveniat aliquis, Paulus docens ait : PosuitDeus
iii ecclesia primo apostolos, secundo prophetas, tertio doctores. Ubi igitur
charismata domini posita sunt, ibi discere oportet veritatem, apud quos est ea
quae est ab apostolis ecclesiae successio et id quod est sanum et irreprobabile
conversationis et inadulteratum et incorruptibile sermonis constat."

126 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

seed." 1 "So now," we resume after a few chapters, " you
who wish to exercise your curiosity to better profit in
the matter of your salvation, run through the apostolic
Churches, where the very chairs of the Apostles still
preside in their own places " Corinth, Philippi, Thes-
salonica, Ephesus, Rome. Make it your business to
inquire what they have learnt and taught ! This is
his challenge. 2 The unchanging tradition goes hand in
hand with the steadfast ministerial succession, just as
on the contrary the novelties of heresy are associated
with carelessness about order. " Their ordinations are
heedless, capricious, changeable. At one time they
appoint neophytes ; at another, men bound to secular
employment ; at another, apostates from us so that
official distinction may act as a bond to hold them
where truth cannot. Nowhere is promotion so easy

1 de Praescr. 32 : " Ceterum si quae [haereses] audent interserere se
aetati apostolicae, ut ideo videantnr ab apostolis traditae, quia sub apostolis
fuerunt, possumus dicere : Edant ergo origines ecclesiarum suarum,
evolvant ordinem episcoporum suorum, ita per successiones ab initio
decurrentem, ut primus ille episcopus aliquem ex apostolis vel aposto-
licis viris, qui tamen cum apostolis perseveraverit, habuei it auctorem et
antecessorem. Hoc enim modo ecclesiae apostolicae census suos deferunt,
sicut Smyrnaeorum ecclesia Polycarpum ab loanne collocatum refert, sicut
Romanorum Clementem a Petro ordinatum. Itidem proinde utique et
ceterae exhibent, quos ab apostolis in episcopatum constitutes apostolici
seminis traduces habeant. Confingant tale aliquid haeretici. Quid enim illis
post blasphemias illicitum est ? "

3 16. 36: "Age iam, qui voles curiositatem melius exercere in negotio
salutis tuae, percurre ecclesias apostolicas, apud quas ipsae adhuc cathedrae
apostolorum suis locis praesidentur, apud quas ipsae authenticae literae eorum
recitantur, sonautes vocem et repraesentantes faciem uniuscuiusque. Proxima
est tibi Achaia? habes Corinthum. Si non longe es a Macedonia, habes
Philippos, habes Thessalonicenses. Si potes in Asiam tendere, habes Ephesum.
Si autem Italiae adiaces, habes Romam, unde nobis quoque auctoritas praesto
est . . . Videamus quid didicerit [ecclesia Romana], quid docuerit, quid
cum Africanis quoque ecclesiis contesserarit." ib. 37: "Si haec ita se
habent, ut veritas nobis adiudicetur, quicunque in ea regula incedimus,
quam eccleaia ab apostolis, apostoli a Christo, Christus a Deo tradidit,
conutat ratio propositi nostri."

165.

in.] The Witness of Church History. 127

as in the camp ot rebels, where even one s presence is
in itself a claim. And so one is a bishop to-day,
another to-morrow; the reader of to-morrow is a deacon
to-day ; the layman of to-morrow a presbyter to-day.
For they impose even on laymen the functions of the
priesthood." l

The age of Irenaeus is to be for the present our anticipated

by Hege-

starting-point ; but it is important to emphasize that C! P A P D!
there is no originality about his ecclesiastical concep
tions. Not only does his own language exclude such a
supposition, but we have external testimony to the same
effect. Eusebius 2 has preserved for us some words of
Hegesippus, the father of church history/ in which
he is speaking of his journey to the West, made not
later than A.D. 167 : "The Church of the Corinthians,"
he says, " remained in the right word down to Primus
bishopric in Corinth. I had intercourse with them
when I was sailing to Borne, and I passed some days
with the Corinthians, in which we took comfort
together in the right word. And when I was in Rome
I made a succession [i.e., a list of the succession]
down to Anicetus, whose deacon was Eleutherus.

1 ib. 41: " Ordinationes eorum temerariae, leves, inconstautes. Nunc
neophytos collocant, nunc saeculo obstrictos, mine apostatas nostros, ut gloria
eos obligent, quia veritate non possunt. Nusquam facilius proficitur quam
in castris rebellium, ubi ipsum esse illic promereri est. Itaque alius hodie
episcopus, eras alius ; hodie diaconus, qui eras lector ; hodie presbyter, qui
eras laicus ; nam et laicis sacerdotalia munera iniungunt."

2 Hegesipp. ap. Euseb. H. E. iv. 22 : Kal fTTf/j.eve&gt;&gt; 17 fKK\ij&lt;rla. ^ KopivOluv
Iv r$ 6pO$ \6yifi FJ-txpi Ilpfyzou tiriffKOTreuovTos v Kopifffif ols criW/xtfri irX^ow efs
Pu/j,7]v, Kal ffvvSitrpiijsa rols KopivBiois ^ufyos iKavas, i&gt; als ffvvaveirdri/j.ei&gt; rif
6p9y \&yq&gt;, yev&/jLfvo^ St ev Pw^tTj SiaSoxriv ^iroirjffii^v M^X/ 3 " Avi/c^rov, 08
Sidxovos fy E\tv6fpos KO.I irapa AviKrjTov 5ia5^x erat SWTI}/), ped ov E\4udepos.
tv ftcdffTri 8 SiaSoxy Kal tv e/axcn-Tj TriXet oCrws Hx ft &gt; ( * &gt;J c6/toj KTjptiffirfi Kal oi
Trpo&lt;f&gt;TJTai Kal 6 Ki^ptoi.

128 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

And from Anicetus, Soter succeeds, and after him
Eleutherus. Now in each succession and in each
city it is as the law proclaims and the prophets and
the Lord." Hegesippus then had found a succes
sion in each city. He made a list for the purpose of
his history at Rome ; but there, as elsewhere, he had
found the thing existing. Let Hegesippus testimony
then reinforce that of Irenaeus.

Starting thus from about the middle of the second

century the episcopal succession is an undoubted fact

Alienee in m ^ known Christian Churches. It is, however,

desirable to review the evidence not only of the fact,

but also of the importance attached to it.

A - We begin with the East, and in the East with
the cradle of our religion Palestine. "As early
as the middle of the second century all parties concur
in representing James [the Lord s brother] as a
bishop in the strict sense of the term." l The episco
pate, that is to say, was at that date an institution
certainly believed to derive in Jerusalem from St.
James. Eusebius has preserved to us a complete list
of the successors of Symeon, who was chosen in his
place first, thirteen Jewish bishops, and then, after
the annihilation of Jerusalem and the foundation
upon its site of Aelia Capitolina, thirteen Gentile
bishops, 2 down to the accession of the venerable
Narcissus, who was engaged in the Paschal contro-

1 Lightfoot Dissert, p. 208. See Hegesipp. ap. Kuseb. H.E. iv. 22 ; the
Clementine Ep. Petri, Ep. Clem. init. , Horn. xi. 35 ; and Clem. Alex. ap.
Euseb. H.E. ii. i. In this review of second century episcopacy I am
mainly following Dr. Lightfoot.

- Euseb. H.E. iv. 5, v. 12.

in.] The Witness of C kurch History. 129

versy. 1 There can be at least no doubt of the exist
ence in Jerusalem of an episcopal succession of im
memorial antiquity at the date which is our starting-
point for the present. In the Paschal controversy
we find the bishop of Jerusalem associated with three A.D.
other Palestinian bishops 2 (of Caesarea, Tyre, Ptole-
mais), in writing an encyclical letter in favour
of the western view. The testimony of the Clemen
tines, 3 which may be taken to represent Ebionite
ideas at the end of the second century, goes to
assure us that at that date the episcopate at Caesarea,
Tyre, Sidon, Berytus, Tripolis, and Laodicea could
plausibly be represented as having been instituted
by St. Peter. 4 It must be noticed that there is the
same insistence upon the episcopal succession in the
Ebionite Clementines as in the fragments of Hege-

1 Euseb. H.E. v. 23. - Euseb. H. E. v. 25.

3 The Clementine Homilies and Recognitions contain substantially the same
narrative. They purport to contain an account given by Clement of his con
nection with St. Peter and of St. Peter s journeyings, discourses, etc., in
cluding his institution of bishops, presbyters, and deacons at various places
in Syria. Both are Ebionite, though the Recognitions present Ebionite ideas
in a very modified form. Both are based apparently on an earlier document,
and are of Syrian origin. Dr. Salmon (Diet. Chr. Biog. CLEMENTINE LIT.)
dates the Recogn. about A.D. 200 and the Homilies about A.D. 218. [Origen
quotes the former about A.D. 230.] He thinks the document on which they are
based may go back to A.D. 160. Dr. Lightfoot says : "the Homilies cannot
well be placed later than the end, and should perhaps be placed before the
middle of the second century" (Dissert, p. 211). There are also two
letters to James from Peter and Clement, both now prefixed to the Homilies,
but the latter probably served originally as preface to the Recognitions
(Diet. Chr. Diog. i. p. 570). It describes St. Peter s ordination of Clement as
bishop of Rome.

4 See Recogn. vi. 15 : " [Peter] appointed as bishop over them [at Tripolis]
Maro . . . and with him he ordained twelve presbyters and deacons at the
same time." Cf. iii. 66 (Caesarea, bishop, twelve presbyters, and four
deacons), x. 68 (Laodicea) ; Horn. iii. 72 (Caesarea), vii. 5 (Tyre), 8 (Sidou),
12 (Berytus), xi. 36 (Tripolis, bishop, twelve presbyters, and deacons), xx. 23
(Laodicea). See also Ep. Clem, ad lac.

130 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

sippus and in the writings of Irenaeus ; episcopacy,
and episcopacy derived from the Apostles, was not,
we perceive, a matter of dispute. 1
Syria. The episcopal succession at Antioch is historical

C. A.D. 110.

at least from Ignatius. If we cannot fully rely upon
the list of bishops given us by Eusebius, 2 at least
bishop Theophilus, the apologist, and bishop Serapion
come out into the light during the second century.

1 It is worth while collecting the conception of the ministry given in
the Clementine documents.

(1) There is the idea of succession to the Apostles. Clement succeeds St.
Peter (Ep. Clem. 2, 19). St. Peter, in his letter to James, emphasizes the idea
of succession on the analogy of the seventy elders who succeeded to " the
chair of Moses." Here the successors seem to be the whole presbyterate,
but subordination to the bishop is strongly marked (Ep. Petr. 4. 2).
The bishop s chair is also called "the chair of Christ" (Ep. Clem. 17, and
Horn. iii. 70).

(2) The idea of the episcopal succession is mainly that of succession to the
teaching office, in order to keep the tradition (cf. Irenaeus) : see Ep. Petr.
init. and Ep. Clem. 2, 6 : TJ TWV \6yuv tcaQedpa, 6 T??S dX-qdelas irpOKaOetfuevos,
6 -rfjs d:\rjOelas irpeo^rTjs. But the bishop has intrusted to him " the authority
to bind and loose " with divine sanction (ib. 2 : otirw neradlSw/ju TTJV Qovalav
TOV Seff/J-efaiv Kal \ueiv, Iva. irepl Travrbs oC civ -xfLporov-f]ff^ tirlrTJs 717$ ftrrat Sfdoyfta-
rtfffj^vov Iv otipavoii : cf. ib. 6, Horn. iii. 7 2 ) 5 ne i 8 the TrpoeoTtis (Ep. Clem.
6) ; he has the general administration of the Church (5(o/K??&lt;ns, ib. 3, etc.) ;
and all is to be done by the presbyters with his knowledge (Ep. Petr.
4. 2). He is to be kept clear from secular cares (Ep. Clem. 5, 6). St.
Peter is represented as baptizing and breaking bread ; also the elders at
Jerusalem as baptizing (Ep. Petr. 4. i).

(3) Presbyters are to exercise moral discipline ; to administer charitable
relief; to reconcile disputants (Ep. Clem. 7-10; Horn. iii. 67, 68). The
deacons are " the eyes of the bishop," to assist his pastoral care in the dis
tribution of alms, with considerable independence in the latter department
(Ep. Clem. 12 ; Horn. iii. 67). There is also mention of catechists, but ^;he
bishop is represented in one place as the catechist (Ep. Clem. 13, 14). The
Ship of the Church is described elaborately with her full equipment of
officers, etc. (ib. 14, 15). 4

(4) Ordination is by laying on of hands (Ep. Clem. 19 ; Horn. iii. 72 ;
Recogn. iii. 66), with accompanying prayer (Horn. iii. 72).

In all this there is nothing specially Ebionil - ; but James is called "bishop
of bishops," and has a universal authority ascribed to him (Ep. Clem. init.).
Even Peter, though he is called "first of apostles" (ib. i), has to give
an annual account to him of his doings (Recogn. i. 17), and is subject to him
(ib. 72). This is Ebionite. 2 Euseb. H.E. iv. 20, 24; v. 22.

IIL] The Witness of Church History. 131

So much for the Church of Palestine and the
Greek Church of Syria. Of the early " Syrian Church,
strictly so called" the Syriac-speaking Church we
have no authentic history. It is, however, worth
while noticing that the early traditions of that Church
represent the "ordination to the priesthood" as the
means of the propagation of the Gospel, venerate the
threefold ministry as of apostolic institution, and lay
great stress on the episcopal succession deriving in
each Church from an apostle through the laying
on of hands. 1

We pass from Syria to Asia to find the epis- Asia Minor.
copal succession a very old established institution.
It is enough to say that Ignatius had impressed A.D. no.
upon the Churches of Ephesus, Magnesia, Tralles,
Philadelphia, and Smyrna, that the bishop, with the

1 See The Teaching of Addaeiis the Apostle and The Teaching of the
Apostles ancient Syriac documents, trans, in Clark s Ante-Nicene Library,
vol. xx esp. pp. 32, 48. See Tixeront Origines de Veglise d Edesse pp. 1 14 ff.
The former is a retouched version, dating apparently from about 400 A.D., of
the document quoted by Eusebius (H.E. i. 13), which existed in "the
archives of Edessa, at that time a royal city." The latter document uses
an old pre-Peshitto Syriac reading. As to their ecclesiastical ideas, it may
be noted that the bishop is called by a word translated guide and ruler. "
Addaeus, the apostle, ordains Aggaeus, and he "made priests and guides in
the whole country of Mesopotamia." The authority of the guide is limited :
"it is not lawful for him to transact the affairs of the Church apart from
those who minister with him" (Teaching of the Apostles p. 41). Cf. Lightfoot
Disseft. p. 211 n. 6 It should be noticed that the apostles who originate
" ordination to the priesthood " (Teaching of the Apostles p. 48) are reckoned
at seventy-two, and amongst them are Luke and Addaeus, whom Eusebius
calls Thaddaeus and describes as "one of the seventy disciples of Christ"
(ff. E. i. 13). The number seventy-two represents the older Curetonian
Syriac reading of St. Luke x. i ; the Peshitto has " seventy." (On the rela
tions of the Cur. Syr. to the Pesh. see Westcott and Hort Introd. to N. T.
pp. 84, 85.) The Arab, El MCjfizi (who wrote a history of the Coptic Church
in the fourteenth century, but drew upon earlier authors, such as Eutychius)
speaks likewise of "seventy apostles " (in Malan Orig. Doc. of the Copt. Ch.
iii. p. 23) ; this may represent some old Alexandrian statement, directly or
indirectly.

132 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

presbyters and deacons, represents the authority of
God, and we are not allowed to doubt that at least
they learned the lesson. Besides Polycarp of Smyrna,
Onesimus of Ephesus, Damas of Magnesia, and Polybius
of Tralles, whom Ignatius mentions, we hear during
the second century of Papias, a contemporary of Poly-
carp, and Claudius Apollinaris, bishops of Hierapolis, 1
of Sagaris, bishop of Laodicea, and Melito, bishop of
Sardis. 2 Polycrates, bishop of Ephesus at the end of
the second century, speaks of himself as having had
seven of his own family before him in the episcopate,
whose traditions he followed. 3 If we pass from the
proconsular province to Asia Minor, in the wider
sense of the term, we have not much evidence bear
ing on the subject ; but we hear of bishops in the
second century at Sinope 4 and at Eumenia, 5 at
Amastris, at Comana, at Apamea 6 ; and there is no
indication such as would lead us to doubt the
universal extension of the episcopate in the Churches
of that country. Towards the end of the century
episcopal synods become common ; at the time of

1 The episcopate of Claudius, c. A.D. 171, rests on the authority of his
contemporary, Serapion (ap. Euseb. H.E. v. 19); Papias on that of Eusebius
representing the common account (H. E. ii. 15).

2 c. A.D. 150-170, on the authority of Polycrates in Euseb. //. E. \. 24.
8 Euseb. H. E. v. 24.

4 Marcion of Sinope is described as " episcopi filius " in [adv. Omn.
Haer. appended to] Tertull. de Praescr. 51. Marcion propagated his system
before the middle of the second century. He was himself recognised as
bishop by his sect and organized it oil the Church s model ; f aciunt favos
et vespae, et faciunt ecclesias Marcionitae " (Tertull. adv. Marc. 5).

6 Polycrates ap. Euseb. H. E. v. 24.

6 Palmas of Amastris is mentioned by Dionysius of Corinth writing to the
Churches of Pontus (Euseb. H. E. iv. 23). Zoticos of Comana and Julianus
of Apamea are mentioned by the anonymous contemporary adversary of the
Montanists (ap. Euseb. H. E. v. 16).

in.] The Witness of Church History. 133

the Paschal controversy there were a number of
bishops in Pontus ; and Polycrates l speaks of " great
crowds " of bishops whom he had summoned to con
ference on that subject.

If there is less evidence of the diffusion of episco- Greece.
pacy in Greece in the latter half of the second century,
this probably does not mean more than that the Church
there was less prominent than the Church in Asia. 2
Where we hear of church government it is episcopal.
At Corinth, when Hegesippus visited it, there was not e. A.D. m
only a bishop, Primus, but a succession ; 3 after him
we hear of Dionysius, and at the time of the Paschal
controversy of Bacchyllus. 4 In the mention which
Eusebius makes of one of Dionysius letters " to the
Athenians" (about A.D. 170), we hear of at least two
bishops in the succession of Athens prior to that date
Publius, who was martyred, and Quadratus, who had
recalled their Church from something like " apostacy
from the word," into which they had fallen. 5 If this
bishop is that Quadratus who presented his Apology
to Hadrian at Athens, this record carries back the
Athenian succession at least very early in the
century. The tradition of the earlier episcopate of
Dionysius the Areopagite is not here in question.

We have the names of no bishops on contemporary Macedonia.
evidence during the second century in Macedonia,
but when Tertullian is rhetorically bidding the

1 Euseb. H. E. v. 24.

2 The problems presented by the Epistles of Clement and Polycarp will
be considered below. They do not fall within this period.

3 Euseb. H. E. iv. 22.

4 Euseb, H. E. iv. 23 ; v. 22, 23.

5 Euseb. H. E. iv. 23. Publius is called 6 Trpoeorws avr&v.

134 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

heretical teachers to take counsel of " the apostolic
Churches, where the very chairs of the Apostles still
preside," he goes on, " Is Achaia nearest to you ? you
have Corinth ; if you are not far from Macedonia, you
have Philippi, you have Thessalonica," showing that
at the end of the century Macedonia had episcopal
successions which were believed to derive from
apostolic ordination. 1

Thrace. If we pass from Macedonia to Thrace we pass to a

district almost without Christian record, but towards
the end of the century we find a bishop of Debeltum
signing an encyclical letter, directed against the
Montanists, 2 " and the existence of a see at a place so
unimportant implies the wide spread of episcopacy in
these regions." 3

Crete. On our passage from Greece to Egypt we may take

Crete by the way. There we know that at least two
episcopal sees existed about A.D. 170, for Dionysius
of Corinth wrote a letter " to the Cnossians," with
words of advice to Pinytus their bishop, and another
" to the Church at Gortyna, with the other parishes
[i. e. dioceses] in Crete," specially commending Philip,
the bishop of Gortyna, who is also known as the author
of a work against Marc ion. 4

Alexandria. On arriving at Alexandria we shall undoubtedly
find ourselves in a Church of the three orders. It is
true that we cannot trace to its source or verify the

1 Tertull. de Praescr. 36. Cf. Origen on Rom. xvi. 23: "fertur sane
traditione maiorum quod hie Gaius [St. Paul s host] primus episcopus fuerit
Thessalonicensis ecclesiae. "

- Euseb. H.E. v. 19.

3 Lightfoot Dissert, p. 217. 4 Euseb. H.E. iv. 23, 25.

tie exis
tence of

in.] The Witness of Church History. 135

complete and dated list of Alexandrian bishops, which
Eusebius gives us, reaching back to St. Mark as
founder of the Church. We do not in fact know the
name of any Alexandrian bishop on indisputable evi
dence till we get to Demetrius, Origen s contemporary ;
for "the Alexandrian succession, in which history is
hitherto most interested, is not the succession of the
bishops, but of the heads of the catechetical school." l
But Clement s evidence gives us all that we want. He TI
was born about the middle of the second century, and
not only had the Church which he knew bishops, pres- abie? u
byters, and deacons, 2 but it had even passed out of

1 Lightfoot Dissert, p. 226.

2 " The grades in the Church here of bishops, presbyters, deacons, I believe
to be imitations of the angelic glory " (Strom, vi. 13. 107 : at frravffa Kara.
TTJV KK\T]&lt;rtav irpoKOTral firiffKbTTUp, TTpefffivrtpuv, SiaKOvuv, [ji.i/u.rifj.a.Ta ol/ucu dyyeKiKijs
db&s). The whole chapter runs thus : The perfect Christian gnostic is even
here equal to the angels : he may be made equal to the Apostles: "not
that they became apostles because they were chosen for some special pecu
liarity of nature, for Judas was chosen with them ; but they were capable of be
coming apostles on being chosen by Him Who foresaw even how they would
end. For Matthias, who was not chosen with them, on showing himself fit
(&lt;5ios) to become an apostle, is substituted for Judas. So now too, those who
have exercised themselves in the Lord s commandments and have lived per
fectly and with knowledge (yvua-TiK&s), according to the Gospel, may be en
rolled (tyypatpfjvai) in the chosen body of the Apostles. Such an one is in reality
a presbyter of the Church and a true deacon of the will of God, if he do and
teach the things of the Lord, not being ordained (xfiporovo&gt;j[ji.evos) by man, nor
reckoned just because he is a presbyter, but counted (Kara\ey6fj.ei&gt;os) in the
presbyterate because he is just. And even if here upon earth he be not
honoured with the chief seat (irpuroKadeSpia), he will sit on the four and
twenty thrones judging the people, as John says in the Apocalypse." The
four and twenty elders, he continues, are the chosen of the chosen, equally
from Jews or Greeks. "Since I think the grades in the Church here of
bishops, presbyters, deacons are imitations of the angelic glory and of that
dispensation (olKovo^ias) which the Scriptures say await those who, following
the footsteps of the Apostles, have lived in perfection of righteousness accord
ing to. the Gospel. For these, the Apostle writes, lifted up in the clouds
will serve their diaconate first (diaKovriffeiv), then be reckoned with the pres
byterate in a higher grade of glory, for glory differeth from glory, until they
grow up into a perfect man." Clement s meaning is apparently that moral
excellence and gnostic enlightenment w r ere qualifications for the apostolate of

136 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

memory that bishop and presbyter were interchange
able titles in St. Paul s days. 1 We have additional

old and make a man a true priest now (cf. the exclamation of the people in
demanding Athanasius election &\rjdus tTrlvKoiros, Athan. Apol. c. Ar. 6);
not, however, in the sense that they can enable a man to dispense with ordina
tion or justify him in assuming ministerial functions without it, but only in
the sense that, if he be not admitted to the clergy here, he will be hereafter
raised to those grades of glory which the present distinctive offices in the
Church adumbrate here below ; they are titles for a place in the hierarchy
in heaven, if not here. It will be noticed that though Clement divides the
hierarchy into three orders, he can still (like Origen and many others) speak
of the presbyterate as the "chief seat " ( 106 above). The mam distinction
with him, as with Irenaeus and many after them, is between presbyters and
deacons. Thus in another passage (Strom, vii. I. 3), contrasting the two sorts
of ministry to men the more menial service (inrrjpfTiKr}) and the higher ministry
of improvement (/SeXriwrt/cT; depaireia) he finds the former exemplified in the
Church s diaconate, the latter in the presbyterate, thus dividing the church
ministry into two sorts (6/j.olw Kara rrjv ^KK\rjffLai&gt; rriv ptv /SeXncoTucrji oi irpeff-
/3frrepoi &lt;r&lt;j}ovffu&gt; et /ciW, TT]V uTrrjpfTiKTjv d ol OIO.KOVOI) ; here the presbyterate
must include the bishop.

Clement s position on many points is somewhat hard to define. His line
of thought is not one which, like that of Irenaeus, leads him to speak much
about the ministry. At the same time there is an mtellectualism in his whole
conception of religion, a recognition of a priesthood of knowledge (for reffs.
see Bigg B.L. p. 101), which represents an opposite tendency to the priest
hood of enthusiasm among the Montanists. This, we must acknowledge,
whatever fascination Clement s gentle, pious, generous spirit has for us
had in it dangerous elements of Gnosticism, and led him even to shrink
from attributing to our Lord real human feelings, a real flesh and blood like
ours (Bigg B.L. pp. 93, 71 n. s ) ; it makes him in a measure depreciate
mere faith and desire to create a Church within a Church, a Church of
the spiritually enlightened (Bigg p. 85 f.). Thus it may have tended to
make him depreciate the ministry which comes of ordination by comparison
with the priesthood of knowledge, but there is no evidence of this. His
point of view is not at all unecclesiastical. Christianity is not by any means
to him a mere idea or philosophy ; it is embodied in a visible society. Nor
in the passage quoted* is there anything to lead us to suppose that he
shrank from recognising the necessity for orders in the Church, or their
exclusive rights, any more than he shrank from recognising the exclusive
prerogative of the Church. Dr. Bigg says no more than is true when he
says : " It is important to add . . . that Clement lays great stress upon the
observance of the existing church discipline, the regular use of all the
ordinary means of grace " (pp. 96, 97). He very likely, however, did not
recognise fully that the unworthiness of the minister hinders not the grace
of the sacraments, and he speaks of baptism administered by heretics as OVK
oliceiov /cot yvfjffiov VSup (Strom, i. 19. 96). On this, and on his not using
:=acerdotal language of the ministry, see below, p. 1 96 f .

1 Paed. iii. 12. 97: "there are an infinite number of suggestions in the

in.] The Witness of Church History. 1 3 7

reason to believe that the episcopal office was recognised
at Alexandria as distinct from the presbyterate very
early in the century. The emperor Hadrian visited
Alexandria in A.D. 130, and he gave an account of
his visit in a letter to Servianus which is preserved.
Amidst the motley crowd of the devotees of all sorts
of religions and superstitions, whose fickle inconsist
ency, as it appeared in his eyes, half amused and half
disgusted him, he recognised the "bishops of Christ"
as distinct figures from the Christian presbyters. 1

There is thus no ground for doubting the ex
istence of an episcopal succession at Alexandria long
before the middle of the second century. But we but Jerome
have it on Jerome s evidence that this succession had
some peculiarity. He is writing 2 in a state of great
indignation with the arrogance of deacons in the
Church of Rome. He (like other patristic writers)
wishes to emphasize, as a corrective to their self-
assertion, the especial dignity of that priesthood,
which, with some differences of function, presbyter
and bishop share in common. His view will be con
sidered later, but he illustrates it by a practice which
he attributes to the Church of Alexandria in earlier
days, and with this illustration we are now concerned.

sacred books directed to select persons, some to presbyters, some to bishops,
some to deacons, others to widows."

1 See his letter to Servianus (ap. Vopisc., quoted by Lightfoot Ignatius
i. 464; cf. Dissert, p. 225): "Illic qui Serapem colunt Christiani sunt, et
devoti sunt Serapi qui Christi se episcopos dicunt. Nemo illic archisyn-
agogus ludaeorum, nemo Samarites, nemo Christianorum presbyter,
non mathematicus, non haruspex, non aliptes. Ipse ille patriarcha, cum
Aegyptum venerit, ab aliis Serapidem adorare, ab aliis cogitur Christum.
The patriarcha " is (no doubt) the Jewish patriarch.

2 Ep. cxlvi ad Evangelum.

138 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

that, down to Jerome then asserts that "from the days of St. Mark

A.D. 233-249

265, the 249 " the Evangelist down to the episcopates of Heraclas
constftuted 6 and Dionysius the presbyters at Alexandria used

by mere *

election, always to appoint as bishop one chosen out of their
number and placed upon the higher grade, just as if
an army were making a general, or deacons were
choosing one of themselves whose diligence they knew
and calling him arch-deacon. For what" (he asks)
"except ordination does a bishop do which a presbyter
does not ? " l The language of this statement is
ambiguous, but Jerome seems to mean, as he was
certainly understood to mean by later Latin writers,
that there was no fresh consecration or ordination re
quired in earlier days at Alexandria to make a presbyter
bishop, but that he became bishop simply in virtue of
his election by the other presbyters. There would
have been thus a substantial identity between the
two orders. Jerome had of course resided at Alex
andria, and had had opportunities of making himself
acquainted with Alexandrian traditions ; but, if this

His state- is his meaning, his statement is wholly without inde-
pendent support in Latin or Greek literature. 2 Epi-
phanius, for example, Jerome s older contemporary and
bishop of Salamis in Cyprus, though he knew Egypt

1 The Latin is quoted in Appended Note B, where there is some further
discussion of the matter.

2 His statement is copied by later Latin writers, and an Arab patriarch
of the tenth cent., Eutychius, is quoted in support ; .on whom see App. Note
B. Surely Dr. Lightfoot is mistaken (Dissert, p. 231 n. 2 ) when he quotes
Ambrosiaster (in Eph. iv. 12) in support of Jerome: "denique," says
Ambrosiaster, "apud Aegyptum presbyteri consignant si praesens
non sit episcopus." The reference here is to confirmation, not ordina
tion. Moreover Didymus, who lived and taught at Alexandria and was
Jerome s teacher, says absolutely : ^TT/O-KOTTOJ /x6^os TT? &vudfv x-P tTl Te\e? T&

(de Trin. ii. 15).

in.] The Witness of Chiirch History. 139

better than Jerome and was acquainted with the
peculiar position of the Alexandrian presbyters, which
anticipated that of the parish priests of later days
was seemingly ignorant of any such fact as Jerome
mentions. 1 There is no trace of it in any Alexandrian
writer of the third or fourth centuries. Thus Athana-
sius records how a council at Alexandria, in A.D. 324,
had declared null and void a pretended ordination
by a schismatical presbyter, Colluthus. It has been
recently suggested that the mere fact of such an
ordination having occurred is a sign that the older
traditions of the substantial identity of the bishop
and the presbyter still survived in the byways of
the Alexandrian Church. But Athanasius language,
or rather the language he quotes from the letter of a
synod of Egyptian bishops held in A.D. 340, does not
countenance this. " How then," they ask, " is Ischyras
a presbyter ? Who appointed him ? Colluthus, was
it not ? This is the only plea left. But that Col
luthus died a presbyter, and that his every ordination
is invalid and all who were appointed by him in his
schism have come out laymen and are so treated, is
plain, and nobody doubts it." 2 This is not the lan-

1 Haer. Ixix. I. Had he been acquainted with the supposed fact, it
probably would have appeared in his language against Aerius, which is re
ferred to later. It would have needed explanation.

2 Athan. Apol. c. Ar. n, 12 (quoting from a synodical letter of Egyptian
bishops) : OUTOS 5^ earif 6 iro\vdpv\\T]Tos 10-%1/pas, 6 A"} 1 " 6 v^b rfjs tKK\Tj&lt;rlas
Xtiporov-r]8els /cat, Sre roi)s virb MeXeTtou KaraffraOevras irpeafivrtpovs A\t!;av8pos
e5^x er &gt; M 7 ?^ tKeivots &lt;rvi&gt;api6/*T]9fts ovrus ovd tKeWev Kareffrddt). irbOev oi&lt;v
irpeajSi/repos lo^i/pas ; rivos Karaffr^ffavros ; S,pa KoA\oi/0ov; rovro yap \OLTr6v.
ctXV STI ~K6\\ovdos Trpeff^ijrfpos iav ^reXei/rrjcre, /cat Tratra x e ^P &lt;*fo"&lt;&gt;0 y^yoftv
&KVpos Kal irdvres ol Trap avroO /caraara^J Tes & T ^x^/taTi \aiKol yeydvacri
/cat OVTW ffwdyovrai, dij\ov, Kal otdevi KaQffTT]Kev dfj.(f&gt;i^o\ov. Cf. 74 (and 76) :
oi)5^7TOTe \firovpybs rrjs eKTcXijat aj ytyovev . . . e/CTrecrwi /cai T^J i/ ei/SoCj inrovotas
7ov Trpe&lt;rj3vTfpiov.

140

Christian Ministry.

[CHAP.

ib)isnot

guage which could have been used if there had been
an appeal in the matter to any ancient tradition of
the Church.

The language and silence of Origen are also signi-
ncant. Origen was thirty-eight years old when
Heraclas became bishop, in whose time the gradual
exaltation of the episcopate is supposed to have begun.
Origen, besides giving us to understand that the
method of ordaining bishops was by laying-on of hands, 1
also speaks of them frequently as occupying a quite
different grade to presbyters, and he uses language
which implies that the position of bishops was one of
immemorial antiquity. 2 It must also be remembered

1 When Origen (in Num. xxii. 4) is rebuking the " priucipes ecclesiae " (i.e.
bishops) for appointing their own relations or even their sons to succeed them
in their sees, he quotes Num. xxvii. 18-20 (where Moses is directed to choose
Joshua and lay hands upon him, etc.) and continues: "audis evidenter
ordinationem principis populi tarn manifesto descriptam, ut paene expositione
non egeat. " Just above he had distinguished the " princeps populi " from the
"presbyteri" of Num. xi. 16. Cf. also in Exod. xi. 6.

2 Origen s language about church offices is of this nature :

(1) Bishops and presbyters are classed together as v tKK\t]criaffTiKrj doKovvres
elvai vwepoxfj (in loann. xxxii. 7); cf. in Matt. xvL 22: ol 8t ras irpuTOKaOedplas
irfTriffrev/j.{voi rov \aov fTriaKoiroi Kal 7rpe&lt;r/3t/repot.

(2) Much more frequently they are spoken of as constituting distinct
classes ; cf . in Luc. xx : "Si lesus subiicitur Joseph et Mariae, ego non
subiiciar episcopo qui mini a Deo ordinatus est pater ? non subiiciar pres-
bytero qui mihi Domini dignatione praepositus est ? " Again, in the beautiful
contrast which he draws (c. Cels. iii. 30) between the Christian and the
pagan tKK\Tj&lt;ria, he distinguishes the dpxuv of the Christian community from
the fiovXevral the bishop from the presbyters in several typical Churches,
of which Alexandria is one. Again, speaking (de Oral. 28) of the different
"debts "which different classes of the community have to pay, he specifies
the distinct debt of widow, deacon, presbyter, and continues : /ecu fwiffK6-irov
5 6&lt;pfi\T) J3apvr&lt;irr) a.Trairov/j.^vrj i;7r6 rov TT}J 8X775 lKK\rjcrias crarrTjpos Kal ^KdiKov/j^vt)
el pr] &iro5i8$ro. And in a similar strain in lerem. xi. 3 : ou iravrus 6 /cX^pos
ff&fci . . . TrXelov yw &Trairov/j.ai Trapd rbv didKOvov (this was after he was
ordained priest), TrXeiov 6 SICLKOVOS trapa. rbv \aiK6v 6 5 TTJV iravruv TJ/J.UV tyKf-
Xetptov^cos &pX7]v O.VTTJV TTJV tKK\ r)&lt;riao TiKT)v tirl ir\elov aTratretroi. Cf. in Ezech.
v in Luc. xvii.

(3) He puts the bishops alone in a remarkable way, as the Church s rulers :

in.] The Witness of Church History. 141

that Origen had suffered severely from specially epis
copal authority at Alexandria. He had been ordained
presbyter, as is well known, at Caesarea, without the
consent of Demetrius, the bishop of Alexandria. Now,
while a mixed synod of Egyptian bishops and pres
byters had consented only to banish him for this
breach of canonical discipline, a synod of bishops alone
had gone further and deposed him from his presby-
terate, as he and his friends thought, unjustly. 1 This
severer treatment would make him quick, like Jerome,
to notice the arrogance of bishops. 2 If then Heraclas,
Demetrius successor, had deprived the presbyters of
an ancient right, it would not have escaped his atten
tion ; yet, writing at the end of Heraclas episcopate,
he characterizes the Alexandrian Church among others
as " a mild and stable" society, and speaks of want of
zeal, not of rivalry, as the fault likely to be found in

"per singulas ecclesias bini sunt episcopi, alius visibilis, alius invisibilis ;
ille visui carnis, hie sensui patens " (in Luc. xiii). He is alluding to the
Angel of the Apocalypse, whom he conceives of as the spiritual guardian of
the Church and counterpart of the earthly bishop. This leads to the remark
that

(4) He conceives the bishop of his day to be the bishop of whose qualifica
tions St. Paul instructs us (in Matt. xi. 15 ; c. Cels. iii. 48). Also he speaks
of bishops as the immemorial tradition in the Church ; he speaks of people
who have to boast of fathers and ancestors wpoedpias ^tw/i^ots fv rg fKuXijaiq.
eiriffKOiriKOv dpbvov 1) irpefffivreplov rifj.rjs ^ diaKuvias ets TOV \abv (in Mutt. xv. 26).
And as he singles out " stability " as a note of the Church, when he is con
trasting it with the pagan societies (c. Ctls. iii. 30 : wpaeld TIS ical wrra0//s)
and this when Alexandria is specially mentioned among other Churches he
is clearly not conscious of any change in the Church s constitution which is
going on. Nor does his language at all suggest that the episcopate at Alex
andria was in a peculiar position.

1 Diet. Chr. Biog. s.v. ORIGEN iv. p. 100.

2 He does, as a fact, rebuke the bishops, especially those of great cities,
for secularity and pride, but not as if their order was exalting itself at the
expense of the presbyters ; cf. in Matt. xvi. 8, in Exod. xi. 6, and Diet. Chr.
Biog. s.v. OKIGEN iv. p. 127.

142 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

bishops and clergy. 1 So far then as Jerome s theory
postulates at Alexandria an original lack of clear dis
tinction between the orders of bishop and presbyter,
followed by a gradual exaltation of the episcopate,
during the period of Origen s life, it has all the testi
mony of his language against it. 2
( C ) if true, is It requires, then, a great effort of confidence to

not incon-

ffi*p n riMi$ie trust Jerome s witness, especially when we consider
sion ucc that it is the witness of Jerome in a temper, 3 and that
under such circumstances he is not too careful with
his facts ; but it has been so generally accepted by
western writers from the fourth to the twelfth
century and by modern critics, that it will be the
better course, as our object is not merely archaeological,
to face what is at any rate the possibility of its being
true. It should then be noticed that, when western
church writers of the Middle Ages quote and accept
Jerome s statement, it causes them no disquietude
in view of the existing distinction of bishops and
priests. They would maintain that no one can validly

1 c. Gels. iii. 30.

2 So far again as Jerome s words postulate that the elective authority for
the episcopate lay simply with the presbytery, it has against it the evidence
that the ancient mode of episcopal election at Alexandria gave great power
to the vote of the whole people. It is not likely that the presbytery should
have lost power and the people gained it. See Athan. Apol. c. Ar. 6 -irav
rb irXrjOos /cai Traj 6 Xa6s ; Greg. Naz. Orat. xxi. 8.

There were remarkable features about Alexandrian episcopal elections
in later days. They were made rapidly to avoid disturbance (Epiphan.
Haer. Ixix. n), and Liberatus speaks thus of the episcopal consecration
(Breviar. 20) : " Consuetude quidem est Alexandriae ilium qui defuncto
succedit excubias super defuncti corpus agere, manumque dexteram eius
capiti suo imponere et, sepulto manibus suis, accipere collo suo beati
Marci pallium et tune legitime sedere. "

3 Dr. Bigg, in another case, makes short work of Jerome s unsupported
testimony" (B. L. p. 214 n. 1 ).

in.] The Witness of Church History. 143

execute any ecclesiastical function which does not
belong to him by the proper devolution of ecclesias
tical authority. But this no one accuses the Alexan
drian presbyters of having done. They were ordained,
ex hypothesi^ on the understanding that under certain
circumstances they might be called, by simple election,
to execute the bishop s office. They were not only
presbyters with the ordinary commission of the
presbyter, but also bishops in posse. 1 Elsewhere
there were two distinct ordinations, one making a
man a bishop and another a presbyter ; at Alexan
dria there was only one ordination, which made a
man a presbyter and potential bishop. When this
arrangement ceased and Alexandria was assimi
lated to other Churches, the presbyters began
to be ordained as mere presbyters ; and hence
forward any assumption by one of them of episcopal
powers, such as Colluthus was guilty of, was treated
as a mere assumption, the results of which were
simply invalid. It is unnecessary to do more than
recall, in view of such an hypothetical situation, the
contention of the last chapter, namely that the
church principle of succession would never be violated
by the existence in any Church of episcopal powers,
whether free or conditional, in all the presbyters,
supposing that those powers were not assumed by
the individual for himself, but were understood to
be conveyed to him by the ordination of the Church.

1 Their position would not have been very unlike that of the chorepiscopi,
who could only ordain validly (in the mind of the early Church) where they
had the sanction of the town bishop.

144 Christian Mimstry. [CHAP.

The state of things, then, which is assumed to have
existed at Alexandria violates the complete uniformity
of the church ministry in the period we are consider
ing it requires us to introduce qualifications into
our generalization of results but it does not affect
the principle. 1

s ^ ^ ar we nave been going through the evidence
as supplied by the history of Eastern Christianity on the

conceived . J . ^ . . *

existence of episcopal successions in every Church.
It remains to seek additional light on the conception
entertained of the ministry; and that from three
sources

(1) writings which are concerned with worship

and church order :

(2) the canons of councils :

(3) some representative Fathers.

a&gt; Liturgies, (l) Besides the oriental offices of ordination, of

KtfL. \ /

ancient though uncertain date, 2 and some mediaeval
commentaries on the ancient rites, such as that of
Symeon of Thessalonica, we have older sources of
evidence. There is the work of the (Syrian) pseudo-
Dionysius, On the Ecclesiastical Hierarchy, a work
probably of the end of the fifth century, elaborating
the mystical significance of the Church s orders ; and,
more ancient, the work which by gradual accretions
took shape in the Apostolical Constitutions. We have
reason to know that this book existed substantially
as we have it about the middle of the fourth century, 3

1 See Simcox Early Church History p. 359 n. 1
3 Given in Morinus de S. Ord. p. ii.

8 Dr. Lightfoot has shown (Ignatius i. p. 253) shown is not too strong a
word even in face of Harnack that the interpolator of the Ignatian letters

etc.

III.] The Witness of Church History. 145

and it undoubtedly embodies a great deal of a much
earlier date. Now, all this body of writings puts
before us the ministry of bishops, presbyters, and
deacons as constituting without any possibility of
doubt the Church s hierarchy. There are minor orders,
but they are on a different level. 1 Nor is there any
tendency, as in some similar western, works, to mini
mize the original distinction of bishops and presbyters.
There is a difference indeed between one document
and another in respect of the dignity of the presby-
terate. The earlier work makes the bishop the typi-
cal priest, and, while it acknowledges the priestly
character of the presbyter, tends to make him simply
the bishop s assistant. In the later writings a more
independent priesthood is recognised as belonging to
the presbyter. This corresponds to the historical fact;\
for, while at first the bishop was the officiating priest |
in. each community and the presbyters were his assist
ants, the process of decentralizing which went on in
the East as in the West, though not to the same

plagiarized from the Apostolical Constitutions. "Moreover," he adds, "the
plagiarisms are taken from the work as we have it now . . . The obligations
to the two last books are hardly less considerable in comparison with their
length than to the earlier and larger part of the work." But the date of the
interpolated letters is fixed with great certainty by their doctrinal tone ; they
were composed in the latter half of the fourth century perhaps soon after
350. "There is nothing," says Dr. Lightfoot, "in the Apostolic Constitu
tions, even in their present form, inconsistent with an earlier date thau this,
while their silence on questions which interested the Church in the middle
and latter half of the fourth century is in itself a strong presumption that
they were written before that date. " This would still leave room for minor
alterations such as must have occurred in v. 1 7 (on the keeping of Easter),
since it was quoted by Epiphanius.

1 Cf. Symeon ap. Morinus de S. 0. p. ii. p. 129. The orders treated of by
Dionysius are three ; he lays great stress on their separate dignity (ap.
Morinus de S. 0. p. ii. p. 53 f.). Cf. Apost. Const, viii. 46 : bishops, priests,
and deacons were ordained by the Apostles.

146 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

extent, resulted in the presbyter gaining a more inde
pendent ministry. So far as a change took place, it
was in this direction rather than in the other. But
it did not touch the distinction of orders ; the bishop
has from the first, and retains, the exclusive power to
consecrate the chrism for confirmation and to ordain
to the several orders of the clergy. 1 Nor is it unim
portant to notice that there is no growth in the
sacerdotal conception. On the contrary, while the
mediaeval rites of ordination are moderate 2 in their
expression of it, there is an overstrained tone some
times apparent in the sacerdotalism of the earliest of
these writings, the Apostolical Constitutions. The
general conception of the priesthood is, however,
practically identical through all the literature now
The apos- under discussion. 3 The earliest description of the

tolical con
stitutions, modes of ordaining a bishop and a presbyter will give

us a clear impression of the way in which the ministry
is regarded.
Mode of At the ordination of a bishop, 4 there is first to be

ordaining a m

bishop. the gathering on the Sunday of the bishops, pres-

1 See Apost. Const, vii. 42, viii. 28 ; cf. Dionysius (ap. Morinus de 8. 0. p. ii.
p. 55) : ^ Qeia. 6eff/J-odfffia TTJV TUV lfpapx&lt;-Kuv rd|ewv ayiaffreLav Kal rr/v rov Oeiov
/jujpov TeXficiiffiv Kal TTJV iepav rov Ovaiaffrripiov TeXerovpyiav rcus TWV Iv6u&gt;v lepapxuv
[i.e. the bishops] reXeffiovpyois Svi&gt;d/j,eaiv evialws d,irK\7]puffei&gt;. So much later
Symeon (ib. p. 129) reckons pvpov tvepyeiv among episcopal powers ; the pres
byter has not the ^eraScm*?? xdpts, nor is he able to do anything reXetm/cdj r)
&lt;f&gt;uriffTiK6i&gt;, but he can consecrate the mysteries and baptize.

2 It is noticeable how the phrase occurs in the ordination of a deacon
(ap. Morinus de S. 0. p. ii. pp. 69, 79, 86) : "Not through the laying-on of my
hands, but by the visitation (tv tirurKoirr)) of Thy rich mercies is grace given,
that he may stand purged from all sin in the dreadful day of judgment." The
distinction is thus emphasized between order and sanctity.

3 The correlation of the high priest, priests, and Levites of the Old
Testament with the bishops, presbyters, and deacons of the New appears in
the Apost. Const. , only mingled with other comparisons.

4 Apost. Const, viii. 4, 5. Dr. Hatch calls this ceremony of the ordina-

in.] The Witness of Church History. 147

byters, and people. Then the presiding bishop is
solemnly to question the presbyters and laity as to
their choice of the candidate, as to his worthiness and
character. This is to be done thrice, and they are to
reply as at the tribunal of God and of Christ, and
in the presence of the Holy Spirit and of the angels.
" Then, silence having been made, one of the first
bishops, standing with two others near the altar
the rest of the bishops and presbyters silently
praying, and the deacons holding the Gospels open
upon the head of him who is being ordained (x^t/oo-
rovovpevov) shall address God." He invokes Him
under His attributes of supremacy and as the gover
nor of the Church, 1 " who through the coming
of Thy Christ in the flesh didst give laws to Thy
Church, with the testimony of the Paraclete through
Thine Apostles and us Thy bishops here present by
Thy grace : who didst foreordain priests from the
beginning for the government of Thy people, first
Abel, Seth, Enos, Enoch, Noah, Melchizedek, and
Job : who didst appoint Abraham and the rest of
the patriarchs, with Thy faithful servants Moses and
Aaron, Eleazar and Phinehas : who of them didst
ordain rulers and priests in the tabernacle of witness :
who didst choose Samuel for priest and prophet : who
hast never left Thy sanctuary without a ministry :
who wast pleased to be glorified in those whom Thou
didst choose :" he then goes on to pray " now also do
Thou by the intercession of Thy Christ, pour down by

tion of a bishop the earliest eastern form of what in later times would have
been called the ritual of ordination or consecration " (B.L. pp. 131, 132).
1 For the two forms of the prayer, see Pitra lur. Eccl. Or. i. p. 50.

148 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

means of us the power of Thy ruling Spirit, who is
ministered by Thy well-beloved Son Jesus Christ, 1
whom He gave by Thy will, who art the eternal God.
Grant in Thy name, God, who knowest the heart, to
this Thy servant whom Thou hast chosen to be bishop,
that he may rule (shepherd) Thy holy flock and ex
ercise his high priesthood to Thee, blamelessly minis
tering day and night, and, propitiating Thy face,
gather together the number of those who are being
saved and offer to Thee the gifts of Thy holy
Church : give him, O Lord almighty, through Thy
Christ the participation of the Holy Ghost, that he
may have authority to remit sins according to Thy
commandment, to ordain clergy (SiSomi /cXifpous)
according to Thy ordinance, to loose every bond
according to the authority which Thou hast given
unto the Apostles, 2 arid to please Thee in meekness
and a pure heart unchangeably, unblamably, unim-
peachably, offering to Thee [a pure and unbloody
sacrifice, which through Christ Thou didst institute
as the mystery of the new covenant, for] a savour of
sweetness through Thy holy Servant Jesus Christ,
our God and Saviour, through whom to Thee, be
glory, honour, and reverence in the Holy Ghost, now
and ever a,nd for the ages of ages." "And when
the bishop has thus prayed, the rest of the priests
"vith the people shall respond Amen. And after
the prayer one of the bishops shall lift up

1 AUTOS KO.I vvv /jLeffirtiq. rov ^piffrov (rov Si TJ/JLWV eirl x.ee T-t]v 8uva/J.iv rov
r)yf/j.ovtKov aov irvevfj-aros, Sirep SiaKoveirai ry Tjya.Tn ifj.frip crov iraiSl.

2 Neither the power of ordination nor the power of binding and loosing ia
specified in the later rites. See App. Note C.

in.] The Witness of Church History. 149

the sacrifice upon the hands of him who is ordained
(xei/ooToz^eis). And in the morning he shall be
enthroned."

In the ordination of a priest, 1 the injunction is that Mode of

ordaining

the bishop lay his hand upon his head, with the presby- a priest-
tery and deacons standing by, and offer a prayer, in
which God is invoked as providing "for things im
mortal by mere preservation, but for mortal things
by a succession." He is implored " to look upon and
increase the Church and multiply her rulers, ... to
look upon this His servant raised to the presbytery
by the vote and judgment of all the clergy, and to fill
him with the Spirit of grace and counsel, that he
may help and govern His people with a pure heart."
As God did order Moses to elect elders and filled
them with the Spirit, so now He is entreated " to
supply and keep unfailing in us the Spirit of His
grace, that he (the presbyter), filled with powers of
healing 2 and the word of teaching, in meekness may
instruct God s people and serve Him sincerely and
accomplish unblamably the priestly ministries on
behalf of His people."

It is not necessary to quote the office for the General

* doctrine of

ordination of a deacon. But it must be pointed out {Jyf*** 1
that what has been quoted above could easily be
illustrated from different parts of this work. There
is an intense insistence on the necessity for ordination
to qualify a man for any ministerial work s : there

1 Ajjost. Const, viii. 16.

2 This expression seems to derive from very early days ; but similar ex
pressions are found in the western prayers of ordination. See App. Note C.

3 E.g. ii. 27 : IIws olov re frvdpuwov eavrbv els lepucrvvriv iiripplirreuf, /JLT) \a^f&gt;vra

1 50 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

is a reiterated magnifying of the office of bishops,
whether as priests ministering the oblations of the new
covenant, especially the eucharistic sacrifice, 1 or as
prophets and kings ("he is your king and ruler,"
nay more, "he is your earthly god after God" 2 ), or as
mediators between God and His people, 3 as, " after
God, their fathers, begetting them to adoption through
water and the Holy Ghost" : there is an emphatic
distinction drawn between the powers of a bishop
and those of a presbyter 4 (" the distinction of names

TO dl&lt;t)/M irapd KpeiTTOvos, Kal woie iv tKelva & (i.6vois TOIS lepevyiv QeaTiv. Cf.
ii. 28, iii. 10 : OVTS XCUKOIS liTLTptwonev iroieiv TL T&V lepariKuv Zpyuv. It seems
admitted (viii. 46) that God s supernatural or miraculous call, as in the case
of Ananias (Acts ix), dispenses with the necessity for human ordination.
But cf. viii. 26 : an exorcist with the gift of healing would require to be
ordained to the regular ministry.

1 E.g. ii. 25 : Tyuets ovv ffrj/j.epov, & tirlffKOiroi, ivT( ry Xay v/j.ui&gt; lepets, Xeinrcu,
01 \eiTovpyovvTes TTJ lepq. ffKrjvy, TTJ dyiq, Kal KaOoXiicfj KK\r}&lt;ria, Kal irapeffT&Tes
T&lt;J&gt; 6vfftaffTt]pL(f} Kvpiov TOV 6eov i^fj-Civ Kal irpotrdyovTes aury rots Xcryt/cas Kc.l dvaifJ-dK-
TOVS dvcrias did Itjcrov TOV /J.eyd\ov a/&gt;%ie/&gt;^ws i)/ae?s rots Iv i&gt;p.lv \aiKOis iark irpotpri-
rai, apxovres Kal ijyovfj.evoi Kal /SatrtXets, ol /j-ffftrai Oeou Kal TUV iriffrwv airrov, oi
doxeis TOV \6yov Kal dyye\T7Jpes, ol yv&ffTai TUV ypa&lt;pwi&gt; Kal tpdoyyot, TOV 6eov Kal
ftdpTvpes rod ^eX^/xaros avTov, ol TtdvTuv ras dfj.aprias fiaffTd^ovTts Kal irepl irdvTUv
&iro\oyov/j.evoi. Cf. ii. 27, 28.

2 ii. 26 : OVTOS apxav Kal rtyovp.evos v/j,)i&gt;. OVTOS V/JLWV /3acri\evs Kal dvvda Tijs
OVTOS vn&v ^Triyfios Oebs p.tTa debv 8s 6&lt;pei\ei, TTJS Trap vp-Qiv TI/J.TJS diro\aveiv. irepl
yap TOVTOV Kal TUIV bp-oiuv avTbs 6 debs ZXeyev Eyw flwa 9eot ^crre Kal viol v\f/lcr-
TOV irdvTts, Kal Qeovs ov KaKoXoy-rjffeis. 6 yap twiffKowos TrpoKaOeftcrOu v/j.wv
cSs ^eoO dia TeTi/jnrjfjitvos, rj Kparei TOV K\T/pov Kal TOV \aov TravTos &pxt&lt;~ Cf. ii. 33-
This is surely rather overstrained language.

3 ii. 25, 26 : The bishop is /xeutr^s deov Kal V/JLUV Iv Tats irpbs avTbv \aTpelais
. . . OVTOS fj.erd dfbv iraT^p v/j-tLv, 5i vdaTos Kql irvevp-aTOS dvayevvi]ffas V/J.3.S eis
vlodfo~iav. ii. 32 : Si ov [so. ^TriffK6irov] TO ayiov Trvev/j,a b Kvpios tv Vfuv HduKEV v
TTJ xetpo0e&lt;rg, 5: ov dyia 8byp.aTO, fJ.f/j.adriKaTe Kal debv lyv&KaTe Kal els XpiffTbv
ireiriffTevKaTf, 5i ov eyvdcrdyTe inrb deov, 8t oC eatppayiaOriTf e\ai($ dya\\id&lt;reus
Kal /jLvpy ffvv^ffeus, Bi oC viol tpwTos dveSfi xOrjTe, SC ov Kvpios kv T&lt; &lt;f)WTi,ff/J.f v/j.ui&gt;,
T-fj TOV eiruTKbirov xf^podefflq. fJ-apTVpuv, i&lt;f&gt; f"Ka&lt;nov vfj.ui TTJV lepdv e^eTetve (pufrjv
Xtywv Ttos fJiov el ffv, tyd) ffrip-epov yeye vvrjKd ere.

4 viii. 46 : "Icrre yap irdfTws ^TTIO-KOTTOVS Trap 7]/j.S&gt;v dvop-affdevTas Kal irpeff-
{tvre povs Kal 5ia/c&lt;Wi/s evxy xal x et pvv eirtdecrei, TTJ OLatpopq. TUIV ovo/maTur Kal TTJV
Sta&lt;popdv TUV irpayiMaTUv SeiKVvovTas ov yap b flovKbp-cvos Trap TJ/JUV ^TrXiypoi; TTJV
X.eipa, ucrirep tirl TTJS KijSSiJXow TUV 5afj.d\euv ^irl TOV Iepof3od/t irapaKeKou/j.e t rjs
lepuffvvrjs, dXX 6 Ka\ov/jLevos virb TOV 6eov. iii. 10 : OVK ewiTpeirop-fv Trpe&lt;r(3vTf pot.s

in.] The Witness of Church History. 1 5 1

is a distinction of realities " specially, only a bishop
can ordain) : there is a strong and powerful assertion
of the principle of order : finally, there is a striking
passage on the apostolical succession, with special refer
ence to the perpetuating of the eucharistic sacrifice.
" Christ, the only-begotten, was the first high priest
by His Nature, not having snatched the honour for Him
self, but being appointed by the Father ; who became
man for us, and, when offering His spiritual sacrifice to
His God and Father before His passion, appointed us l
only to do this, though there were with us others too
who had believed on Him ; but a believer did not,
as such, become a priest or obtain the high priestly
honour ; but after His assumption, we, having offered
according to His commandment a pure and blood
less sacrifice, appointed bishops and presbyters and
deacons, seven in number." 2

The later writings to which we have alluded are
without the exaggerated tone which sometimes appears
in the Constitutions, and the thoughts connected with
the various ordinations are often of great moral beauty
and interest. It is tempting to dwell upon them. 3
But, in spite of certain differences, the whole literature

Xeiporoveiv. viii. 46 : E/cetVo Koivfj iravres Trapayyt\\o/Ji.ei&gt;, ^Kaarov tpftirttr rdei
rrj doOtlffy avr Kal /J.TJ virepfialvtiv rovs tipovs.

1 The Apostles are supposed to be the speakers.

2 viii. 46 : Hpwros rolvvv TIJ &lt;(&gt;ucrei dpxifpebs o [tovoyev^s X/3tor6y, oi&gt;x eai/ry
TTJV Tt/aV apvaaas, a\\cL irapd, rov Ilarpdj Karaffradeis 8s yev6fj.evos &v0pti)iros 5i
i]/j.ds /cat rr]v Trvev/J,a.TiKT]v OvcrLav irpo&lt;T&lt;pp&lt;av ry Of&lt;$ airroO Kcd irarpl irpb TOV irdBovs,
yfuv dierd^aro /J.6vois TOVTO ITCHC IV, KO.LTOI 6vTdiv ffiiv rifuv KO.I ertpuv ruv els airrbv
ireirio-TevKortav ciX/V 01) Trdvrus 6 irurTeij(ras ijSr) Kal lepetis Ka.re&lt;jrt\ TJ dpxiepaTiKTJs
d^i as Irvx 6 M era ^ T V dvd\7)\f/iv avrov rj/j.e?s, Trpoffff^yKOvres Kara rrjc dtdra^iv
aiiroC Overlay Kadapav Kal dvai/j.aKTOv, irpofx el P tff &/ J - e Q a eT CTK^irous Kal irpf

Kal dia.K6vovs cirra rbv dpid/j.6v.

3 Some of the chief passages are quoted in App. Note C.

152 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

is pervaded by the same principles and it has been
better for our purpose to exhibit them as they appear
in the earliest documents.

(2) Canons of (2) What is the witness of oriental councils ? It
is very slight. For, as the principle of the ministry
was little opposed, it was as little contended for ; and
it is not till the fourth century that we begin to have
the canons of councils. The canonical literature is
occupied a good deal with clerical discipline, and the
distinctive powers of bishops, priests, and deacons are
throughout assumed and guarded. The earliest

A.o.814. recorded canons are those of Ancyra. The council
held here was of the nature of a "general council" of
the Churches of Asia Minor and Syria, "to heal the
wounds inflicted on the Church by the persecution
under Maximin." l The language of its twenty-five
canons implies throughout the threefold ministry :
there is the general government of the bishop, 2 the
priestly ministration of the presbyters, 3 and the
assistant ministry of the deacons. 4 The thirteenth
canon has been much quoted as (implicitly) giving
not only country bishops but also town presbyters a
power to ordain, with the leave of the bishop of each
diocese ; but the reading which would give this
meaning is not supported by the manuscripts. The
true meaning seems to be represented in the Syriac

1 Hefele Conciliengesch. 16.

2 Cc. 2, 5, 10, 15. The clergy in general (c. 3) constitute a Tdu.

C. I : presbyters rijs TI/J.IJS TTJS /card TTJV KaOtdpav fj.ertx 01 "* 11 J their func
tions are irpocrfiepeiv, oyutAeu , \eirovpyelv ras te/jartKas Xeirovpylas.

C. 2 : i) lepa \eirovpyla, r) TOV &prov T) irorfiptov dvafifpeu i.e. either the
presenting the oblation to the presbyter who offers (irpovfopei, c. I ; cf. the
use of ava&lt;j&gt;tpeiv in the account of the ordination of a bishop, Apost. Const.
viii. 5) : or the communicating the people (see below, Can. Nicaen. 18).

in.] The Witness of Church History. 153

version : "It is not lawful for country bishops to
create presbyters or deacons in the country, but also
not in the city, without the permission of the bishop,
which is everywhere granted by letters." 1 It has
been mentioned already that a council at Alexandria
(A.D. 324) declared the man who had been ordained by
a presbyter to be a mere layman. The great Council
of Nicaea, among other canons, 2 prohibits deacons
" who have no power to offer " from " giving the body
of Christ to the presbyters " who have the sacrificial
authority ; 3 it also sternly rebukes a practice, which
had come to the ears of the Fathers, of deacons com
municating even before bishops. " Let all these
things, then," the canon concludes, " be done away,

1 On this see App. Note D. There were country priests as well as coun
try bishops. Each class, having in some sense the same powers as the
corresponding class of the town, had limited rights in the exercise of them.
Thus only on an emergency could country priests celebrate in the town
church (Can. Neo-Caes. 13) ; on the other hand country bishops could offer
in the town freely (Can. Neo-Caes. 14), but not ordain without special permis
sion. The council of Neo-Caesarea was almost contemporary with that of
Ancyra. It may be mentioned that the canons of Neo-Caesarea mention a
current idea that the imposition of hands in ordination carried with it the
absolution from all sins except carnal ones.

2 The legislation about the metropolitan sees, i.e. the distinction of rank
amongst bishops, does not here concern us. Notice will hereafter be taken
of the absence of clear distinction between a valid and a canonical ordination.

3 C. 1 8 (Trpoa&lt;j&gt;{peiv, Sidovai rb ffuifj.a TOV xpiffTov) ; cf. Can. Laodic. 19. The
practice here rebuked, of deacons communicating presbyters, may have some
analogy with the western custom, which gave the deacons an independent
authority to minister the consecrated elements. "As the consecration belongs
to the priest, so the dispensation of the sacrament belongs to the minister
(deacon) . . . the former sanctifies the oblations, the latter dispenses
them when they are sanctified. Moreover, the priests themselves are not
allowed for fear of presumption to take the chalice from the Lord s table,
unless it have been given them by the deacon." Thus " without deacons a
priest has his name but not his office." This comes from Isidore of Spain
de Eccl. Off. ii. 8 (ap. Hittorp. p. 23) ; it is repeated by Rabanus Maurus de
Inst. Cler. i. 7 (ap. Hittorp. p. 316), and Ivo, bishop of Carnot (ap. Hittorp.
p. 472). At the same time the deacon s ministerium is carefully distin
guished from the priesthood. Cf. Can. Ancyr. 2.

154 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

and let the deacons remain within their proper limits,
knowing that they are the servants of the bishop
and inferior to the presbyters : and let them take the
Eucharist according to their rank after the presbyters,
when it is given them either by the bishop or the
presbyter. And deacons must not even sit down in
the midst of the presbyters, for this is contrary to
rule [canon] and order. And if any one will not obey,
even after these regulations, let him be deposed from
his diaconate." At Nicaea, and in the synods which
followed, we have a great multitude of canons bear
ing on clerical discipline insisting on clergy passing
gradually through the various grades of the hierarchy,
prohibiting their passing from one diocese to another,
limiting their respective rights, regulating the grada
tions of rank but nothing more that concerns our
present purpose.
(3) Greek (3) What is the witness of the Greek Fathers?

Fathers.

2d century. The powerful testimony of Ignatius to the divine and
exclusive authority of the bishop, as in each community
the sole source of government and ministry, falls
outside the period now under consideration and will
be taken account of later. In the Clementines we have
found a theory of the functions of the threefold min
istry, in which the bishop has the supreme administra
tion and the authority to bind and loose, but in which
his teaching authority, as the successor to the "chair
of the apostle," or " the chair of Christ," the great
Prophet, is mainly emphasized. 1 Clement of Alex-

1 See p. 130, n. 1 It must be remembered that the Clementines are
Ebionite, and that their view of the Eucharist is a very low one.

in.] The Witness of Church History. 155

andria says but little of the ministry, as we have
seen, but speaks of its three orders as representing
ascending grades of spiritual dignity.

In the third century almost all that we get on the 3d century.
theory of the ministry 1 in the East consists of scat
tered references in the writings of Origen. To him
the ministry not only represents the divine authority
of government, but is a priesthood, after the analogy
of the Mosaic, and in application of the one priest
hood of Christ. 2

1 It should, however, be said that Firmilian of Caesarea, one of the most
distinguished bishops of the third century, in his letter in reply to Cyprian,
A.D. 256 (ap. Cypr. Ep. Ixxv), reproduces all Cyprian s language about the
episcopate. See 16 : " Potestas ergo peccatorum remittendorum apostolis
data est et ecclesiis quas illi a Christo missi constituerunt et episcopis qui eis
ordinatione vicaria successerunt." 17: "Stephanus se successionem Petri
tenere contendit." It may be noticed that he speaks of bishops as presbyters:
"quando ornnis potestas et gratia in ecclesia constituta sit, ubi praesident
maiores natu [i.e. oi irpea-pijTepoi] qui et baptizandi et manum imponendi et
ordinandi possident potestatem " ( 7) ; yet he also ( 8) specifies bishops as
claiming to give the Holy Ghost by laying on of hands : "ut hi quidem [i.e.
episcopi qui nunc] possint per solam manus impositionein venientibus haerc-
ticis dare Spiritum sanctum." Cf. 4: "seniores et praepositi." The word
presbyter could still be used in such a sense as to cover the bishops. This
letter must have been translated by Cyprian. The traces of a Greek original,
however, are plain ; see Diet. Chr. Biog. s.v. CYPRIAN i. p. 751 n. x We can
hardly be wrong so far in concluding that Firmilian accepted and repeated
Cyprian s language about the episcopate, though he uses presbyter in a
sense which leads to Cyprian translating it into maiornatu.

2 See in Levit. v. 3 : Christ is the only sacrifice and the only priest ; but
He has given His priesthood to His Church ; "consequens est ut secundum
imaginem eius qui sacerdotium ecclesiae dedit, etiam ministri et sacerdotes
ecclesiae peccata populi accipiant, et ipsi imitantes magistrum, remissionem
peccatorum populo tribuant." The priests who preside in the Church are
said repropitiare delicta ($ 4), but this is explained of the moral process
by which they bring men back to God. There are strong exhortations to
confession, which is to be private or public at the confessor s discretion, in
Psalm, xxxvii. 6, horn. ii. ; in Levit. ii. 4.

It should be mentioned at the same time that Origen seems to say that the
unworthiness of the minister does affect the spiritual validity of his ministra
tions ; cf. in Levit. v. 12 : the unworthy priest "non est sacerdos nee potest
sacerdos nominari. " See Bigg B. L. p. 215 f .

We have quoted from Origen above (p. 140 n. 2 ) on the threefold ministry.

156 Christian Ministry. [CHAP

4th century. In the fourth century the body of testimony grows
with the mass of writings. There is, to quote some

Athanasius. examples, the beautiful letter of Athanasius to Dracon-
tius. Dracontius was a monk, who had been elected
to a bishopric close to Alexandria and had received
the "grace of the episcopate," but afterwards, moved
by various fears, fled into concealment and left his
high charge. Athanasius endeavours to recall him
to his duty, in part by reminding him of monks who
have made good bishops, but principally by recalling
to his mind the dignity of the episcopate as insti
tuted by Christ through His Apostles and having,
therefore, not merely the authority of the Church
but the authority of Christ Himself, and as being the
essential condition of the continuous life of the Church
and the handing down of grace; by reminding him
also that he has received an actual grace in his ordina
tion as real as the grace of baptism, for which he will
be in any case responsible. 1

There is a temptation to dwell on the spiritual
beauty and power which is put into the patristic
conception of the ministry. When is Gregory of

1 Ep. ad Dracont. 3, 4 : Et 5 ruv KK\ricnu&gt;v TJ Stdrafis OVK dpta/cei &lt;roi, ov8
vo(j.lfeis TO rijs tiriffKOTrijs \eLTOvpyrj/J.a [ucrdbv ^Xft-f, d\\d Kara^poveiv TOV TO.VTO.
diara^afj^vov ffUT-?)pos weTroLriKas aavTov TrapctKaXw, fj,rj TotaOra \oylfov /mr)5 avfyov
rwv roOra &lt;rv/j.{3ov\ev6vTW ov yap fifta A/MUCorrfov TO.VTO. & yap 6 Kvpios dia TUV
diroffTbhwv TerinruKe, ravra. /caXa /cai jltfiaia (J.evei ij S TUI&gt; dSeX0wv dfi\ia irati-
fferai. el yap TOV afirbv vovv ftxov Trdvres, dtov vvv i"x,ov&lt;riv ol &lt;rvfj./3ov\f)jovTs aoi,
TTWJ av yvov &lt;7i) xptffnai 6s, eTricrKdwiav fj.rj &VTUV ; tav d tcai ol fj,ed iifj.as ava\d-
/3wcrt rbv TOIOVTOV vow, TTWS B.V ffvcrTTJvai dvvrjffuvTai al ^KK\r)(riai ; ^ vojj.l^ovffiv ol
(rvfj-jSovXetiovrts croi fj.-r)dv fi\i]&lt;t&gt;tvai &lt;re, 6 n Karafipovoviriv ; dXXd /cal TOVTO ^euSws.
&pa yap avrovs vo/j.ifiv fj-rjdev elvai fj.i]8 rrjv TOV XourpoO x^P LV &gt; ^ av Ttvej TOVTOV
KO.Ta&lt;t&gt;poi&gt;uxrv dXX ei XTj^as, & ayaTnjTt ApaK&VTie /j.rj avexov TUV ffVju.povXevdvTuv
&lt;roi, fj.rjd dirdra cravTbv diraiT rjdria eTat, yap TOVTO irapa TOV de8&lt;aK&Tos Geov. ?i OVK
fJKOvvas TOV dirooToXov \tyovTos Mr; d/i^Xet TOV iv aoi xaptf/taroj. The expression
}) TTJS ^iricr/coTr^s x^P s occurs in 2.

in.] The Witness of Church History. 1 5 7

Nazianzus eloquence so high as in speaking of the
priesthood ? There is the intense sense of the dignity
of the priesthood, of the surpassing moral claim which
it makes on those who share it ; l there is the clear
and powerful realization of its connection with the
whole purpose of the Incarnation ; of the dependence
of the priesthood of the Christian ministry upon the
unique priesthood of Christ, and of its relation to the
Mosaic priesthood as being its spiritual counterpart and
fulfilment 2 ; there is the unfailing spirituality of idea
the outward sacrifice which it is the priest s high
vocation to offer, always being kept in close connec-

1 See especially Orat. ii. 94, 95 (on the occasion of his ordination as pres
byter, A.D. 361): OlSa d ywye /J.rj5 robs ev TOIS &lt;?&lt;J!jfj.ao~i r&v iepeuv r) T&V dv/j-drui
dve^eTdffTovs p.evovTas dXXa TeXeiovs rAeta irpocrdyeiv vevofJLUTfj.evov, cnj/nfioXov, olaai,
TOVTO Trjs /card. ifivxT)v dpTioTrjTOS /jir)8 ffTO\r]s TTJS lepaTiKr}s ?) ffKevovs TWOS rwt&gt;
ayiwv \fsaveiv iravrl OefjUTbv ov jjLrjde rets Ovffias avras v&lt;p &v Kal ore Kal ov /nj
KaOrJKOv ?ii&gt; dvaXiffKeaOcu fjnjSZ TO g\aiov dTro/Mfj-eiffOat TTJS x/aiVews /J.T)d TO 6v/j.iafjLa
T^S ffwdtcreW /j.rj5 dsT& iepbv eiffdvai, Sorts r) ifsvxrjv r) crw/xa ov KaOapos, /uexP
Kal TUV fUKpoTaTuv Toaovrov dei els TO, dyia. TUJV dyiuv irpo&lt;j(j&gt;Qt.Tq.v OappovvTa, &v
evl KO.I airal; TOU evtavTov /n6vov eirifiaTby TjV TOffoijTov 5e? r6 /caraTreracr/aa ^ TO
i\a(TTr]piov T) TTJV /ct/3wTW T) TO, Xepou/3i,u ^ irpoa pX^Treiv elvai TTO-VTOS r) TrpoffaTTTecrdat.
TCLVTO. otv eiSws eyw, Kal OTI /j.r]8fis fi^toj TOV (j.eyd\ov /cat 6eou, Kal 6ti/j.aTos Kal
dpxiepews, 6 crTts //.TJ TrpoTfpov eavrov irapfaTtjcre ry OeQ Bvcriav guxrav, dytai&gt;, /J.f]d^
TTjv \oyiKT]i&gt; XaTpeiav evdpeffTov eTredei^aTO, fjir)5 eOvye T 6e$ Overlay alvdfffus Kal
TrvevfJia ffWTeTp(.p.p.evov, fjv fjLovrjv 6 irdvTa Sous aTratret Trap THJ.UV Ovfflav, TTWJ
IweXXov Bappfjcrai 7rpoff&lt;j&gt;peiv avrii} TT^V f^wOev, TTJV T&V p.eya.\wv fjLvaTrjpitav avTiTwov,
?! TTUJS tepew? o X ?A ta Ka ovofj.a VTrodueadai, trplv ocrt ots Zpyois reXetcDcrat rots %e7/3as.

2 Orat. x. 4 : Atoi, TOVTO et s /j.tffov ayeis Kal inroxupovvros \a/j,j3dvri Kal Trapat
ffeavTov Kadifeis TOVTO TO e/J,bv dSt /cij/xa, &lt;pa.L^s av; Kal KOIVUVOV Troty TII&gt; (fipovTlStav Kal
TU3i&gt; (jTe(f&gt;a,vd}v StdroOroxptets dp%tep^a /cat Trepi/SaXXets TOV TroSrjpi) /cat TrepiTLdys T^V
KlSapiv Kal TrpocrdyeLS T&lt;$ 6v&lt;naaT7jpiif TTJS Trvev/j.aTiKrjs oXo/cavraxrews /cat Oueis TOV
fj,6ffX v T^S reXetwcrews /cat reXetors TOIS %etpas 7&lt;J5 Trvfvp.aTi Kal eiadyei.s ets TO, iiyia TLOV
dyiwv eTTOTTTeiiffovTa Kal jrotets XfiTovpybv TTJS O-KTJVTJS TTJS dXrjdivrjs ty %Trrjei&gt; 6 Kvpios
Kal OVK avdpwTTos fl 5 Kal aiov vp-Giv TST&V ^PLOVTUV Kal virep 08 Kal els ov TJ ^ptVtf,
o!5e TOVTO b waTTjp TOV d\r]8ivov Kal OVTUS xpiffTov, ov ^xpiffev e\aiov dya\\id(reus irapb.
Tofis fjieTo^ovs aurov, %pf&lt;ras TTJV dvdpiairbTt]Ta Trj deoTTjTi, (acne iroirjffai TO. d/McpoTepa.
ev, Kal avTos 6 debs Kal Kvpios i]/j.(ai&gt; Irjffovs Xptcrros, 5t ov TTJV KaTaXXayrjv eo-x^Kafjief,
Kal Tb irvevfj.a Tb ayiov, 8 e OeTO 7]fj.as els TTJV oiaKovlav TavTr/v ev rj Kal e0r?7/ca / aej
Kal KavxufJ-eOa en eXrridi. TTJS do^rjs TOV Kvpiov r)/J.uv Irjcrov XpicrroO, y ij 56a eis
TOVS alwvas T&V aluvuv. d/wjc.

158 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

tion with its inward and spiritual correlative, " the
sacrifice of praise and of a contrite heart, which is the
only sacrifice which God asks of us ; " l there is the
anxious sense of the difficulty of the pastoral cure, in
view of all the perplexing varieties in men s disposi
tions and necessities, capacities and states of life, all
of which the pastor must have in constant and instinc
tive view ; 2 there is, lastly, the strong belief in the
reality of ordination grace conveyed through the
laying on of hands. 3

. A great deal which can be said of Gregory in this
connection can be said of John Chrysostom also. Two
points are specially worthy of notice. First, that
alive as Chrysostom is to the spiritual dignity of the
priesthood, in virtue alike of its sacrificial and of its
judicial powers, 4 he is equally alive to its responsibility
for individual souls laying immense stress on the
necessity for considerateness, for gentle and patient self-
adaptation to the different characters and needs and
weaknesses of men, whether of high or low estate. 5 He

1 See the quotation above from Orat. ii. On the true succession to the
episcopate moral as well as actual see Orat. xxi on St. Athanasius.

2 Orat. ii.

3 Cf. the account of St. Basil on his death-bed (Orat. xliii. 78) : 6av/j.a-
rovpyei: TWI&gt; irpoeiprifiitvwv O&K ZXarTov waking his faculties of speech and action
on the verge of death to ordain some of his disciples, rrjv xeipa 8ldu&lt;rt ical rb
weCpa.

4 See especially his famous work de Sacerdotio iii. 4-7 ; vi. 4.

5 Cf. de Sacerdot. ii. 3, 4 ; iii. 16 (on the case of the widows) ; iv.
(latter part) ; vi. 8. This is a remarkable feature of the patristic concep
tion of the ministry : for great orators, like Gregory and Chrysostom,
are apt to be more alive to the common sensibilities of man than sympathetic
with the differences of individual temperament. This insistence on the need
of discerning men s different needs and characters appears equally in the
western writers on the ministry. If it is not so prominent in St. Ambrose s de
Officiis, it appears sometimes remarkably in St. Leo s conception of govern
ment where we should not expect it, aud it is very prominent in St. Gregory

III.] The Witness of Church History. 159

is as impressive on the function of the pastor as on that
of the priest. Secondly, while he, like Gregory, speaks
of the common priesthood which belongs to bishops
and presbyters and emphasizes (like some westerns)
the closeness of the two orders to one another in
dignity, he never fails to distinguish the unique
privilege and power of ordaining which belongs to
the bishop. 1

This special power of the episcopate was empha-
sized in the famous saying of Chrysostom s younger
contemporary, Epiphanius, that while presbyters could
beget children to the Church, i.e. by baptism, only
bishops could beget fathers to the Church, i.e. by
ordination. This passage in Epiphanius 2 is important
(like the action of the Alexandrian council in the
case of Colluthus), because it gives us an expression

(de Cura Pastorali ii init. and iii. This work had immense recognition and
authority in the West and even in the East ; see pref. to Mr. Bramley s
translation). The same characteristic appears in the instructions to the
penitentiary priest in the ancient Ordo Romanus (ap. Hittorp. p. 25 f.).

1 Cf. Horn, in 1 Tim. xi. I : Oi) woXv p.t&lt;rov avT&v [irpefffivrtpuv] /cat einffKO-
iruv /cat yap /cat airrol di8a&lt;TKa\lav elfflv avade5ey/j.tvoi Kalirpoaraffiav TTJS e/c/cX?;cras.
Kal a irept einaKbiruv elwe, raOra /cai 7rpe&lt;r/3irr^pots apfJ,6TTei T-fj yap xetporop/a fJ-ovrf
inreppfpriKaffi, Kal TOVTQ /j.6vov doKovcrt TrXeovfKreiv robs irpefffivrtpovs. Hom. in
Phil. i. I : OVK av 5 irpeafivTepoi IwlaKoirov fx fl P OTOV ^i ffav - Horn, in I Tim.
xiii. I : 01) yap Sfy IT pea fibre pot rbv eirlaKoirov e"Xipor(&gt;vow. Chrysostom (on Phil,
i. i) admits that St. Paul uses the terms bishop and presbyter interchange
ably. But so also, he adds, is the word diaicovia applied to the bishop s office.
The language was not fixed, but the three offices were distinct : Sirep ot&gt;v tyyv,
Kal ol TrpecrjSuTepoi rb iraXaibv eKa\ovvro twlffKOiroi Kal diaKovoi TOV XpurroO, /cat
ol tirlcTKOTroi TrpeapvTepoi Sdev /cat vvv 7r6XXw ffvu.Trpe&lt;rl3vTtp({&gt; eiriffKoiroi ypdfiovffi
/cat ffwdiaKbvtp XOITTOV 5^ ~rb Idla^ov e/cdcrry airovv[J, r)Tai 8vo/J,a, 6 tTriffKcnros Kal 6
irpefffiurepos.

2 adv. Haer. Ixxv. 4 : "On /*& a.Qpoavvri s iffrl rb irav g/jnrXewv [sc. Aerius],
TO ffiJVfffiv KeKrrjfJitvois TOVTO Srj\ov rb \tyeiv avrbv tTriaKoirov Kal Trpecr/Sirrepoj
tffov elvai. Kal iru&gt;s &rrat TOVTO Svvarbv ; rj n^v yap &lt;TTI iraT^puv yevvrjTiKT]
Tats irartpas yap yevvq. Trj tKK\rjffla i] 5 iraT^pas (J.T) 8vva/j,frr) yevvy.v 8ta TTJS
TOV XovrpoO Tra\iyyev&lt;rias TKVO. yevvq. Trj lKK\7i&lt;rLa, ov /JLTJV Trar^paj i) SidacrKaXovs.
Kal TriDs olov TS TIV rbv Trpea-purepov KaOiffT^v (j.rj fyovTa %etpo^ecrt aj TOV x fl P OT( &gt;veiy,
rj fiTTfw avrbv elvai Lvov T^&gt; tirurKoircj) ;

160 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

of the Church s mind in clear view of the antagonistic
position. Aerius 1 had definitely held that there
was no difference of order 2 between a bishop and
a presbyter. " The bishop lays on hands," he said,
" but so does the presbyter : 3 the bishop baptizes,
so does the presbyter likewise : the bishop is the
minister of worship, so is the presbyter : the bishop
sits upon the raised seat (throne), and the presbyter
too." There is then no difference. Aerius does not
seem to have appealed to any church tradition, but
simply to facts in the Church s present constitution
and to the common use of the words presbyter
and episcopus in the New Testament. Epiphanius
meets his argument from the New Testament with a
mixture of truth and error with which we are not
at present concerned. 4 He meets him, however, first
of all with an appeal to the mind of the Church

1 Aerius was still alive ( i) when Epiphanius wrote. His original motive
in formulating his anti-ecclesiastical views was not apparently a noble one,
though Epiphanius does not make the best of those against whom he writes.
He was in opposition not only to the right of bishops but to other church
customs, and he was also of Arian antecedents.

2 fda rdty, fjua TI/J.-TI, ?v d&w/ua ( 3).

3 I.e. in certain benedictions of penitents the priest used prayer with
laying-on of hands the prayer of imposition of hands. This at least the
Church would have admitted ; irpfcrfivrepos -^eipoGerel, ov xfiporoveT (Apost.
Const, viii. 28). See note (22) on Apost. Const, viii in Migne Patrol. Graec.
i. p. 1083.

4 He denies (unlike Chrysostom) that St. Paul uses TT pea pure pos and
(irlffKoiros of the same person. So far he has a bad case. On the other hand
he argues that the Church in the apostolic days was incomplete ; in some
places there were bishops and deacons, in others presbyters, according to the
degree of completeness of each Church or the fitness of individuals : ov yap
iravra evdi/s rjSvvrjOq&av ol d7r6&lt;rroAot Karacn ij(rai . . . OVTTW [oiirw MSS] TT}S
tKK\r]fflas \a[3oij(n&gt;)s TO. 7rXijpu)/u,aTa TT}S oiKovofdas. OVTU KO.T ^Keivo Kaipov fjffav ol
rdiroi.. Kal ycip ZxaaTov irpdy/J-a OVK OTT dpx^s TO. TTO.VTO. &lt;j-)(ev dXXd Trpoj3aii&gt;ovTOS
TOV xp& vov TO- Trpos T\etucrif TWV xpewv Karripri^eTo ( 5). He also calls atten
tion to the fact that the presbyters have at least some one over them in the
Pastoral Epistles. Cf. Theodore Mops, on 1 Tim. iii. 8.

iii.j The Witness of Church History. 161

on the matter. His customary abusiveness of tone
must not blind us to the fact that he speaks clearly,
with the consciousness that he is on quite sure
ground, when he says that, whatever the presbyter
may do, he cannot lay on hands in ordination that
in this sense bishops alone constitute the " generative
order " of the Church. 1

Now the evidence of the Eastern Church has been summary

for the Kast.

passed in review. What is the result ? Leaving out
of account for the moment some elements in the
estimate formed of the ministry which will come into
consideration later, it is enough to say at present that
everywhere, where there is any evidence forthcoming,
we have found the threefold ministry existing and
regarded as alone authoritative in virtue of succes
sion from the Apostles. In all cases the authority to
ordain the clergy has been found, wherever the ques
tion can be raised, to belong to the bishops, nor can
fair evidence be produced of any single instance in
which ordination by a presbyter (or in view of the
exceptional arrangement supposed to have existed at
Alexandria, we must say, by a presbyter with the
ordinary commission) was either allowed 2 or even con
templated as under any circumstances allowable or
valid.

B. We pass from the witness of Greek to that of B.

Episcopal

Latin Christianity. Here we may deal very briefly
with the evidence for the existence of the successions

1 There is a passage about the apostolic succession, which may be referred
to, in Ephraem Syrus adv. Haer. serm. xxii, ap. Opp. Syr. [ed. Rom. 1740)
ii. p. 488.

2 See on the case of Paphnutius App. Note E.

1 62 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

of bishops in the period under consideration, for it is
not disputed. The episcopal succession was clearly of
immemorial antiquity at Rome when Irenaeus wrote.
There is no trace of a pre-episcopal age in any other
part of Italy, or in Africa, Gaul, or Spain. The
beautiful letter of the Churches of Lyons and Vienne,
giving an account of the persecution which fell upon
them in the time of Marcus Aurelius confirms the
testimony of Irenaeus for Gaul. 1 The language of
Tertullian is evidence enough for Africa, where indeed
episcopacy developed into an exuberance of sees
rivalled only in Asia. It is true that in later cen
turies episcopacy took some remarkable forms, es
pecially, as has been noticed, in the Irish Church. 2

1 Euseb. H.E. v. i. There is the aged bishop Pothinus, brriv diaKoviav Trjs
tiriffKoirfjs e Aovydowy TTfTriffTfVfdvos ; there is the deacon Sanctus ; there is
the presbyter Irenaeus (c. 4).

" A satisfactory account of the episcopate in the Scotic Church of Ireland
may be found in Todd s St. Patrick, Apostle of Ireland, and Eeeves Eccl.
Antiquities of Down, Connor, and Dromore. Its three notable features were
(i) its indefinite multiplication; (2) its undiocesan character; (3) its sub
ordination to the abbot-chiefs. The Church outside the empire, as inside it,
was organized on the lines of the existing society. Thus in Ireland it be
came tribal, and small chieftaincies would have resulted in small episcopates
(Reeves p. 303 : "the spiritual jurisdiction of the bishop was coextensive with
the temporal sway of the chief tarn "). But what introduced its unique
features into church organization here was its predominantly monastic char-
racter. The abbot was the real church ruler, and he was not always or
generally a bishop. Hence the subordination of the episcopate. The bishops
even lost control over the ordinations which they administered (cf . Bede H. E.
iii. 4 ; Todd pp. 7-25). The episcopate, having thus lost its characteristic
functions of government, was given as a mark of spiritual distinction (Todd
p. 5). Thus it became indefinitely multiplied ; seven bishops are often found
together in one spot (Todd pp. 33-35). Also it lost its diocesan character
(Reeves p. 135 f. on "the ambulatory nature of episcopacy"). When the
Danish invasions (c. A.D. 795 and onward) drove the Irish clergy and monks in
great numbers on to the continent of Europe, the bishops seem to have behaved
themselves as if they were in their own country, in entire neglect of diocesan
restrictions. Hence conciliar enactments against these "Scoti qui se dicunt
episcopos esse " (Reeves p. 135). And up to the twelfth century, when the
Irish Church was organized on diocesan lines under papal influence, the

III.] The Witness of Church History. 163

There Christianity was monastic in a unique sense.
The abbot took his place as spiritual head side by
side with the chieftain of the clan. Often, indeed, the
same person was both abbot and chieftain, and the
old clan government continued with a new monastic
character. Under these circumstances the bishop lost
the governing authority which properly belonged to
his office and became a mere instrument kept to per
form those spiritual functions which he only could
fulfil. But for such purposes he was kept : " the
bishops were always applied to, to consecrate churches,
to ordain to the ecclesiastical degrees or Holy Orders,
including the consecration of other bishops ; to give
Confirmation, and the more solemn benedictions ; and
to administer the Holy Communion with peculiar
rites." l No accession of power to abbot or king ever
militated against the principle of ministerial succes
sion. Through all the different forms which the church
ministry assumed, and they have been very various,
this has been the constant principle. Never has it
been supposed that the accident of ecclesiastical

looseness of Irish episcopacy was a standing scandal to canonical Europe ;
see the protests of Anselm and Bernard, quoted by Todd pp. 2, 4 : " dicitur,"
writes Anselm to a titular king of Ireland, "episcopos in terra vestra passim
eligi et sine certo episcopatus loco constitui, atque ab uno episcopo episcopum
sicut quemlibet presbyterum ordinari." {This latter irregularity was char
acteristic of the Celtic Church, but the canonical rule seems to have been
observed at lona ; cf. Bede H.E. iii. 17-22.] So St. Bernard (de vita S.
Mai. 10) : " nam, quod inauditum est ab ipso Christianitatis initio, sine ordine,
sine ratione mutabantur et multiplicabantur episcopi pro libitu metropoli-
tani ita ut unus episcopatus uno non esset contentus, sed singulae paene
ecclesiae singulos haberent episcopos." He clearly does not understand the
situation.

1 Todd St. Patrick p. 5. Cf. Vita S. Brigidae, ed. Colgan in the Triadis
Thaumaturgae Acta, p. 523 ; Adamnan Vita S. Columbae i. 36, ed. Reeves
[Dublin, 1857], pp. 66-69.

164 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

authority, apart from episcopal order, gave a man
the power to ordain. 1
The concep- It remains then to seek the light thrown upon this

tion of the &

ministry in conce ption of the ministry in the West

(1) by typical theologians after A.D. 150 : 2

(2) hy writers on worship and by the church offices :

(3) by the canons of councils.

a) western (l) St. Cyprian, the great bishop of Carthage,

stands out prominently among western writers who

cyprian, vindicated the claim of the apostolic ministry. It

c A.D. 250. L J

cannot be rightly maintained that he added anything
new to the belief of his predecessors, western or
eastern, in the visible unity of the Church or the
authority of the episcopate. Nor did he bring these
two doctrines into any new connection ; Ignatius and
Irenaeus had already put the bishop in a very clear
position in relation to church unity. Nor again is it
true to say that Cyprian in any way created the
doctrine of schism or destroyed an existing " freedom
of association " in the Church. 3 He did not in fact

1 See App. Note E on some supposed cases of presbyterian ordination.

2 Clement of Rome is therefore not yet in discussion. The conception of
the ministry held by Irenaeus and Tertullian has been already exhibited. A
passa^o from Hippolytus is noticed in another connection, App. Note G.

3 Dr. Hatch (B.L. p. 103) has maintained that "the rule [that there
should be only one bishop in a community ] was not firmly established
until the third century. Its general recognition was the outcome of the
dispute between Cyprian and Novatian." "For this assertion," says Dr.
Salmon truly, " he offers no proof whatever. Cyprian certainly treats it as a
monstrous and impious thing, that when one bishop had been duly elected
another should be ordained ; but there is no evidence that this view was
then either novel or singular. Novatian no doubt had a respectable following,
but there is no evidence that he claimed to be anything less than the bishop of
Rome, or that either he or any of those who acknowledged him as bishop of
Rome acknowledged Cornelius also as bishop" (Expositor, July 1887, p. 8
n. 1 ). The opposite is in fact quite plain : cf. the letters of Cornelius to

in.] The Witness of Church History. 165

create or innovate, but he gave emphatic expression
to an existing church principle in view of the parti
cular circumstances of his episcopate.

The Church is one, then, this is his position
with a visible external unity. The essence of that
unity lies indeed in a spiritual fact the life of Christ
which is communicated to the Church ; but this life
is communicated to a visible society, bound together
by visible bonds of external association. 1 To this
visible society he that would be Christ s must belong ;
"he cannot have God for his father who has not

Fabian and of Dionysius to Novation, ap. Euseb. H. E. vi. 43, 45. The
Novatianist confessors clearly imply that there was no question of acknow
ledging both : see their profession ap. Cyprian Ep. xlix. To go back a long
way before Cyprian, it is surely of the essence of Ignatius conception that
there should be but one bishop in each community. Of course difficulties
may have arisen in particular cases in determining what constituted a com
munity. Ordinarily, no doubt, the civil civitas became the ecclesiastical
parish ; but we should like to hear something more definite about the
position of Hippolytus at Rome, and how he was regarded by his contem
poraries. He regarded himself, we can hardly doubt, as the bishop of Rome.
He was in that capacity in antagonism to the regular bishop Callistus, who
represented the laxer policy of the Church. But was he ordained bishop in
antagonism to Callistus on the gi-ound that he had lapsed into heresy and
betrayed the church discipline ? or is some other suggestion, such as Dr.
Salmon makes (Diet. Chr. Biog. s.v. HIPPOLYTUS iii. pp. 90, 91), possible?

Harnack appends to his translation of Hatch s work (die Gesdlschaftsver-
fassung etc. p. 252) a note in disagreement, in the above sense : " Ich kenne
iiberhaupt keinen Grand, der gegen die Annahme spricht, dass sich die Regel,
in jeder Stadt sei stets nur ein katholischer Bischof zu dulden, bereits am Ende
des zweiten Jahrhunderts festgestellt hat." Dr. Hatch has more recently
quoted in support of his view (Growth of Ch. Instit. p. 17) some words of
Epiphanius : ot&gt; y&p irore i] AXe^dvSpeia 8i5o tTUffKoirovs ZffXfv ws at fiXXcu TnSAets
(adv. Hcer. Ixviii. 7). But the second bishop here spoken of as existing in
other Churches of Egypt but not at Alexandria is the schismatic Meletian
bishop. The Meletian schism is the subject of the whole section, and the
context leaves no doubt as to the meaning. On the subject of this note see
Ch. Quart. Rev., July 1888, "Ancient and Modern Ch. Organization."

1 Cf . de Unit. Eccles. 5 : Ecclesia Domini luce perfusa per orbem totum
radios suos porrigit : unum tamen lumen est quod ubique diffunditur, nee
unitas corporis separatur : ramos suos in universam terram copia ubertatis
extendit, profluentes largiter rivos latius pandit : unum tamen caput est et
origo una et una mater fecunditatis successibus copiosa."

1 66 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

the Church for his mother." 1 The sin of schism sepa
rates from Christ in such completeness that not even
martyrdom can expiate it. 2 Of this unity the bishop
is in each community at once the symbol, 3 the
guardian, 4 and the instrument. He is the instru
ment of it because " the bishops, who succeed to the
Apostles by an ordination which makes them their
representatives," are the possessors of that sacerdotal
authority and grace with which Christ endowed His
Church, and which is necessary for her existence. 5

1 Ep. Ixxiv. 7 (quoted above, p. 16, with other passages).

de Unit. Eccles. 14. Great light is thrown on Cyprian s conception of
the sin of schism, so far as concerns the relations of different Churches, by his
subsequent attitude towards Stephen of Rome. He would no doubt have said
that the sin of schism in the case of any division lies with the Church from
which the unjust claim proceeds which causes the division. Stephen made
such a claim, i.e. a claim affecting the independence of the Churches of Africa
in an open question, and endeavoured to enforce it byan excommunication which
Cyprian and the Africans ignored. " Make no mistake," wrote St. Firmilian
of Caesarea, speaking of Stephen, " you have excommunicated yourself " (ap.
Cypr. Ep. Ixxv. 24). It is to be remarked that St. Augustin makes St.
Cyprian in this matter the type of the unschismatical temper, because, while
lie maintained the independent judgment of the African Churches, he did not
break off communion with those who differed from them ; but, as far as in
him lay, remained at unity with them in spite of differences (de Bapt. v. 25.
36). Augustin is following Jerome in this, who commends Cyprian on the
same grounds (adv. Lucifer. 25 : "non cum anathemate eorum qui se sequi
noluerant").

3 Ep. xliii. 5 : " Deus unus est et Christus unus et una ecclesia et cathedra
una super Petrum Domini voce fundata. Aliud altare constitui aut sacer-
dotium novum fieri praeter unum altare et unum sacerdotium non potest."

4 de Unit. Eccles. 5 : " Quam unitatem firmiter tenere et vindicare debe-
mus, maxime episcopi qui in ecclesia praesidemus, ut episcopatum quoque
ipsurn unum atque indivisum probemus."

5 Ep. Ixvi. 8 : " Unde scire debes episcopum in ecclesia esse et ecclesiam
in episcopo et si qui cum episcopo non sit in ecclesia non esse. " ib. 4, 5 :
" [Christus] dicit ad apostolos ac per hoc ad omnes praepositos qui apostolis
vicaria ordinatione succedunt : Qui audit vos, me audit . . . qui reiicit vos,
me reiicit. . . . Unde enim schismata et haereses obortae sunt et oriuntur ?
dum episcopus qui unus est et ecclesiae praeest superba quorundam prae-
sumptione contemnitur et homo dignatione Dei honoratus indignus hominibus
iudicatur. " Ep. xxxiii. i: "Dominus noster, cuius praecepta metuere et
servare debemus, episcopi honorem et ecclesiae suae rationem disponens in

in.] The Witness of Church History. 167

This plenitude of the priesthood l is in every bishop,
and in every bishop equally, just as every one of
the Apostles was " endowed with an equal fellow
ship of honour and power." But the apostolate,
which was finally given to all equally, was given first
to St. Peter, that by its being given first to one man,
there might be emphasized for ever the unity which
Christ willed to exist among the distinct branches or
portions of His Church. 2 The episcopate which be
longs to each bishop belongs to him as one of a
great brotherhood linked by manifold ties into a
corporate unity. 3

evangelic loquitur et dicit Petro : Ego tibi dico quia tu es Petrus, et super
istam petram aedificabo ecclesiam meam, et portae inferorum non vincent earn,
et tibi dabo claves regni caelorum, et quae ligaveris etc. . . . Inde per tem-
porum et successionum vices episcoporum ordinatio et ecclesiae ratio decurrit
ut ecclesia super episcopos constituatur et omnis actus ecclesiae per eosdem
praepositos gubernetur. Cum hoc ita divina lege fundatum sit, miror quos-
dam audaci temeritate sic mihi scribere voluisse ut ecclesiae nomine litteras
facerent, quando ecclesia in episcopo et clero et in omnibus stantibus sit con-
stituta. "

1 As having this plenitude of the priesthood, the word sacerdosis gener
ally used of the bishop; but the presbyter also has sacerdotal powers.
Cyprian speaks of our Lord as " adorning the body of the presbyterate with
glorious priests, " i. e. at the ordination of a presbyter (Ep. xl). Cyprian did
not draw out the usual analogy of bishop, priest, and deacon to high-priest,
priest, and Levite of the Old Testament (Diet. Chr. Biog. s.v. CYPRIAN i. p. 741).

2 de Unit. Eccles. 4 : " Loquitur Dominus ad Petrum : Ego tibi dico,
inquit, quia tu es Petrus etc. . . . Super unum aedificat ecclesiam, et
quamvis apostolis omnibus post resurrectionem suam parem potestatem
tribuat et dicat : Sicut misit me Pater et ego mitto vos : accipite etc. . . .
tamen ut unitatem manifestaret, unitatis eiusdem originem ab uno in-
cipientem sua auctoritate disposuit. Hoc erant utique et ceteri apostoli
quod fuit Petrus, pari consortio praediti et honoris et potestatis, sed exordium
ab unitate proficiscitur, ut ecclesia Christi una monstretur. Quam unam
ecclesiam etiam in cantico canticorum Spiritus sanctus ex persona Domini
designat et dicit : Una est columba mea." ib. 5 : " Episcopatus unus est,
cuius a singulis in solidum pars tenetur," i.e. in such a way that each has the
responsibility of the whole ; the whole is in each.

3 Ep. Iv. 24 : " Cum sit a Christo una ecclesia per totum mundum in
multa membra divisa, item episcopatus unus episcoporum multorum concordi
numerositate diffusns."

1 68 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

A bishop stands, then, in various relations to the
Church. In virtue of his election he represents his
flock } he is a part of the Church and in a sense respon
sible to it and stands in a certain constitutional, though
not clearly denned, relation to his presbyterate and
the clergy generally. They are his recognised council,
advisers, co-operators ; he does nothing without them. 2
But over and above this he represents divine author
ity. He is divinely appointed ; he has not taken his
honour upon himself. 3 Moreover, in the exercise of
his authority, he is responsible to no man outside his
Church but to God only. Cyprian does not explain,
in connection with this position, the meaning of the
provincial council of which he made so much use.
Presumably the provincial council has a certain
authority over the individual bishop, 4 but none the
less the independence of each bishop is asserted by
Cyprian with unrestricted completeness. 5 His respect

1 " Ecclesia in episcopo est." Cf. Ep. Iv. 5, and Diet. Chr. Blog. i. p. 741.

2 See above, p. 105, and also Cyprian s letters to his presbyters, when
in retirement, explaining the grounds on which he had ordained to the
clergy without consultation; Ep. xxxviii. i : "In ordinationibus clericis,
fratres carissimi, solemus vos ante consulere et mores ac merita singulorum
communi consilio ponderare." Ep. xxx. 5: " collatione consiliorum cum
episcopis,presbyteris,diaconis, confessoribus, pariter ac stantibus laicis." See
Epp. xxix ; Ixvii. 5.

3 Ep. Ixx. 3 : " Secundum [Domini] dignationem sacerdotium eius in
ecclesia administramus." Ep. lix. 5 : " Existimat aliquis summa et magna aut
non sciente aut non permittente Deo in ecclesia Dei fieri, et sacerdotes, id est
dispensatores eius, erunt non de eius sententia ordinati ? " On the contrary :
" plane episcopi non de voluntate Dei fiunt, sed qui extra ecclesiam fiunt. "

4 St. Augustin expresses the gradations in the authority of bishop and
of church councils (de Bapt. v. 22. 30).

5 Ep. Ixii. 3 : " Qua in re nee nos vim cuiquam facimus aut legem damus,
quando habeat in ecclesiae administration e voluntatis suae arbitrium liberum
unusquisque praepositus, rationem actus sui Domino redditurus." Ep. Ixxiii.
26 : " nemini praescribentes aut praeiudicantes, quo minus unusquisque
episcoporum quod putatfaciat, habens arbitrii sui liberam potestatem."

in.] The Witness of Churck History. 169

for the see of Rome, as being in a special historical
sense what every episcopate is essentially, as possess
ing the same authority the see of Peter, will not
go to the length of allowing it any jurisdiction over
other Churches. It may be in a special way the
symbol of unity, as Peter was among the Apostles,
but it is nothing more. 1

This is the theory of the episcopate into which
St. Cyprian poured all the force of his great character,
all the dignity of his strong holiness, to make it a
living reality. He stands out in church history as
the typical bishop, and with his weighty sentences
he impressed on the episcopal theory an abiding form.

Next to Cyprian, it will be well to quote a vivid Lucifer,

J " c. A.D. 360.

expression of the principle of the succession from a
bishop of Cagliari in Sardinia that Lucifer who was

1 It is "locus Petri," "Petri cathedra, ecclesia principalis, unde unitas
sacerdotalis exorta est " (Epp. Iv. 8, lix. 14). These last words mean, I
suppose, simply that Peter s priesthood was the first given : he goes on to
assert the independent jurisdiction of each episcopate. Cf. Jerome Ep.
cxlvi ad Evangelum : " Ubicunque fuerit episcopus sive Romae, sive
Kuyubii, sive Constantinopoli, sive Rhegii, sive Alexandriae, sive Tarn s,
oiusdem meriti, eiusdem est etiam sacerdotii. Potentia divitiarum
ft paupertatis humilitas vel sublimiorem vel inferiorem episcopum non
facit. Ceterum omnes successores apostolorum sunt." It is not the
place here to discuss whether the conception of the see of Peter, as in a
special way the symbol and centre of unity, had any effect on the development
of Petrine claims. The conception reappears in St. Optatus of Milevis
(de Schism. Don. ii. 2, vii. 3 with a more papal tone, but cf. vi. 3) and
in St. Augustin ; see ABGDarlum 1. 232: "Numerate sacerdotes vel al&gt;
ipsa Petri sede;" c. Ep. Man. 4: "Multa sunt alia quae in [ecclesiae
catholicae] gremio me iustissirne teneant . . . tenet ab ipsa sede Petri
apostoli, cui pascendas oves suas post resurrectionem Domiuus commendavit,
usque ad praesentem episcopatum successio sacerdotum. " Elsewhere he
speaks of all the Apostles as the source of the succession : " ecclesia ab
ipso Christo inchoata et per apostolos provecta certa successionum serie
usque ad haec tempora, toto terrarum orbe dilatata. . . . ecclesia, quae ab
ipso per apostolos succedentibus sibimet episcopis usque ad haec tempora
propagata dilatatur " (c. Faust, xxviii. 2, 4).

170 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

Athanasius friend, but whose impatience and violence
led him at last into being the founder of a schism-
atical body. He is addressing Constantius the
emperor out of his place of exile in Palestine and
speaking of his nobler friend Athanasius. 1

" You persecute the man," he says, " whom you
ought to listen to. While he is still alive, you send
to succeed him that George who is your partner in
heresy, when, even if Athanasius had been set free
from the body, it was not lawful for you to send any
one, but it was and is in God s hand to appoint whom
He thought proper as bishop of His people, and that
through His servants the catholic bishops. For no
man can be filled with the power of the Holy Ghost
to govern God s people, save he whom God has chosen,
and on whom hands have been laid by the catholic
bishops, just as, when Moses was dead, we find his
successor Joshua, the son of Nun, filled with the Holy
Ghost ; because, says Scripture, Moses had laid his
hands upon him." :

1 Whether he was himself ever actually separated from the Church is
doubtful ; see Diet. Chr. Biog. s. v. LUCIFER. His writings date from his exile.

2 de S. Athan. I. 9 : " Persequeris eum per quern te audire praeceperit
Dominus ; agente eo in rebus humanis cohaereticum tuum Georgium mittis
successorem, cum, tametsi fuisset liberatus iam Athanasius ex corpore, tibi
non licuerit mittere, sed fuerit ac sit in Dei manu quern fuisset dignatus
populo suo antistitem instituere per servos videlicet suos, hoc est catholicos
episcopos. Neque enim posset impleri virtute Spiritus sancti ad Dei
gubernandum populum nisi is quern Deus allegisset cuique manus per
catholicos episcopos fuisset imposita, sicut defuncto Moyse impletum Spiritu
sancto invenimus successorem eius lesum Naue. Loquitur scriptura sancta
dicens : Et lesus filius Naue impletus est spiritu intelligentiae ; imposuerat
enim Moyses manum super eum : et audierunt eum filii Israel et fecerunt
secundum quod mandavit Dominus Moysi. Conspicis ordination! Dei te
obviam isse contra Dei f aciendo voluntatem, temet mucrone gladii tui iugula-
tum, siquidem non licuerit ordinari, nisi fuisset defunctus Athanasius, et
defuncto Athanasio catholicus debuerit per catholicos ordinari episcopos."

Jerome,

in.] The Witness of Church History. 171

Now we approach an interesting class of writers Am

ter,

who represent a tendency in the western Church to sso .ioo.* D
minimize the position of the episcopate. There is,
first, the author of the Commentaries on St. Paul s
Epistles who is commonly called Ambrosiaster and
wrote in Damasus episcopate at Rome. 1 Whoever
he was, he was a man of considerable mental power
and spiritual insight " brief in words, but weighty
in matter." Secondly, we have the author of some
Questions on the Old and New Testament, once
ascribed to Augustin, probably a presbyter at Rome
of the same epoch as the last writer, but so far later
that he uses his commentaries. 2 Thirdly, there is
Jerome, who expresses the same sentiments as the
other two writers, but at a later date, apparently

1 " Cuius [ecclesiae] hodie rector est Damasus" (in i Tim. iii. 14). We
may assume that St. Augustin is right in calling him Hilary (see for evi
dence Diet. Cfir. Biog. s.v. AMBROSIASTER). It is however hardly possible
that he can be Hilary, the Sardinian deacon, associated with Lucifer in
his embassage to Constantius in A.D. 354, and subsequently a Luciferian.
Not so much (a) because St. Augustin calls him "sanctus," for Jerome calls
Lucifer "beatus" and "bonus pastor" even when he is deploring his
grave mistake (adv. Lucifer. 20 though, be it remembered, St. Augustin
borrows considerably from this little treatise in his argument against the
Donatists and in it Hilary is pilloried with all the power of Jerome s
sarcasm) not so much, however, on this account as (6) because the com
mentary on i Cor. i. 12-16 is not the work of one who followed Lucifer,
a rigorous anabaptist (adv. Lucifer. 26), and (c) because he acknowledges
Damasus as bishop. But we have not the means of saying how much the
Commentaries may have been interpolated, or when.

" He wrote at Rome (Qu. cxv ; cf. his polemic against Koman deacons
in Qu. ci ; the " we " who are opposed to the Romans in Qu. Ixxxiv are
probably the Christians see Langen Gesch. der Rom. Kirche i. p. 600) about
300 years after the destruction of Jerusalem under Vespasian (Qu. xliv) i.e.
A. D. 370-380. He was seemingly a priest sacerdos Dei et praepositus plebia "
(Qu. cxx) ; and we gather that he was a presbyter from his polemics against
deacons and depreciation of bishops (Qu. ci). This, however, does not give
us any grouud for saying that he belonged to the Luciferian party. The
same tone meets us in Jerome. He uses the Commentaries of Ambrosiaster,
but his style seems to imply that he is a different man.

172 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

when he had become thoroughly disgusted with the
Church at Rome, and had changed his earlier tone
towards it and its clergy. 1 It must be added that
Jerome s sentiments passed into the writings of some
later western authors. 2
These last What then is it that these writers teach about

writers

cTotld* sacer " the ministry ? First, it must be said that they in no
way minimize the sacerdotal character of the ministry.
Jerome is indeed something of an extreme sacerdot-
alist ; and if the unknown Commentator is not that,
at least he gives us a substantial view of the priestly
function. " Layings-on of hands [i.e. ordinations],"
he says, " are mystical "words, by which the selected
man is confirmed for his work, receiving authority,
so that he should venture in the Lord s place to offer
sacrifice to God." " That," says St. Jerome, " can be
no Church which has no priest." ;

(&) do not Next, none of these writers disputes the present

dispute the

authority of the threefold ministry or the limitation
to bishops of the power of ordination. They do not
maintain that, even in the extremest circumstances,

1 In Jerome s earlier years his tone is papal, e.g. in his letters to Damasus
from the East A.D. 375-380 (Epp. xv, xvi). Afterwards, disgusted with Roman
manners and disappointed of the Roman episcopate, he broke with the
Church there A.D. 385, and his abusive tone about the Roman clergy is subse
quent to this date, e.g. Ep. Hi ad Nepotlan. is after A.D. 393. His Com
mentaries on the New Testament, which contain the passages minimizing the
episcopal office by comparison with the presbyterate, date A.D. 386-392.
His letter to Evangelus (Ep. cxlvi) is marked by its hostile tone towards
Rome to belong to the period subsequent at any rate to A.D. 385, and Ep.
Ixix ad Oceanum is about A.D. 400.

2 See App. Note F. " S. Hieronymi senteutia," says Morinus (de S.
Ord. p. iii. ex. iii. 2. 19), "universae ecclesiae Latinae acceptissima fuit et
immerito a multis theologis cum gravi censura repudiata : imprudentes enim
cum S. Hieronymo universam prope ecclesiam Latinam condemnarunt."

3 For all quotations from these writers see App. Note F.

in.] The Witness of CJmrch History. 173

a presbyter a presbyter of the existing Church
could validly ordain. Thus the Commentator is em
phatic "that none of the clergy, who has not been
ordained to it, should take to himself any office which
he knows not to have been intrusted or granted to
him" (in spite, that is, of what may have been the
primitive practice). " It never was lawful or per
mitted," he says again, " that an inferior should ordain
a superior, for nobody gives what he has not received."
" All orders are in the bishop ; " " the dignity of all

ordinations is in the bishoat" " What does a bishop

&lt;5f^ ..... r

do," says St. Jerom^eveii^h^n /jp| is minimizing the
episcopate, " that ^itore^jler jifpls not do, except
ordination?" The|^^^;^adyftie| presbyter are to

one another as the m^ip$b^cjild priest of the old

&gt;. M "
covenant. x ^ ^X

Once more, they do nW [regard the present three- A r sin .f th

/ IT Apostles :

fold arrangement of the ministry as an innovation of
the postapostolic Church, so that it should lack the
authority of the Apostles. The present constitution
represents their ordering. Nay, according to the
Commentator, it represents more : " because all
things are from one God the Father, He hath
decreed that each Church should be presided over by
one bishop."

Jerome, however, seems to hold that, while niy they

maintain

Christ instituted only one priestly office, it was the * *% &gt;
exigencies of church life which led to its being sub- ai
divided under apostolic sanction into the presbyterate
and the episcopate. At any rate, whether the distinc
tion was ordained by Christ Himself or of apostolic

174 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

authority, these writers were agreed that (as the names
bishop and presbyter are used in the New Testa
ment of the same officers) the presbyters originally
were also bishops, and it was because of the dangers
of rivalry and division which threatened this arrange
ment from the first that it was determined that in
future only one person should have the authority and
name of the episcopate, the rest receiving only the
commission of presbyters. 1 How much truth there is
and some- in this view is not now in question. They thought

what mini- .....

rateeqnent a ^ so that this original identity of the presbyterate and
episcopate had left its mark on the subsequent con
stitution of the Church in such sense that presbyters
and bishops still share a common priesthood, and that
(waiving the question of confirmation 2 ) there is nothing
which is reserved to a bishop except the function of
ordination. Jerome used this view with powerful
effect to exalt the priesthood of the presbyter, as
against the arrogance of Roman deacons on the one
hand, and on the other against the overweening
self-assertion of bishops. It was a bad custom, he
thought, which prevailed in some Churches, that pres
byters should not be allowed to preach in the presence

1 Jerome affirmed, as has been said, that the old constitution had in a
measure been maintained at Alexandria down to the third century.

2 The western councils strictly limit to bishops the consecration of the
chrism. St. Jerome makes no remark on the subject where he is speaking
controversially on the subject of bishops, but he assumes (adv. Lucifer. 9)
the limitation of confirmation to bishops in a sense which implies that
under no circumstances, not even of imminent death, could a presbyter
confirm. At Alexandria, say the Commentator and the author of the Quaes-
tiones, a presbyter confirms (consignat or consecrat) if the bishop be
absent, but they are contradicted by the contemporary Alexandrian Didymus.
Seep. 138 n. 2

IIL] The Witness of Church History. 175

of bishops. 1 Their exalted dignity is a thorn in
Jerome s side; "as if they were placed in some lofty
watch-tower, they scarcely deign to look at us mortals
or to speak to their fellow-servants." 2 A priest should
indeed " be subject to his bishop [pontifex] as to his
spiritual father, but bishops should know that they
are priests, not lords, and if they wish their clergy to
treat them as bishops, they must give them their
proper honour." 3 This is the animus in Jerome s
vheory. 4

Now when we have clearly considered this view,
we shall see surely that it is not what it is sometimes
represented as being. It is not a presbyterian
view. It does indeed carry with it the conception of
the great church order being the priesthood ; it em
phasizes that the distinction of presbyter and bishop
is nothing compared to the distinction of deacon and
priest. Moreover, it involves a certain tentativeness
in the process by which the Apostles are held to have
established the church ministry ; it admits a survival
of an older constitution into the later life of the Church.
But it does not carry with it the idea that the pres- This view

not un-

byter, pure and simple, the presbyter of the settled acce P teble
church constitution, has the power under any circum
stances to assume episcopal functions. It teaches
something quite different, viz. that the earliest pres
byters were ordained with episcopal functions were,

1 Ep. lii ad Nepot. 7 : " Pessimae consuetudinis est in quibusdam ecclesiis
tacere presbyteros et praesentibus episcopis non loqui. "

2 in Gal. iv. 13. 3 Ep. lii. 7.

4 " S. Hieronymus in aestu contentionis indulgere solet exaggerationibus
rhetoricis " (Morinus).

I7t&gt; Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

in fact, bishops as well as presbyters till the subse
quent ordination of presbyters without episcopal func
tions put an end to the old arrangement and brought
about not episcopacy but what we have called
monepiscopacy. 1 St. Paul, says the Commentator,
passes from the ordination of bishops to that of dea
cons, because the ordination of a bishop and a pres
byter is the same. But this is must be an historical
present. The ordinations of a bishop and a presbyter
were wholly distinct in his day. " In our day," he
says, a few lines further on, "there should be in a
city seven deacons and a certain number of presby
ters and one bishop/ Church authority had in fact
restrained to one the functions which at first were
more widely extended, and no one can at all enter
into the feelings of the early Church about ordination
who does not perceive how much stress they laid on
church authority, as conditioning a man s spiritual
status. 2
(2) canons (2) We need not dwell long on the western

of councils.

councils. After the Carthaginian council in 256 A.D.,
which simply echoes the mind of Cyprian on the re-
baptism of heretics and only gives us evidence we
hardly need that Cyprian s view of the bishop s
office was also the view of his colleagues, the record
of western councils opens with that of Elvira

1 See Thomassin Vetus et Nova Ecclesiae Disciplina p. i. lib. i. c. i. 6.

2 Morinus sees the more modern representation of Jerome s view in the
scholastic opinion that the episcopate does not differ from the presbyterate
in sacerdotal character, but is an extension of the same character by the
addition of a new authority. The consecration of a bishop does not impose
a new character, but only superadds a new authority. See de S. Ord. p. iii.
ex. iii. c. I.

in.] The Witness of Church History. 177

(Illiberis) in Andalusia, which occurred in the early
years of the fourth century, and that of Aries a
representative western council in A.D. 314. 1 Both
these councils assume as a matter of course the sacer
dotal ministry of the Church and the three orders of
bishops, presbyters, and deacons. 2 So far as they are
concerned with the ministry, they are occupied only
with the maintenance of discipline and the regulation
of inter-episcopal relations. 3

(3) When we turn to the Latin rites of ordination, (3) Latin

v liturgies

we find a constant implication of the doctrine of indicate

1 Augustin even calls it a " plenarium ecclesiae universae concilium."

2 Episcopi, presbyteres et diacones (Elvira, cc. 18, 19; cf. 27,
75 and Aries, cc. 20, 21) : clerical office a status (Elvira, c. 53) : the bishops
sacerdotes (Elvira, c. 48) : the sacerdotal function sacrificare (Aries,
c. 19).

3 E.g. there is the restraining of deacons in Aries, c. 18, whose arro
gance we hear of first in Cyprian s letters ( Ep. iii. 3 : the deacon must
"honorem sacerdotis agnoscere"). In days of persecution deacons had been
known even to offer the Eucharist in many places, and this is curtly repri
manded : cf. Aries, c. 15 "De diaconibus quos cognovimus multis locis
offei-re, placuit minime fieri debere." [There is no reason whatever for think
ing that this represents any remains of an earlier discipline. How in days
of persecution such an abuse should have sprung up is intelligible enough.
It must be remembered that the fourth century is full of lament over the
decay of discipline, as e.g. in Basil the Great, Ep. xc.] In Spain there is
no trace of such a license, but we hear of deacons in charge of congregations*
as in later ages, and Elvira c. 77 enacts thus: "Si quis diaconus regens
plebem sine episcopo vel presbytero aliquos baptizaverit, episcopus eos per
benedictionem perficere debebit [i.e. confirm] : quod si ante de saeculo reces-
serint, sub fide qua quis credidit poterit esse iustus. "

Elvira c. 32 restrains to bishops the function of dealing with penitents ;
only in cases of necessity may a presbyter admit to communion, or even a
deacon, if the priest order him. Cf. Carthage, A.D. 390, cc. 3, 4 ; Hippo
Regius, A.D. 393, c. 30. Other canons concern clerical discipline (Elvira, c. 33,
Aries, c. 2) ; the mutual relation of bishops (Elvira, cc. 53, 58, Aries, c. 17) ;
the requirement of at least three bishops to consecrate another (Aries, c. 20) ;
the permission, in necessity, of lay baptism, to be followed by episcopal con
firmation (Elvira, c. 38).

We notice specially in later councils (e.g. Carthage, A.D. 390, cc. 3, 4;
Hippo, A.D. 393, c. 34 ; Toledo, A.D. 400, c. 20) the limitation to bishops
of the consecration of the chrism. There was clearly a tendency in the
presbyters to assume this function.

178 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

fche priesthood and of the orders in the ministry of
bishops, priests, and deacons. 1 The distinction be
tween these and the minor orders is marked in the
West by the subdeacon not receiving the laying-on
of hands. 2 It should be noticed in this connection
that the uniformity of idea which pervades the various
rites of ordination (and in this respect we may include
the Greek with the Latin) makes a great impression
upon the mind. It is not indeed the case that there
is no change of ideas, but it is not in any way funda
mental. The conception of the Christian pastorate
and priesthood in succession to the apostles is the
constant element.
(a) increase Such change as appears is mainly ol two sorts.

in ritual, not rr J

in doctrine ; There i S} first, the elaboration of ritual. It is import
ant indeed to remind ourselves that a more elaborate
ritual of ordination does not necessarily mean a
deepening of the conception of what ordination brings
with it. The earliest writing devoted to the con
sideration of a Christian sacrament Tertullian s trea
tise On Baptism is as full of belief in the spiritual
effect of the laver of regeneration as any treatise of
a mediaeval schoolman could be ; but he makes it
his special point that it- is on account of the real
spiritual efficacy of Christian sacraments that they

1 This statement is justified in App. Note C. The episcopate is called
an ordo (episcopatus ordo) in the Gregorian Sacram. ap. Muratori Lit.
Rom. Vet. ii. p 358.

2 So the so-called canons of the fourth council of Carthage ordained
(c. 5 quoted by Morinus de S. Ord. p. ii. p. 260). Cf. Isidore de Eccl. Off.
ii. IO ap. Hittorp. p. 23 : " hi [sc. subdiacones] igitur cum ordinantur,
sicut sacerdotes et Levitae, manus impositionem non suscipiunt." So
Rabanus Maurus de Inst. Cler. i. 8 ap. Hittorp. p. 316.

in.] The Witness of Church History. 179

do not need to be made impressive by outward
pomp. They can be simple, because they have so
real an inward grace attached to them. It is pagan
rites which need decking out with pomp and circum
stance, just because they have nothing else to trust
to for impressing men s minds. 1 The belief in baptis
mal grace, then, did not grow with the elaboration of
baptismal ceremony. Just in the same way it does
not follow that, because ordination rites became more
complicated, the Christian Church was growing to
rate more highly the consecration which they con
veyed. To the last there remains in the western
office a reminder that, while outward pomp was of
the essence of the old priesthood, for the very reason
that that was essentially external and symbolical,
the essence of the new priesthood lies in inward and
spiritual reality. The prayer for the consecration of
a bishop calls to mind the glory of the vestments of
the Aaronic priesthood, and prays that whatever
those vestments signified by the brilliancy of gold, by
the splendour of gems, by the variety of manifold
workmanship, may shine forth now in the characters
of Christian bishops, and that the precious ointment
upon the head which runs down unto the beard and
goes down to the skirts of the clothing may be to

1 The passage is well worth quoting, de Bapt. 2 : " Nihil adeo est, quod
tarn obduret mentes hominum, quam simplicitas divinorum operum quae in
actu videtur et magnificentia quae in effectu repromittitur : ut hie quoque
quoniam tanta simplicitate sine pompa, sine apparatu novo aliquo, denique
sine sumptu homo in aqua demissus et inter pauca verba tinctus non multo
vel nihilo mundior resurgit, eo incredibilis existimetur consecutio aeternitatis.
Mentior, si non e contrario idolorum sollemnia vel arcana de suggestu et
apparatu deque sumptu fidem et auctoritatem sibi exstruunt. Pro misera
incredulitas, quae denegas Deo proprietatessuas, simplicitatem et potestatem ! "

180 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

them the unction within, aye and without, of spiri
tual grace and spiritual power. 1
(6) a growing Secondly, beside ritual adiuncts there is a certain

independ-

prtesthood change in idea noticeable in the rites of ordination.

rresb e yter. It consists chiefly in emphasizing the special sacer
dotal functions of the presbyter. Thus in the later
forms we have the commissions to the priest : Re
ceive power to offer sacrifice ; Receive the Holy
Ghost : whose sins thou dost remit, they are remitted,
etc. Now these later forms are significant. There is
indeed nothing new in the conception of sacrifice or of
the power of absolution as belonging to the priest
hood, nor is any new idea involved in the imperative
form of commission ; what is new is the specification
of them and especially of the latter in the case of
the presbyter. It belongs to a stage of church
organization in which the presbyter is regarded as
having a more independent priesthood, attaching to
him as an individual. In earlier days the priest
hood is kept more closely in connection with the
Church or community. In the Church or com
munity the high priest or bishop exercises the sacer
dotal and pastoral functions, and the presbyters are
attached to him as co-operators of his order. This
idea of co-operation is what is remarkably empha
sized in the early prayers for their ordination.
Later owing to the more independent position
which the circumstances of large dioceses gave to
the presbyter his substantive priesthood, inhering
in him as an individual, comes more to the front.

1 See App. Note C.

in.] The Witness of Church History. 181

A presbyter is not so much a man who occupies
a certain position and grade in the hierarchy of the
community ; he is an individual with special powers.
His priesthood has become detached. 1

1 It will be useful at this point to quote some summary statements from
western writers of what belongs to the presbyter s office. Thus from St.
Isidore, c. A.D. 620, de Ecd. Off. ii. 7 ap. Hittorp. p. 22 : " [Presbyteris] sicut
episcopis dispensatio mysteriorum Dei commissa est. Praesunt enim ecclesiis
Christ! et in confectione divina corporis et sanguinis consortes cum episcopis
sunt, similiter et in doctrina populorum et in officio praedicandi. " He
follows Jerome, and quotes him in saying that only ordination is reserved
to the bishop. But later (c. 25) he adds confirmation (quoting Pope Inno
cent), "nam presbyteri, licet sint sacerdotes, pontificatus tamen apicem non
habent. Hoc autem solis pontificibus deberi, ut vel consignent vel paracletum
Spiritum tradant, quod non solum ecclesiastica consuetudo demonstrat, verum
et superior ilia lectio apostolorum, etc. . . . Nam presbyteris, sive extra
episcopum, sive praesente episcopo baptizant, chrismate baptizatos ungere
licet, sed quod ab episcopo f uerit consecratum : non tamen frontem ex eodem
oleo signare, quod solis debetur episcopis, cum tradunt Spiritum paracletum. "
When speaking of penitence, he specifies "sacerdotes" as the ministers of it
-"astante coram Deo sollemniter sacerdote" without mentioning whether
tishop or presbyter (ii. 16). The Ordo Romanus (ap. Hittorp. p. 93) specifies
offerre, benedicere, praeesse, praedicare, bap tizare, as the functions
of the presbyter. Pseudo-Albinus Flaccus (ap. Hittorp. p. 50) while re
peating the older canon which allows a deacon to receive confessions where
there is no priest, makes the bishops or presbyters "quibus claves regni
caelorum traditae sunt " the proper ministers of the penitential discipline.
Kabanus Maurus (de Inst. Cler. ii. 30), while making bishop or presbyter
the minister of private confession, makes the bishop the minister of public-
penance, and the bishop or presbyter at his desire (iussu tamen episcopi)
the minister of public absolution.

All this is summed up in canon 7 of the second council of Seville pre
sided over by Isidore A.D. 619: "Nam quamvis cum episcopis plurima
[presbyteris] ministeriorum communis sit dispensatio, quaedam tamen auc-
toritate veteris legis, quaedam novellis ecclesiasticis regulis sibi prohibita
noverint : sicut presbyterorum et diaconorum ac virginum consecratio ; sicut
constitutio altaris, benedictio vel unctio : siquidem nee licere iis ecclesiam
vel altarium conseerare ; nee per impositionem manus fidelibus baptizatis vel
conversis ex haeresibus paracletum Spiritum tradere ; nee chrisma conficere,
nee chrismate baptizatorum frontem signare ; sed nee publice quidem in
missa quemquam poenitentium reconciliare ; nee formatas cuilibet epistolas
mittere. Haec enim omnia illicita esse presbyteris, quia pontificatus apicem
non habent, quod solis debere episcopis auctoritate canonum praecipitur, ut
per hoc et discretio graduum et dignitatis fastigium summi pontificis de-
moiistretur. Sed neque coram episcopo licere presbyteris in baptisterium
introire, neque praesente antistite infantem tingere aut signare, nee poeni-
tentes sine praecepto episcopi sui reconciliare, nee eo praesente sacramentum

1 82 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

conclusion Now the evidence which early Christian history

for the . i i

fcistory from affords for the position of the ministry has been

A.D. 150 : JT J

(i) the prin- passed in review. If reference is made to the four

ciple of i i

succession P sl tions which were enunciated at the beginning of

accepted: ^ ^apter, ft ^ j^ f Qun( J fa^ fa e twQ nrs t t O
(ii) an epis- r*i i i

copate, with g O a t, present no further have been thoroughly justi-

xclusive o o J i

Srdination, fied. Everywhere we have found a ministry, recog-

universal. . 1-1 l

nised as having authority by succession from the
Apostles : everywhere the three distinct orders of
bishop, presbyter, and deacon : everywhere the limita
tion to the episcopate of the power of ordination.
The only qualification which has to be made lies in
the recognition that a school of western writers held
that originally there had been no substantial dis
tinction between a bishop and presbyter; and one
of these writers affirms, in effect, that this state of
things continued in the Church of Alexandria into
the third century. It has however been pointed
out that in the view of these writers, so long as the
presbyters were understood to have episcopal powers
(either generally or under certain circumstances), there
was no separate ordination to the episcopate. 1 They
do not hold that episcopal functions could under
any circumstances be assumed by the later presby
ters of the settled church constitution, who have
been ordained as presbyters and nothing more and

corporis et sanguinis Christi conficere, nee eo coram posito populum docere
vel benedicere aut salutare nee plebem utique exhortari."

1 St. Paul implies that normally a man will pass from one grade of the
church ministry up to another. This was always the canonical method ; see
Aposl, Const, viii. 17. But ordinations per saltum, even to the episcopate,
were known and recognised in early days. See Diet. Chr. Ant. s.v. BISHOP
i. p. 219.

in.] The Witness of Church History. 183

would require a separate ordination to make them
bishops.

Some further points have still to be made good Evidence

produced.

in order to justify the remaining positions which we
enunciated at starting.

II. The Church did from the first, we maintain, n. That

ordination

regard ordination as a sacramental l rite, to which ^ a c s ra r S.
was attached a special authorization or grace, of which a y&gt;
the laying-on of hands was the outward sign. On
the other hand it has been recently urged that the idea
of ordination in the earliest Church carried with
it only the association of official appointment, such as
belonged to contemporary secular society. The words
by which it is described "were in use to express ap
pointment to civil office. When other ideas than those
of civil appointment came beyond question to attach
themselves to ecclesiastical appointment other words
were used." This is a strange argument in view
of the history of Christian terminology. Ecclesia

1 1 use this expression without exact definition of a sacrament. The con
ception of ordination, for example, given by Rabanus Maurus, de Inst. Cler.
i. 4-7, is sacramental in the sense that the laying on of episcopal hands is
regarded as an act conferring certain mystical powers. Yet when he comes
to speak (c. 24) of the sacraments of the Church, he reckons three only :
"Sunt sacramenta baptismum et chrisma, corpus et sanguis, quae ob id
sacramenta dicuntur, quia sub tegumento corporalium rerum virtus divina
secretius salutem eorundem sacramentorum operatur : unde et a secretis
virtutibus vel sacris sacramenta dicuntur. Quae ideo fructuose penes
ecclesiam fiunt, quia sanctus in ea manens Spiritus eundem sacramentorum
latenter operatur effectum." Earlier, however, St. Augustin had in sub
stantially this sense spoken freely of ordination as a sacrament. But I
want to avoid, as much as possible, the history of terminology.

2 Dr. Hatch B.L. p. 129. In notes 33 and 34 he says: "The words in
use in the first three centuries are x e P TOl e " &gt; KO.BiffTa.veiv, Khypovadai, con-
xtituere, ordinare. . . . After the first three centuries there were not only
other words of the same kind, e.g. irpoe.\6e1v, irpodyeaOai, promoveri, praeferri,
but also xeipo6erel(jOa.i, ifpacrOat, consecrari, benedici. "

184 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

was a common term enough in the Greek language ;
but did it carry to St. Paul no special Christian as
sociations ? To break bread/ to give thanks/ were
common terms ; but " the bread which we break/ St.
Paul says, " is the communion of the body of Christ."
* Baptism had common enough associations in con
nection with pots and cups, brazen vessels and
tables ; but we could not therefore argue that it
was only when the sacrament of initiation came to be
known as the enlightenment or the salvation/
that associations of spiritual power began to be
attached to it. 1 It is the earliest Christian writings
that are most suggestive in this respect. It is the
simplicity of the language in which Tertullian speaks
of Christian baptism and Justin describes the Christian
Eucharist, which throws into high relief the profound
conception which they entertained of their spiritual
efficacy. 2 So far as technical language is concerned,
certainly Christianity poured new wine into old bottles.
Accordingly, it will not at all surprise us that the
author of the Acts should speak simply of Paul
and Barnabas appointing elders in every Church
(^eipoTovelv, Acts xiv. 23), or that St. Paul should
leave Titus to appoint elders (Kadia-Tdvew, Tit. i. 5) ;
and that we should afterwards be, as it were, let into
the secret of this appointment by St. Paul attri
buting it to the Holy Ghost (Acts xx. 28), and speaking

1 Bingham Ant. xi. i. 4, 5.

a Tertullian is quoted above. Justin Martyr s account of the Eucharist
is studiedly simple. There is no term which is not of common life, yet he.
concludes with the well-known passage : We receive it not as common bread
and common drink . , . but we have been taught that the food ... is the
flesh and blood of that Jesus who was made flesh " (Apol. L 65, 66).

in.] The Witness of Ckurch History. 185

to Timothy of the gift or special endowment of the
Spirit " which was in him by means of the laying-on
of his hands."

We may recognise, further, that in the whole pro- and con-

, . ferred by

cess of her ordinations the Church seems to have la yi n g- n

of hands.

borrowed a good many elements from civil society round
about her. The elements of appointment to civil
offices " were nomination, election, approval, and the
declaration of election by a competent officer " the
renunciatio. Then there was the usurpatio iuris ;
the consul or praetor designate, for example, formally
exercised his office and by exercising it entered upon
its legal tenure. 1 Now some of the steps of this pro
cess belong to human nature and would reproduce
themselves in all appointments ; but it is impossible
to avoid tracing back to this civil process some of the
features of the Church s later forms of ordination. If
election, testimony, examination, approval must neces
sarily have been there, yet we need not have found, as
in fact we do, the renunciatio to be an element in the
ordination ceremony of the West, and still more of the
East, though in characteristic Christian language. 2
Further, the reading of the Gospel by the newly-
ordained deacon ; the concelebration of the newly-
ordained priest ; the enthronization of the bishop ; the
giving to the persons ordained to the minor or (much
later) to the higher orders the instruments of their
ministry all these ceremonies are probably enough

1 See Dr. Hatch B.L, p. 129; Diet. Ohr. Ant. s.v. ORDINATION ii.
pp. 1503-1507.

2 Diet. Chr. Ant. ii. p. 1507 ; and below, App. Note C.

1 86 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

the Christian form of the c usurpatio iuris. 1 But all
these features in the ordination ceremonies of East or
West were additions of varying and uncertain date. As
what stamped the Christian ministry from the first had
been the idea of divine mission and authorization, so
the rite which corresponds to this idea had been all

1 Morinus saw this, and seems to draw the right conclusion. He notes :

(1) The fundamental identity of the method of ordaining bishops, pres
byters, and deacons in East and West.

(2) The divergence with reference to the minor orders as they grew up :
in the East they were ordained with laying-on of hands, but in the West by
the tradition of the instruments of their office, with some appropriate in
junction. (See the canon of iv Carthage, quoted by Morinus p. ii. p. 260 :
after the description of the method of ordaining bishops, presbyters, and
deacons by laying-on of hands and prayer, the canon continues, " subdiacomis
cum ordinatur, quia manus impositionem non accipit, patenam de
episcopi manu accipiat vacuum et calicem vacuum; de manu
vero archidiaconi urceolum cum aqua et mantile et manuter-
gium : " and so on for the other orders.) This he compares to the method of
assuming civil or military office by adopting or receiving the insignia.
So e.g. Dio Cassius (Hist. Rom. Ixviii. 16) speaks of the giving of the sword
by the emperor as the method of appointing prefects of the praetorians :
ore irpwrov Til II\\OVTI TU&gt;V Sopv&lt;p6pwi&gt; iirap^eiv rb t &lt;/&gt;os, 8 irapafavvvaQai abrbv
(Xpjjv, &peev, fyvfjivufft re afrrb Kal avaTeivas %$?) AdjSe TOVTO rb ft ^os, iva, &v
/JLI&gt; AcaXuJs 5px w ) vrrip tfj.ov, &v 5 /CCIKWS, (car* e/uou avry Xpyvy- Reimar says
in his note: "hinc periphrasis praefecti praetorio e&lt;f&gt; rb i(pos 3jv, ap.
Philostratum ; " and gives references, quoting also "cum insigne potes-
tatis, uti mos est, pugionem daret" from Victor. Caes. xiii. 9.

Morinus concludes that, whereas the higher spiritual orders which were
derived from the Apostles were always conferred in East and West by the
apostolic method (even though much later the traditio instrumentorum was
added in their case too), the minor orders, which were a gradual and utilitarian
development, were imparted differently in East and West, and in the West by
ceremonies suggested by the method of secular appointment (de S. Ord. p. iii.
ex. xi. c. 5). This would be borne out by the evidence recently adduced by
Harnack connecting the development of the minor orders in Rome with the
reorganization of civil offices (Text. u. Untersuch. ii. band, heft 5, pp. 97-103) :
" Die romische Gemeinde es verstanden hat . . . brauchbare Elemente des
Sacral- und Staatswesens zu adoptiren." He thinks the seven subdeacons were
instituted, probably by Fabian, to equalize the diaconate without losing
the sacred number with the fourteen newly-instituted curatores urbis.
Certainly the church organization was developed closely on the lines of the
imperial system, as convenience no doubt suggested. On the other hand, the
emperor Alexander Severus was disposed to take a lesson from the Church s
method " in praedicandis sacerdotibus. "

IIL] The Witness of Church History. 187

along the central and characteristic rite. Derived

from Jewish traditional practice but stamped by the
Apostles with a new significance, it was the laying-on
of hands accompanied no doubt from the first with
a prayer for the gift of the Holy Spirit which conse
crated and empowered the minister in the Christian
Church for his pastoral charge. 1

III. Now we approach the subject of the indelible in. That

permanent

character impressed by ordination. So far as church lva h s a beiL e ve
officers are elected representatives and ministers
the congregation, they would naturally be regarded,
and all down church history have been regarded, as
holding their place on terms of their good behaviour.
The disorderly cleric has been deposed. But this
does not exhaust the matter. The church officer is
also a representative of God : his ordination has given
him a divine commission and gift of grace ; and as
the gifts and calling of God are without repentance,
so from this point of view it is necessary to regard
him who is once a priest as always a priest, whether

1 The laying-on of hands in the Old Testament appears with a double
significance, (a) When the people laid their hands upon the Levites, when
the priest or the sacrificer laid his hand on the victim, the ceremony meant
that the subject of it was made a representative a substitute (Numb.
viii. 10 ; Levit. xvi. 21, iii. 2-15, iv. 4-29). The Levites were to represent
the people ; the victim was taken as a substitute for the offerer, (b) It
expressed the idea of benediction (Gen. xlviii. 14), and so specially it is
used of Moses consecrating Joshua (Numb, xxvii. 18; Deut. xxxiv. 9:
Joshua was full of the spirit of wisdom, for Moses had laid his hands upon
him "). It also became, before our Lord s time, the Jewish mode of appointing
magistrates and rabbis (Morinus de S. Ord. p. iii. ex. vii. c. 3), and they
laid stress upon a succession from Moses (ib. 8). The characteristic use of it
in the New Testament is by the Apostles to convey the gift of the Holy
Ghost (Acts viii. 17, xix. 6). Cf. the way in which the apostolic succession
is connected with the Jewish in the Clementine Ep. Petri. See further, for
the evidence and significance of the rite in the Christian Church, App.
Note G.

i88 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

he adorn his office or no. 1 The later doctrine of the
indelible character impressed by ordination, in com
mon with baptism and confirmation, and the clearly
drawn distinction between valid and canonical ordi
nations, were the final outcome in the West of the
conflict between these two principles involved from
the first in the position of the Christian ministry.

We see these opposite principles at work in St.
Clement s Epistle. On the one hand, because the
presbyterate has been appointed from above and has
a divine authority, it is declared to be " no light
sin to cast out of their episcopate those who have
holily and blamelessly offered the gifts." 2 On the
other hand, it is implied that had these holders of the
sacred office been bad men, the Church, with whose
consent they had been elected, might have deposed
them from their charge. When Callistus, a bishop
of Rome in the beginning of the third century, repu
diates this idea, issuing his edict that " if a bishop
sin, though it be a sin unto death, he may not be
removed" he is stating the indelibility of ordina
tion character &gt;s in a form against which the canonical
depositions of bishops, all down church history, are a
continuous protest.

1 Harnack states the conditions of the problem well in modification of
Dr. Hatch (die Oesellschaftsverfassung etc. p. 234 n. 13 ) : " As far as con
cerns the bishops and deacons, their activity was almost without control
and ranked as charismatic. This, without any doubt, carries with it the
reason why the officers in the Christian communities occupied from the
beginning a position so wholly different from that held by the officers in the
Oiacrot, or guilds. "

2 Clem, ad Cor. 44.

3 Harnack I.e. p. 258. The words are (Hippolytus Ref. Omn. Haer. ix.
12) : oCros ^Soy/j-dria-ev Sirws el tirivKoiros afjuiprot, n, el Kal 717165 OO.VO.TOV, /IT; detv

in.] The Witness of Church History. 189

In what sense then did the early Christian Church
hold this doctrine ? In such sense, first of all, that
there is no record from the beginning of church
history of the reordination of any one episcopally
ordained in the Church. Once let a man be ordained
to any office, and his ordination held good in every
Church where he offered satisfactory evidence of his
status. 1 This at least is the tendency of all the evi
dence we have. Thus, to take the earliest case ia

1 The 68th of the Apostolic Canons condemns to deposition any bishop,
presbyter, or deacon, who receives a second ordination, both him and his
ordainer, "unless it should appear that his (first) ordination was from here
tics"; the synod of Capua, A.D. 391, forbade rebaptisms, reordinations, and
translation of bishops, and the canon was incorporated into the African collec
tion (Hefele Conciliengesch. 108) ; so Theodoret tells us that a foolish monk,
who was afraid he should be ordained over again (having been ordained once
without knowing it), was assured that " it was not possible to give him twice
the same ordination " (Rel. Hist, xiii ap. Migne Patrol. Graec. Ixxxii. p. 1404) ;
so the author of the Quaestiones in Vet. et Nov. Test, assures us (Qu. ci) :
" quamquam apud . . . Deum unicuique hie honor maneat, qui decretus
est singulis ecclesiarum officiis, ut qui diaconus est diaconi honorem per
omnes ecclesias habeat." When bishops are forbidden to ordain clerics
who belong to other dioceses (Can. Nicaen. 16, cf. Can. Apost. 15 and later),
this of course means to a higher grade than they already held. Dr. Hatch s
statement (Growth of Ch. Inst. p. 36; cf. Diet. Chr. Ant. ii. p. 1479) that in
early days the transference of the officer of one Church to another . . .
when allowed, involved reappointment, or, as it would now be called, reordi
nation," is absolutely gratuitous and unsupported by facts.

Dr. Hatch has often quoted a Galatian sepulchral inscription of A.D. 461
(Corp. Inscr. Graec. No. 9259 : Sis yevbjj.evos irpeafivrepos) as evidence of a
double ordination ; cf. his B. L. p. 137 n. sl On this inscription I should like
to make three remarks.

(1) That the whole inscription does not at all support the sense that
Dr. Hatch puts on it (and Harnack accepts, I.e. p. 234 n. 13 ). A certain
Tarasis there buried is described as Sis revo/j.fvos (sic) Trpeafi* /cat irapa^ova.-
pios ira.poiK-rjo a.s ev TU TOTTW TOVTU. A wa.pa.fj.ova.pi.os (or Trpoafj.ovdpLos) is the Latin
mansionarius. He is a residentiary in charge of any institution belonging
to the Church. This Tarasis was twice appointed " presbyter and residen
tiary " of a particular Church or monastery. There is nothing here to
suggest that he was twice ordained in the fifth century. A similar expression
(referring, I think, to one man) occurs twice in the Ordo Romanus ap.
Hittorp. pp. i, 10 : "presbytero et mansionario."

(2) If the words had stood alone, as Dr. Hatch quotes them, I think a
suggestive parallel might have been found in the Libel!. Prec. Faustin.

190 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

point, St. Peter is represented in the Clementines
as travelling about with some attendant presbyters/
who are clearly conceived of as being more than
local officers as being presbyters wherever they are. 1
Nor, again, when we hear of the reinstatement of
clergy who had been deposed, or who had lapsed
into heresy or schism, do we ever hear of their re-
ordination. It is not indeed till comparatively late
that we hear of any such case : for the severe view
which was taken of deadly sin in the clergy forbade
that they should resume their office, just as it was
forbidden to penitents to be ordained at all. 2

though de- Such lapsed or deposed clergy were treated as lay-
posed clergy

n^ d men, or, when their sin was grave, deprived even
of lay communion. 3 But after the middle of the
fourth century we have plenty of instances in which
clergy, who had become Arians, Nestorians, Pelagians,

et Marcellin. ap. Bibl. Vet. Pair. vol. v. p. 659 b: "egregius ille bis
episcopus." This is referring ironically to the reordinations of the Arians.

(3) It surely is important to remember that tombstone inscriptions all over
the world express a lax popular theology. This has been brought out lately
by recent investigations in the Christian sepulchral inscriptions of Egypt,
Syria, and Asia. Those of Phrygia, for example, perpetuate for a long time
the pagan maledictions on those who lay hands on the tomb. See Mr.
Ramsay in Journal of Hellenic Studies, Oct. 1883, p. 400; also a very interest
ing article by M. E. Revillout in the Revue Egyptologique, 4 me ami. [1885],
no. i.

1 See Clem. Horn. vii. 12 : curb TWV eiro^evuv avr&lt;^ Trpecrfivrtpuv eva fvi-
ffKOirov avrois Ka.Ta&lt;TTricra.s (cf. 5&gt; 8).

2 " Nullum mihi occurrit exemplum spatio trecentorum et quinquaginta
annorum clerici catholici ad haereticos transfugae post reversionem ad
ecclesiam cum ordinum exercitio recepti " (Morinus de S. Ord. p. iii. ex. v.
IO. 2). Cf. Apost. Can. 62 : /uerapo^craj wj Xaucds dexO^TU and Cyprian Ep.
Iv. ii: " sic tamen admissus est Trofimus ut laicus communicet, non . . .
quasi locum sacerdotii usurpet." Morinus, I.e., deals with some instances
advanced in the opposite sense.

3 E.g. Can. Sardic. I : ^yoO/xcu /x?j5 XaiVcDv %Xw TOI)S Tototirovs ^p^vcu
Koivuvlav. Cf. Cyprian Ep. Iii. 1 : " Evaristum de episcopo iam nee laicum
remansisse."

in.] The Witness of Church History. 191

or heretics of whatever sort, were readmitted to
their order/ always without reordination ; l and it is
noticeable that St. Basil, though holding that clergy
who fall away from the Church lose the power of
administering valid sacraments, still speaks of the
ordination gift as a permanent endowment. 2

On the other hand, it is quite certain that the
early Church did not draw the clear line which was
drawn later between the reality of the priesthood
and its regular exercise. The deposed priest was

really regarded as a layman. 3 And in the same way and

... un&lt; ?

ordinations, which later would have been regarded as ^

uncanonical, were in early days regarded as invalid.
Morinus expresses the matter admirably by saying,
"moraliter magis et civiliter de istis philosophati
sunt." They thought of ordination, that is, in con
nection with all its moral and social associations, as
part of the whole life of the Church ; thus very
naturally, " they did not regard the validity of the
ordination as lying merely in the character of the act,
but they took into account also the authority of the
Church and questions of moral expediency." 4 The

1 They are "certainly not ordained again," St. Augustin says (de Bapt.
i. I. 2); cf. Hefele Conciliengesch. 142: "They [i.e. the Massalians] were
admitted on condition of anathematizing their former errors." Morinus I.e.
7, 8 f . collects other instances. The council of Toledo in A.D. 633 (c. 28)
gives the form for the restoration to their order of some clergy who had been
unjustly deposed. They are to receive their lost orders, " gradus amissos
recipere," before the altar by a renewed reception of the vestments or (in the
case of subdeacons) instruments proper to their office " ea in reparationem
sui recipiant, quae cum ordinarentur perceperant. " This is not reordina
tion technically, as Dr. Hatch calls it (Diet. Chr. Ant. ii. p. 1520).

2 Ep. clxxxviii : ol y&p TT/WTOI avaxup fivwrfs irapa. rui&gt; Trartpuv Zcrxov ras

las /cat 5cd rijs findeffeus T&V -Xfipuiv avrCiv elxov rb xdpttr/ia rb irvev/4a.TiK6v.

3 ireirauffdu TOV K\ripov is a common phrase. Cf. Diet. Chr. Ant. ii. p. 1520.

4 Morinus de S. Ord. p. iii. ex. v. cc. 9. 8, 1 1. 2 ; cf. Bingham Ant. xvii. 2.

uncanonical
dinations
valid.

1 92 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

word valid meant to them what, according to more
elaborated definitions, is expressed by both valid and
canonical. How could they believe an act done
in violation of the will of God to carry with it
His ratification and be valid ? So they reasoned,
and so reasoning they pronounced invalid (a/cvpos,
unratified) an ordination of which, in later days, it-
would only have been said : fieri non debet : factum
valet. 1

1 dt/ci&gt;pos tffru i) xetpoTovia., or KaOaipdcrdu. This is very frequent : cf. e.g.
Can. Apost. 36; Antioch. 13, 22; Sardic. 15; Constantin. 4 ; Chalcedon. 6.
A person who had thus received an invalid ordination became disquali
fied for the canonical ministry, and the question of his reordination did
not therefore often occur. But the Church, as we shall see, accepted the
Donatist ordinations. Before that the Church s action is more doubtful.

The Council of Nicaea ( 1 ) rejected the baptism of the disciples of Paul of
Samosata (c. 19) on the ground, as Athanasius tells us, of their heresy
not owing to their use of a defective form (Bright Notes on the Canons p.
67). It therefore decreed also that those, who had been amongst the Paulianist
clergy and were yet considered fit for church orders, should be first "baptized
afresh and then ordained by the bishop of the catholic Church." The re
pudiation of their baptism carried with it a repudiation of their ordinations.

(2) With reference to the Xovatian clergy (ot icadapoi) the Council decreed
wore x.fipodeTovfj.fi ovs cn/roi)s fj.^veiv oC-ras ev r&lt; /cX^py (c. 8). It has been disputed
whether this means that they should be reordained, or receive the imposition
of hands as a ceremony of reconciliation. The former interpretation seems
perhaps of the tivo the more probable ; see Bright Notes p. 25 f. But it is pos
sible that the bishops of the council did not accurately distinguish between a
fresh ordination and an act of reception by the Church which gave validity
to an old one. They use the words fj.veiv ev T$ K\ripif, and certainly the
language does not suggest a new ordination, such as the Paulianists needed.
So in the same way the clergy ordained by Meletius were allowed to retain their
office (Ttfj.7jv teal \eirovpylav) when they had been " confirmed by a more sacred
ordination " (fj-vyriKwr^pa x ei poTovig. jSe^aiwtf^ras, ap. Soc. H. E. i. 9) ; this cer
tainly suggests the idea of an act giving validity to an old ordination, rather
than a completely new ordination. Later western councils receive clergy
ordained amongst the Gothic Arians by a similar laying-on of hands "cum
impositae manus benedictioue " (1 Cone. Aurel. A.D. 511, c. to), "accepta
denuo benedictione presbyteratus " (Cone. Caesaraug. A.D. 592, c. i). In
the context of the passage quoted above from Socrates there is a clear
recognition by the historian in the case of Meletius himself of the distinction
between being a bishop and being allowed to act as such. The council
allowed him (he says) to retain the dt ct TTJS firiffKoir^, but took away the
(i-ovala. TOV wpdrreiv avrbv riva wj

iii.J The Witness of Church History. [93

The great peril, however, of making the unworthi- Distinction
ness of the minister hinder the grace of the sacrament l^ a M
soon became apparent, first in connection with bap- recognised it

r the West ;

tism. Thus the council at Aries a decreed for the
West the validity of heretical baptisms. But the
rigorism, which was always ready to make a man an
offender for a word and then repudiate his ministry,
was still felt in the case of the Luciferians and
Donatists to be a real danger. Accordingly Jerome
and Augustin lead the way in extending the principle
of the decision at Aries, so as to admit of the recog
nition of ordinations made by Arians, where the person
so ordained gave satisfactory evidence of his ortho
doxy, or again by Donatists, if their clergy would
communicate again with the Church on her terms. 2

1 c. 8 : "Si perviderint [haereticum] in Patre et Filio et Spiritu sancto
esse baptizatum, manus ei tan turn imponatur ut accipiat Spiritum sanctum."
c. 13 decided that the ordinations of traditor clergy were valid.

2 This is the point of Jerome s argument against Lucifer. He has a
beautiful passage on the rarity of perfect faith, and the necessity therefore of
recognising that imperfect faith is no obstacle to God s Spirit being admin
istered; "fides, quae etiam apud eos qui bene credunt difficile perfecta
invenitur" (adv. Lucifer. 15). He also presses the principle involved in the
recognition of heretical baptism: "eadem ratione episcopum ab Arianis
recipio qua tu recipis baptizatum " (ib. 14). He does not, however, commit
himself as Augustin does.

Augustin carries out the argument with great vigour, using in part and
developing Jerome s material, in his anti-Donatist writings. The question
(he contends) what a man believes who receives or administers the sacra
ment of baptism is of great importance for his own salvation, but is wholly
immaterial for its effect on the sacrament "ad quaestionem sacramenti"
(de Bapt. iii. 14). Sacraments ministered by heretics are valid, but their
benefits are suspended till those who receive them come over to church
unity (de Bapt. vii. 54. 103 ; c. Epist. Parmen. ii. 13. 29). This is as true
of ordination as of baptism ; as ordained men, if they secede and return
to the Church, are certainly not ordained again, but either again exercise
their former ministry, or if they do not exercise it at any rate retain the
sacrament of their ordination," so also " we do not dare to repudiate God s
sacraments even when administered in schism " (de Bapt. i. i. 2). So, with
great clearness, c. Epist. Parmen. ii. 13. 28 : "nulla ostenditur causa our ille,

194 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

And this was not a mere economical arrangement
in view of particular cases. It was based by St.
Augustin on general principles which would apply
in many directions the principle, namely, that " the
sacrament of ordination remains in those who are
ordained ; and if from any fault a man be removed
from his office, yet he will not be without the Lord s
sacrament once imposed, though remaining now only
to condemn him ; " * and the associated principle
transferred from baptism to ordination, that schism
and heresy do indeed destroy the spiritual value of
niy parti sacraments, but not their realitv. This latter prin-

ally in the "

ciple was not indeed generally admitted in the
East, 2 nor was it quickly worked out to its results
in the West. Still it took root. Leo the Great, for
example, pronounces that some uncanonically conse
crated bishops are no bishops at all, 3 but " pseudo-

qui ipsum baptismum amittere non potest, ius dandi potest amittere : utruinque
enim sacramentum est : et quadam consecratione utrumque homini datur,
illud cum baptizatur, istud cum ordinatur. Ideoque in catholica utrumque
non licet iterari. Nam si quando ex ipsa parte venientes etiam praepositi,
pro bono pacis correcto schismatis errore suscepti sunt et si visum est opus
esse ut eadem officia gererent quae gerebant, non sunt rursum ordinati :
sed sicut baptismus in eis, ita ordinatio mansit integra : quia in praecisione
fuerat vitium quod unitatis pace correctum est, non in sacramentis, quae
ubicunque sunt ipsa sunt. "

1 de Bono Conjuyali 24. 32 : " Quemadmodum si fiat ordinatio cleri ad
plebem congregandam, etiamsi plebis congregatio non subsequatur, manet
tamen in illis ordinatis sacramentum ordinationis : et si aliqua culpa quisquam
ab officio removeatur, sacramento domini semel imposito non carebit, quamvis
ad iudicium permanente."

- Xot, e.g., by St. Basil. In Ep. clxxxviii he does not admit the principle
of the validity of baptism by sects who are in fundamental heresy on the
doctrine of God : nor quite thoroughly as regards the Novatians and Encra-
tites, though some of their ordinations had been allowed. He seems to
regard it as a matter depending on the Church s judgment in any case : so
eastern writers subsequently.

3 Ep. clxvii ad Rusticum inq. 1 : "Nulla ratio sinit ut inter episcopos
habeantur qui nee a clericis sunt electi nee a plebibus sunt expetiti nee a pro-

in.] The Witness of Church History. 195

episcopi." But then he goes on to intimate that,
where their ordinations otherwise " vain "- were
allowed by the canonical bishop, they could be
accepted as " valid," showing clearly that, though he
did not regard consecration with the proper form as
absolutely valid by itself apart from canonical con
ditions, he yet did regard it as valid in such sense
as that church recognition, subsequently given, might
impart to it a retrospective validity.

In this uncertain and ambiguous position the
matter long remained. " What is it," says Morinus,
" to track the controversy [on the validity of hereti
cal or schismatical or simoniacal ordinations] but
to exhibit bishops against bishops, councils against
councils, pontiffs against pontiffs, waging a Cad-
meian war ? " l The Eastern Church has, in fact,
never got beyond the position that the Church has
the power to ratify in any particular case, or set of
cases, ordinations which in the West would be called
per se valid but uncanonical. 2

It can hardly be a subject for regret that the
Church should have exhibited considerable unwilling-

viucialibus episcopis cum metropolitan! iudicio consecrati. Undo, cum saepe
quaestio de male accepto honore nascatur, quis ambigat nequaquam istis esse
tribuendum, quod non docetur fuisse collatum ? Si qui autem clerici ab istis
pseudo-episcopis in eis ecclesiis ordinati sunt, qui ad proprios episcopos
pertinebant, et ordinatio eorum consensu et iudicio praesidentium facta est,
potest rata haberi, ita ut in ipsis ecclesiis perseverent : aliter autem vana
habenda est creatio, quae nee loco fundata est nee auctore munita."

1 de S. Orel, p. iii. ex. v. 8. i .

- Morinus I.e. c. n. 4: "His cum praecedentibus comparatis, colligitur
ecclesiam orientalem varie pro variis temporibus haereticos admisisse.
Constat enim quibusdam temporibus, praesertim nascente haeresi, ut via
planior ad reditum iis sterneretur, certorum haereticorum ordinationes
admisisse : aliis vero eas irritas declarasse et iterasse."

196 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

ness in isolating the consideration of the validity of
ordination from its context in the whole question of
what constitutes a right relation to the Church. It
cannot, however, be denied that the analogy of all
sacramental grace forced the Church to distinguish be
tween the gift that is in the man by the laying-on of
hands and its reverent or obedient exercise. It must
also be borne in mind, especially from the point of view
of our present argument, that whatever hesitation was
felt in accepting and formulating this principle was
due to the high regard in which the ordination gift was
held not to any disparagement of it : so that there
was at no time any hesitation in recognising the in
delibility of orders, when imparted and exercised in
obedience to the Church.

^ -^ w ^ ^ e n ticed that whereas the conception
jfiledmTnew of the Christian ministry and pastorate of souls dates

idea of the ,,,,., . , . ,

ministry, back behind our present period into the immemorial
past, it is only at the beginning of our period that
the title of the Priesthood begins to be applied to it.
Irenaeus and Clement do not speak of the Christian
ministers as priests, while Tertullian and Origen do,
so that it is only towards the end of the second cen
tury that sacerdotal terms begin to be regularly 1
applied to the clergy.

The question arises : Does this change of language
represent a change of ideas, or merely a readjustment

1 Dr. Lightfoot thinks Polycrates description of St. John as "a priest
wearing the mitre irtraXov" (ap. Euseb. H.E. v. 24) is perhaps the first
instance of sacerdotal language being applied to the Christian ministry.
But we have the expression in the Didache xiii. 3 : " the.y are your high
priests."

in.] The Witness of Church History. 197

of terms in view of changed circumstances ? We can
not argue always or absolutely from a gradual change
in language to a change in ideas. For instance, we Reasons for
have every reason for supposing that the first Chris- abstinence
tians believed in the Divine Sonship of Christ. A
Christian of the first century, with the teaching 01
the Apostles in his mind, when he understood the
controversy, would, we feel no doubt, have sided un
ambiguously with St. Athanasius and not with Arius ;
and that not because Athanasius would have persuaded
him to give any new honour to Christ, but because he
would have seen easily enough what his old faith
implied : that it was indeed the teaching of St. John
and St. Paul about Christ that He was God of God,
very God of very God. But, on the other hand, this
faith of the Church could not be expressed so unre
servedly in the first age as in later times. Jesus is
very God was not the first truth to put before a
Jew, but Jesus is the Christ : this is the substance
of the first apostolic preaching as recorded in the Acts
the Messianic authority of Christ, not His divine
nature. Jesus is the Son of God was not the first
truth to preach to the heathen with their polytheism
and mythology, lest they should only too easily incor
porate Him into their Pantheon : the basis of mono
theism must be firmly laid before the Divine Sonship
of Christ can be securely preached. 1 There is then
a change of terminology which means a change of
circumstances rather than of ideas. To take another

1 See St. Paul s first preaching to heathen, Acts xiv. 14-18 and xvii.
22-31.

198 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

instance from the records of the language of the early
Church. The early apologists believed in a Christian
sacrifice in the Eucharist ; if the sense in which
they did so may be discussed, the fact is undoubted.
But Justin Martyr, who expresses his appreciation of
the eucharistic sacrifice to Trypho the Jew, denies to
the heathen emperor that God needs material obla
tions. 1 Athenagoras makes the same denial, and then
puts in parenthetically as it were under his breath
"and yet we must offer a bloodless sacrifice and bring
before God the spiritual service." 2 The Christian
in fact had, or had not, a sacrifice according as the
term was used in one sense or in another. The same
seems to have been true of the priesthood. " It
would only have caused confusion," Mr. Simcox justly
says, 3 "when a great company of the priests was
obedient to the faith/ to have said that St. Barnabas
was a priest, when he was in fact a Levite." The
term priest indeed carried with it many associa
tions, Jewish and pagan, which did not belong to
Christianity. Outside the Epistle to the Hebrews
Christ is not termed a priest, and even there it is
said : "if He were on earth He would not be a priest
at all, seeing there are those who offer the gifts
according to the law." 4 So, too, it is conceivable that
a Christian missionary of our own day might find it
necessary, amidst the associations of a pagan priest -

1 Dial. c. Tryph. 117 (cf. 22); Apol. i. 10.

~ Legal. 13 : xairoi irpofffapeiv 8ov dvainaKTov Ovaiav KO.I rrjv XoyiKijv irpoj-
dyetv \arpdav.

3 Early Church History p. 59.

4 Hebr. viii. 4 (R.V.).

in.] The Witness of Church History. 199

hood, to emphasize by the avoidance of the term the
points of difference in the Christian ministry : just as
it would have been wiser at times to have produced a
monotheistic atmosphere as a preparation for preach
ing the divinity of Christ.

But when once the Christian atmosphere has been
cleared, when once the unique high-priesthood of
Christ is realized and the communication of that
priesthood to the Church, it becomes natural to apply
the term priest to the divinely ordained ministers
of this priestly congregation. As this special applica
tion has been shown in the last chapter to involve no
loss of the general conception of the high-priestly
race/ so also it carries with it no change of ideas
about the ministry. The bishops whom Clement
speaks of as " offering the gifts " in the spiritual
temple of the Church under Christ, " the high-priest
of our oblations," may as well as not be called priests.
Hippolytus expresses by the term the high-priest
hood exactly the same idea of the episcopate as is
expressed by Irenaeus without its use. 1 Ignatius,
who does not call the Christian officers priests, em-

1 See App. Note Or. It is important to notice the triple derivation of
sacerdotal language. There is (1) the idea of the high -priesthood of
Truth. The term high priest is applied thus to the prophet (Didache xiii. 3),
or to the bishop as sitting in the chair of the prophetic teacher (Hippolyt.
Ref. Omn. Haer. prooem. and the Clementines). There is (2) the idea of the
high-priesthood of Sacrifice realized in the Church through the mediation
of Christ. This is the idea of priesthood in the Epistle to the Hebrews,
in Clement of Rome, in Justin Martyr, in Irenaeus ; and the term priest
came to be applied in this sense to the bishop or presbyter as to him
who offers the gifts. It is noticeable that the unity of prophecy and
priesthood underlies the use of the sacerdotal term \fiTovpye1v ry Kvply of the
prophets in Acts xiii. 2. There is (3) the idea of the Power of the Keys the
authority to bind and loose in the Christian society, belonging to the bishop
with the presbyters, as it is emphasized in the Clementines.

2 oo Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

phasizes their authority more than Origen, who uses
the term freely, and not less than Cyprian. There
is an overstrained expression of sacerdotal authority
in the Apostolical Constitutions) but this comes from
a slight hardening of Ignatius s teaching and is
in no apparent connection with the change in
terms. On the other hand, the Fathers are not,
generally speaking, chargeable with a false conception
of the priestly office ; but (as these pages will have
shown) in the old offices of ordination, in the writings
on the pastoral charge and in the early canons the
idea is kept in due proportion and harmony with the
whole of church life and spiritual truth. If the
Church is a high-priestly race, and if in the Church
there is a ministry of divine authority both in the
communication of God s gifts to man and in the
offering of man s gifts to God, that ministry can quite
legitimately be called a priesthood. 1
v. Th V. We may claim now to have fairly substantiated

powers of J *

^dnsii s e. y the four fundamental positions which were propounded
at the opening of this chapter. It is still however
necessary, in order to make our case complete, to

1 It will be asked : Why do we not find in second century theology such
passages about the dignity of the priesthood in connection with the Eucharist
as are quoted, or referred to, on pp. 157-8? The answer to this seems to be
that there is nothing in such passages which does not apply to the whole
Christian life (cf. Hebr. xii. 22-24) an &lt;l which should not be realized by
every Christian, in his degree, in the eucharistic celebration ; but a special
necessity arises for emphasizing these thoughts in connection with the
responsibilities of the ministry in days when the spirit of the world takes
possession of the Church. It is in this way that the heart of the Church is
kept sound. It is only when this sanctity is attributed to the ministry by
contrast to the whole body that a new and false element is introduced into
theology. Further than this, it is not, probably, more than an accident
that the divine authority of the clergy was emphasized first and the sanctity
of their sacramental ministries later. See some further remarks in chap. vii.

in.] The Witness of Church History. 201

refer to the exclusive character attributed to the
powers of the ministry, and attributed to them, as
far as the evidence goes, from the first.

A positive claim is in a certain sense necessarily
also exclusive ; the position involves a negation. I
am empowered by ordination to minister implies
that you who have no such ordination have no such
power/ The church ministry made, then, an exclusive
claim. This, of course, needs qualification ; however
much the office of teaching or baptizing was kept
under the bishop s control and practically confined to
the clergy, still lay baptism was generally regarded
as valid and allowable in circumstances of necessity, 1
while lay teaching also was from time to time per
mitted. 2 Ambrosiaster tells us, as has been noticed
already, that there was at first greater freedom in this
respect. But, though this be admitted, it is still
true to say that certain functions have been regarded
as confined to certain church officers, in such sense as
that others cannot validly perform them. Thus St.
Jerome writes : 3 " Since Hilary, a deacon, has with
drawn from the Church, a world in himself as he
imagines, he can neither consecrate a Eucharist (for
he has neither bishops nor presbyters) nor without a

1 Cf. e.g. Tertull. de Bapt. 17 ; Council of Elvira, c. 38. Jerome (adv.
Lucifer. 9) says : " Inde venit, ut sine chrismate et episcopi iussione neque
presbyter neque diaconus ius habeant baptizandi. Quod frequenter, si tamen
necessitas cogit, scimus etiam licere laicis."

2 Apost. Const, viii. 32. 15:0 diddcncwv, et Kal XaiVcds et-rj, fytTreipos 5 TOV \6yov
Kal Tttv rptiirov cre/xi/is, 8i5a&lt;TKru. See note (32) in Migne Patrol. Grace. L

p. 1132-

3 Jerome adv. Lucifer. 21 ; the meaning of the clause about baptism
is not plain, after the admission of lay baptism, quoted above. Cf. Apost.
Const, viii. 28.

202 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

Eucharist hand on baptism ; and when the individual
is dead, his sect is gone with him ; for, as a deacon,
he could ordain no clergyman after him. And that
is no Church which has no priests." Again, the
eighteenth canon of Nicaea distinguishes between
the deacons " who have not the authority to offer "
and the presbyters who have. This of course
represents the common doctrine ; only a priest can
offer or consecrate the Eucharist, as only a bishop
can ordain. But it is sometimes urged that this is
a later conception in the Church : earlier, as in
Ignatius and Clement, you have the conception of
the authority of the ministry strongly developed, but
without this sacerdotal exclusiveness. " Let that be
esteemed a valid Eucharist," Ignatius says, "which
is celebrated under the bishop or his delegate; . . .
it is not lawful, apart from the bishop, to baptize
oi- celebrate a love-feast:" 1 but here, it is urged, the
idea is simply that a sacrament must be duly autho
rized; and this would be quite compatible with the
validity of a lay Eucharist, if only the layman had
authority given him to celebrate it. It was a question
of order not of exclusive grace.
The rights of Now it is perfectly true that in the first age the

the ministry 1 J

?&gt;rdw, ter f dominant idea was that of church order. 2 The priest
hood was not, as much as in later days, regarded as

1 ad Smym. 8 ; see however further, in chap, vi, for Ignatius s whole
conception.

- Cf. Tertull. de Bapt. 17 : "Dandi quidem [baptismum] habet ius
surnmus sacerdos, qui est episcopus : dehinc presbyter! et diaconi, non tameii
sine episcopi auctoritate, propter ecclesiae honorem, quo salvo salva pax est."
Cf. Jerome, in note above: and [Ambrose] de Sacramentis iii. i. 4 : "exor
dium ministerii a summo est sacerdote."

in.] The Witness of Church History. 203

an endowment of the individual. There was not the
same distinction drawn between what was valid and
what was canonical. On this point enough has
already been said. But it is obvious that the con-i&gt;utaisoof

special

ception of church order is capable of embracing what charisma -
is included in both the terms canonical and valid/
Thus the language of Ignatius about the Eucharist is
capable of covering the position that only a presbyter
can have the bishop s license to consecrate, even if it
also covers the position that a presbyter s celebration,
apart from episcopal authority, would lack validity.
And we certainly find that Clement assigns the offer
ing of the gifts to the episcopal (or presbyteral) office,
and speaks of each order as having its own limited
functions in the celebration of the Eucharist by divine
appointment. 1 Again, when we go further back, we
find in the Acts the idea of exclusive function : for,
though nothing is said about the Eucharist in par
ticular, only the apostle, or perhaps also the pro
phet, can lay on hands to give the gift of the Holy
Ghost. And so, in special connection with ordi
nation, St. Paul speaks of Timothy as empowered
by a gift of grace given to him as an individual by
the laying-on of hands, and presumably conveyed
by him to those on whom he is directed to lay hands
after the apostolic pattern. 2 It does not the least
follow that, because Ignatius and Clement press the
idea of divine order, they ignore the reality of ordina
tion grace, which as positive is also exclusive. It is

1 ad Cor. 40 ; see further, in chap. vi.

- The argument is the same, for our present purpose, if the Acts and
Pastoral Epistles are relegated to the second century.

204 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

of course a fact that there is much more early evidence
for the general position that no ministry was acknow
ledged in the Church which was not performed in
accordance with church order and for the principle
of special positive powers conveyed to individuals by
ordination than for the particular limitation to pres
byters of the celebration of the Eucharist : but it is a
false supposition (considering the traditional character
of the Church) that an institution or limitation only
began to exist when we happen first to hear of it. 1

Have we, then, any reason to believe that a layman

would in any age have been allowed to celebrate the

Eucharist even in case of necessity ? Yes, it is at once

Tertuiiian s answered : Tertullian says so. 2 It is in a Montanist

viw to the . ii- i t

Contrary treatise, where he is arguing, in the severe spirit ol
that body, against the lawfulness of second marriages.
His opponent is supposed to urge that they are for
bidden only to priests. " Vain," replies Tertullian,
" shall we be if we think that what is not lawful for
priests is lawful for laics. Are not even we laics
priests ? (Rev. i. 6 quoted.) It is the authority of
the Church which makes a difference between the
order and the people. . . . Thus, where there is no

J It must have been a surprise to many people to find in the Didache the
observance of the Wednesday and Friday fasts and of trine affusion. Cf.
Harnack in Expositor, May 1887, p. 321.

2 When Clement of Alexandria says of the Christian : eairepas Sf avairav-
aaadai KaO/iKfi /JLCTO. TTJV fcrrLaffiv KCU /j.era TTJV e?rt rats &iro\avcre&lt;riv evxapiffTiav
(Paed. ii. 10. 96), he is referring to the grace for the supper. Evxapurre iv
long continued to be used for saying grace in the church of Alexandria ;
cf. pseudo-Athan. de Virgin. 12 : Her die rbv Uprov trov ei/xo-pi-ffr^craffa ry Oe^
eiri TTJS Tpa.irtfts aov (and so three times iu c. 13). Dr. Bigg s suggestion of a
domestic Eucharist with only the head of the house to celebrate it (B.L.
p. 103 n. 2 ) seems, therefore, gratuitous and is not borne out by the words of
Clement.

in.] The Witness of Church History. 205

bench of clergy, you offer and baptize and are priest
alone for yourself. Nay, where three are, there is a
Church, although they be laics. . . . Therefore, if you
have the rights of a priest in your person when it is
necessary, it behoves you to have likewise the discip
line of a priest when it is necessary to use his right. If
you are a digamist, can you baptize ? can you offer ?
How much more capital a crime is it for the digamist
laic to act for the priest, when the priest himself, if
he turn digamist, is deprived of the power of acting
as priest ? " Tertullian is here confessedly speaking
about abnormal cases, and in this same treatise he
speaks of a man offering the Eucharist under usual
circumstances for his wife or wives departed by the
hands of the priest per sacerdotem. 2 At the same
time there is no doubt about his meaning ; and if this
passage could be fairly quoted as evidence of the
mind of the Church at the time, it would go at least
to show that while the right of the layman to baptize,
in cases of necessity, was rather grudgingly conceded,
there was no sharp line yet drawn in respect of his

1 de Exhort. Cast. 7 : " Vani erimus, si putaverimus quod sacerdotibus
non liceat laicis licere. Nonne et laici sacerdotes sumus ? Scriptum est :
Regnum quoque nos et sacerdotes Deo et Patri suo fecit. Differential!! inter
ordinem et plebem constituit ecclesiae auctoritas et honor per ordinis coii-
sessum sanctificatus. Adeo ubi ecclesiastici ordinis non est consessus, et
offers et tinguis et sacerdos es tibi solus. Sed ubi tres, ecclesia est, licet
laici. Unusquisque enim de sua fide vivit, nee est personarum acceptio apud
Deum : quoniam non auditores legis iustificabuntur a Deo, sed factores, secuii-
dum quod et apostolus dixit. Igitur si habes ius sacerdotis in temetipso
ubi necesse est, habeas oportet etiam disciplinam sacerdotis, ubi necesse est
habere ius sacerdotis. Digamus tinguis ? digamus offers ? quanto magis laico
digamo capitale erit agere pro sacerdote, cum ipsi sacerdoti digamo auferatur
agere sacerdotem ? "

2 &. ii : "Otferes pro duabus et commendabis illas duas per sacerdotem
de monogamia ordinatum ? "

206 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

powers between baptism and the Eucharist. But
though we grant this, it is, on the other hand, cer
tainly not the case that this passage can be fairly
quoted as illustrating the mind of the Church at all.
follows from Tertullian, in fact, is writing as a Montanist ; l that is

his Montan
ist position. ag one Q f a ^dy which was setting itself against the

Church as in other respects, so also in reference to
the authority of the episcopal ministry. 2 He had
himself, before he became a Montanist, adopted a
different tone. He had made carelessness about
sacerdotal distinctions the very characteristic of here
tical bodies. "Their ordinations are heedless, capri
cious, changeable. At one time they put novices in
office ; at another, men involved in secular employ
ment ; at another, men who have apostatized from
us. . . . And so it comes about that one man is
a bishop with them to-day, another to-morrow ; to
day a man is a deacon, and to-morrow a reader ;
to-day a presbyter, and to-morrow a layman ; for
they impose even on laymen the functions of the
priesthood." The tone here is undoubtedly different.
Again, in another treatise, he makes it part of the un
written but authoritative tradition of the Church, that
only the "presidents" that is, no doubt, the bishop

1 There is no doubt about this, for a prophecy of Prisca is quoted (de Exh.
Cast. 10) : "Item per sanctam prophetidem Priscam ita evangelizatur, quod
sanctus minister sanctimoniam noverit ministrare. Purificantia cnini concor
dat, ait, et visiones vident et ponentes faciem deorsum etiam voces audiunt
manifestas, tarn salutares quam et occultas." There can be little doubt that
these words belong to the true text : (so Bonwetsch Montanismus, p. 198).

- Tertullian speaks of course as if his opponent would grant his position.
But Tertullian though he is a very powerful is not a fair arguer, and it
cannot be the least concluded that, when Tertulliau uses or implies a Nonne,
his opponent would have answered Yes.

3 de Praescr. 41. For the Latin, see p. 127 n. 1

in.] The Witness of Church History. 207

and presbyters should administer the Eucharist. 1
The statement, then, that Tertullian makes as to
the power of the layman to offer, in cases of neces
sity, can no more be admitted as evidence of what
the Church would have granted, than similar appeals
made by Waldensians or Wesleyans of later days.

It is, however, necessary to explain a little more character

istics of

fully the position of the Montanists, and that especi-
ally in order to refute the notion that, in their claim to
dispense with the church ministry, they represented
in any way an older and fast vanishing " freedom of
the spirit." :

Montanism, then, as represented by Tertullian, had
two chief characteristics. 3 First, it was a movement
characterized by an intense ascetic rigorism. Tertul-

1 de Corona 3, 4: " Eucharistiae sacramentum et in tempore victus et
omnibus mandatum a Domino, etiam antelucanis coetibus, nee de aliorum
manu quam praesidentium sumimus." He then proceeds to argue on
the authority of the church traditions, and on their claim to obedience :
"harum et aliarum eiusmodi disciplinarum si legem expostules scripturarum,
nullani invenies : traditio tibi praetendetur auctrix, consuetude
confirmatrix et fides observatrix. Rationem traditioni et consuetudini
et fidei patrocinaturam aut ipse perspicies aut ab aliquo qui perspexerit disces:
interim nounullam esse credes, cui debeatur obsequium." Thus he makes
this limitation of the distribution of the eucharistic sacrament to the clergy
one of many immemorial traditions of the Church ; and he speaks of the
authoritativeness of church customs in a tone so different to what is to be
quoted from the tie, Virginibus Velandis that, though the de Corona has some
of the Montanist rigorism about it and dates not before the end of the century,
it cannot belong to his latest and most Montanist period. In the de Virg.
Vel. however, he still speaks of himself as " una ecclesia " with the apostolic
Churches (c. 2).

3 "The fact of the existence of Montanism," Dr. Hatch says (B. L.
p. 125), "strongly confirms the general inferences which are drawn from other
evidence, that church officers were originally regarded as existing for the
good government of the community and for the general management of its
affairs . . . that the functions which the officers performed were such as,
apart from the question of order, might be performed by any member of the
community."

3 On the Montanist movement generally, see A pp. Note H.

208 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

lian, who had deplored * but not corrected his own
impatience, was drawn into its ranks, as men of im
patient, undisciplined zeal have been drawn in every
age into puritan or Novatian parties. In this spirit,
it was opposed to the laxer or more merciful tendencies
of the authorities of the Roman Church of that day. 2
" I hear," says Tertullian with bitter scorn, 3 " that an
edict has been issued, and that a peremptory one.
That pontifex maximus, that bishop of bishops, 4 de
crees : I forgive the sins of adultery and fornication
to those who have performed penance." This readi
ness to grant absolution for even the worst sins the
Montanists intensely resented. Further, the Mon-
tanist discipline involved special fasts and special
restrictions on marriage and other ascetic rules for
laity, no less than clergy which find in Tertullian
a vigorous advocate, and which enable him to heap
contempt on the more ordinary standards of living,
which were reckoned sufficient among churchmen or
1 natural men, as the Montanists called them.
(2) belief in The second characteristic of western Montanism,
prophets/ which it had derived from its Phrygian parentage, was
a belief in the new prophets. There had been in the
persons of the first Montanist prophets a new outpour
ing of the prophetic spirit. They had been the subjects

1 This is what gives such pathos to his treatise de Patientia.

2 The view of the policy of the Roman Church which Mr. Pater gives in
Marlus the Epicurean is so far justified by the number of reactionary move
ments which history connects with the names of Tertullian, Hippolytus, and
Novatian.

3 de Pudic. i.

4 The first title no doubt implies the paganism of the proceedings, and
the second its arbitrariness, in Tertullian s judgment.

in.] The Witness of Church History. 209

of a new and absolute inspiration ; and still (though
they were gone) the Montanist society had brethren
with the gift of revelations/ who saw visions and had
access to divine truth denied to common men. Men

who believe themselves inspired naturally tend to de- and conse

quent dis-

spise mere church officers who make no such claim. ^
And, besides, the church officers in the East first, and m
later in the West, had judged and repudiated this claim
to inspiration. The Church of the natural men had,
according to the Montanist s, rejected the Spirit. 1 It
will not therefore at all surprise us that the Mon-
tanists should have regarded their inspired prophets
as organs of spiritual power, in the possession of
whom they were enabled to despise the bishops with
their official claims. The Church never expressed
any opinion on the rights which could be recognised
in genuine prophets, but she denied that these men
were prophets of God at all. Hence the tone of
antagonism. Tertullian is still speaking of the epi
scopal edict. " You say," he argues, 2 " that the
Church has the power of forgiving sins. This I
acknowledge more than you and determine I, who
have the Paraclete Himself in the person of the
new prophets saying the Church can forgive the sin,
but I will not do it lest they commit others withal. "
The claim to the power of absolution in the Church
was based on our Lord s promise to St. Peter,

1 See Tertull. adv. Prax. i and App. Note H.

2 de Pudic. 21: "Seel habet, inquis, potestatem ecclesia delicta
donandi ? Hoc ego magis et agnosco et dispono, qui ipsum Paracletum in
prophetis novis habeo dicentem : Potest ecclesia donare delictum, sed non.
faciam, ne et alia delinquant."

2io Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

and Tertullian proceeds to examine the promise and
declares that it was given to St. Peter only as an in
dividual. The promised power, therefore, of binding
and loosing has nothing to do with those who claim to
inherit it. " Now, then, what has this power to do
with the Church, with your Church forsooth, mere
natural man ? For, in accordance with the person of
Peter, it is to spiritual men that this power will be
long, either to an apostle, or else to a prophet. For
the Church is properly and principally the Spirit Him
self, in whom is the Trinity of the One Godhead
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The Spirit combines
that Church which the Lord has made to consist in
three persons. And thus, from that time forward,
any number of persons, who may have combined
together with this faith, is accounted a Church
from the author and consecrator of the Church. Arid,
accordingly, the Church, it is true, will forgive sins ;
but it will be the Church of the Spirit by means of
the spiritual man ; not the Church which consists of
a number of bishops." ] It will now be seen that Ter-
tullian s argument about three constituting a Church,
in the passage which came first under discussion, is
in direct connection with the argument of this last
passage. The anti- sacerdotal tone of it is quite

1 t 6. " Quid nunc et ad ecclesiam, et quidem tuam, psychice? Secundum
enim Petri personam spiritalibus potestas ilia conveniet aut apostolo aut pro-
phetae. Nam et ecclesia proprie et principaliter ipse est Spiritus, in quo
est trinitas unius divinitatis, Pater et Filius et Spiritus sanctus. Ilium
ecclesiam congregat, quam Dominus in tribus posuit. Atque ita exinde
etiam numerus omnis, qui in hanc fidem conspiraverint, ecclesia ab auctore
et consecratore censetur. Et ideo ecclesia quidem delicta donabit : sed
ecclesia Spiritus per spiritalem hominem, non ecclesia numerus episcoporum."

sm
not conser-

lii.] The Witness of Church History. 211

manifest or rather, what is manifest is that it sub
stitutes a priesthood of supposed inspiration for the
priesthood of an ordained and official ministry. It
sets the Church of the Spirit against the Church of
the bishops.

So far, then, Montanism gives us good evidence
as to the temper of the Church when she rejected
that movement in the second century. But is it, then,
the case that Montanism represented the older mind
of the Church an older freedom of prophesying ? l vative
Not in the least. The Church never in fact committed
herself at all to any position with reference to the rights
and powers which would be allowed to those whose real
inspiration she could recognise. She did not admit
Montanist inspiration and then deny that it had ac
companying rights ; she simply denied that it was
inspiration. She was taking up no new line towards
prophecy whatever. And the more closely we look at
Montanism, whether in its origin or in its development,
the less inclined shall we be to attribute to Mon
tanism conservative or retrospective tendencies. " It
was the element of conservatism in it," it has been
recently said by one whose justice always commends
his words, " the fact that it spoke the language and
reaffirmed the idea of a bygone day, that gave Mon
tanism its strength, and won over to it so powerful a
champion as Tertullian." 2 Such language, however,

1 We have not, it must be remembered, to deal in Montanism with a claim
for liberty of prophesying in any modern sense, but with a claim of
supernatural inspiration. See Dr. Salmon s article in the Diet. Chr. Biog.
on MONTANUS.

2 Dr. Sanday in Expositor, Feb. 1887, p. no. Bonwetsch, the best recent
investigator of the matter, though he does not altogether accept this view

212 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

seems contrary to the evidence we have of the nature
of Montanism. If we read Tertullian s de Virginilms
Velandis, we shall be struck with its ^^conservative
tone. Tertullian, the catholic, strikes the note of con
servatism in the Praescriptiones. As a Montanist
he still kept his hold on the ancient doctrine ; but
novitas is his watchword in matters of discipline.
In this region he denounces custom : " custom, which,
taking its origin from ignorance or simplicity, is
strengthened by succession into a practice, and then
makes its position good against the truth. ... It is
not the charge of novelty, but the truth, which re
futes heresies. Whatever is against the truth, this is
heresy, even though it be an old custom." The rule of
faith indeed is immovable, 1 but " the other matters of
discipline and life admit the novelty of correction,
because the grace of God works and advances even
till the end." There is a gradual development, then,
in the Church as the Spirit the Lord s Vicar -
gradually works out His plan of discipline. This
development has for its content " the direction of dis
cipline, the revelation of Scriptures, the improvement
of our understanding, the advance to a better state
of things." It is like the natural development of

of Montanism as a conservative or reactionary movement, quotes some words
from the acts of a bishop Achatius in the Decian persecution ( 4 ap. Ruinart
A eta Martyr. Sincera) as a sign that this view of them was held already in
early days (Zeitsckr. f. L Wissenschaft u. k. Leben, i884, heft ix. p. 473). The
words are : " Cataphryges aspice homines religionis antiquae." But they are
completely misunderstood. The words are put in the mouth of the pagan
magistrate. He had first induced the Montanists to apostatize and sacrifice,
and then held them up as examples of return to the ancient religion, i.e. the old
Roman religion ; "admea sacra converses," he continues, "reliquisse quae
fuerant, et nobiscum Diis vota persolvere."

1 .But is more fully unfolded to Montanists : see ad Prax. 2. 30 : de Res.
Cam. 63.

ill.] The Witness of Church History. 213

physical life. The infancy of mankind was under the
Law and the Prophets ; it came to its hot youth under
the Gospel ; now, through the Spirit (i.e. the Spirit
which inspired the new prophets, the Montanist
Spirit, in virtue of which they set the Church of the
Spirit against the Church of the bishops ) it is
realizing the strength of manhood. 1 This passage has
no direct bearing on the claim to possess a substitute
for ordained bishops in inspired prophets, but it dis
poses of the contention that Montanism represented
conservative tendencies in matters of church discipline.
As well, then, might one quote the contemporary
humanitarians as illustrating what had hitherto been
the Church s doctrine about Christ, as the Montanists
to illustrate her doctrine of orders. 2

Now we have come to the end of a long argument, summary.
Starting from the age of Irenaeus, we have traced
downward the stream of church life, and everywhere
we have found the Church recognising the authority
of a ministry, derived by succession from the Apostles,
and consisting of bishops, presbyters, and deacons ;

1 de Virg. Vel. I : " Hac lege fidei manente, cetera iam disciplinae et conver-
sationis adraittunt novitatem correctionis, operante scilicet et proficients
usque in finem gratia Dei. . . . Cum propterea Paracletum miserit Dominus,
ut quoniam humana mediocritas omnia semel capere non poterat, paulatim
dirigeretur et ordinaretur et ad perfectum perduceretur disciplina ab illo
vicario Domini Spiritu sancto. . . . Quae est ergo Paracleti administratio,
nisi haec, quod disciplina dirigitur, quod scripturae revelantur, quod intel-
lectus reformatur, quod ad meliora proficitur ? Nihil sine aetate est, omnia
tempus exspectant. . . . Sic et iustitia (nam idem Deus iustitiae et creaturaei
primo f uit in rudimentis, natura Deum metuens ; dehinc per legem et prophetas
promovit in infantiam ; dehinc per evangelium efferbuit in iuventutem :
nunc per Paracletum componitur in maturitatem. "

- These humanitarians really did make the claim to be the true conser
vatives ; see Euseb. II. E. v. 28. The Little Labyrinth makes the suggestive
rejoinder : " What they said might have been perhaps convincing, if, first
of all, the Holy Scriptures had not contradicted them."

214 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

everywhere we have seen reason to believe that these
ministers were qualified for their high functions by an
ordination given after due election with the laying-on
of the hands of the bishops who were before them, and
only in virtue of such ordination held to possess
the authority and the grace of God requisite for the
ministry they were called to fulfil. It was of course
only gradually that this ministerial principle gained
complete and adequate expression. It was with this
as with church doctrine. In both departments there
is a development in explicitness of conception and in
accuracy and fulness of language. But the principle
held the ground from the first with thorough recogni
tion ; and the evidence of this is that, wherever the
claim of the ministry was challenged, the spirit of the
Church rose to maintain it and those who could not
recognise the authority of their fathers in Christ found
themselves aliens from the brotherhood. The chal
lenge may have come from the side of Montanist
enthusiasm or Novatian separatism ; or it may have
been due to the self-assertion of an individual against
church order, as when Colluthus, who was no bishop,
attempted to ordain a presbyter ; or it may have had
its origin in a collapse of discipline such as led to the
attempt of some deacons, in days of persecution, to
offer the Eucharist ; or it may have been a challenge
in theory rather than in practice, like Aerius denial
of the distinctive dignity of the episcopate. But, in
whatever sense and from whatever quarter the autho
rity of the ministry was challenged, the mind of the
Church spoke out loud in its vindication. For the

in.] The Witness of Church History. 215

ministry was acknowledged, instinctively and univer
sally, as the divinely given stewardship of truth and
grace, as part of the new creation of God; and,
"the things which the Lord instituted through His
Apostles, these," in Athanasius words, " remain hon
ourable and valid." As an institution of Christ
through His Apostles divine, permanent, and neces
sary the threefold ministry made its appearance on
the horizon of our epoch and " the memory of man
ran not to the contrary."

CHAPTER IV.

THE INSTITUTION OF THE APOSTOLATE.

The present HITHERTO we have been occupied in expounding a

position of

m*nt. BU certain set of principles which are involved in the
phrase the apostolic succession of the ministry/ and
in adducing a great body of evidence calculated to
show how completely, and (as far as appears) without
exception, these principles obtained acceptance in the
Church, and governed her action, from the middle of
the second century onwards. It is, in fact, impossible
to exaggerate the intimacy with which the episcopal
succession is bound up with the fixed canon of Scrip
ture and the permanent and stable creed to constitute
what can rightly be called historical Christianity.
There was, indeed, the same tentativeness in the pro
cess by which the formulated nomenclature and (as
some at least may think they have occasion to believe
on reviewing the earlier period) the exact form of
the ministry was arrived at, as appears in the corre
sponding formulation of the creed of the catholic
Church, but in neither case did this development
in language and form involve any change of prin
ciple or belief: and, if we compare the development
of the ministry with the process by which the canon
of Scripture was fixed, we are struck with the fact

CHAP, iv.] The Institution of the Apostolale. 217

that the hesitation, which appears in the latter process
as to what did and what did not fall within the canon,
has no parallel in any hesitation as to what did or
what did not constitute at any particular moment the
ministry in the Church. On this subject there was no
conflict or division of opinion inside the body of the
Church which is brought under our notice. The dis
cussion about Montanism was not (as we have seen)
a discussion as to the rights of prophets, but as to
whether certain people were or were not justified in
claiming the prophetic inspiration.

Hitherto, however, we have not touched the period
which lies behind the middle of the second century.
The reason for this has been that we have such very
fragmentary light on the pace which intervenes
between this date and the point where the Acts of
the Apostles comes to an end. " I have elsewhere,"
says Dr. Salmon, " described the paucity of documents
dating from the age immediately succeeding the apo
stolic, by saying that church history passes through a
tunnel. We have good light where we have the books
of the New Testament to guide us, and good light again
when we come down to the abundant literary remains
of the latter part of the second century ; but there is
an intervening period, here and there faintly illumined
by a few documents giving such scanty and inter
rupted light as may be afforded by the air-holes of a
tunnel. If in our study of the dimly-lighted portion
of the history we wish to distinguish what is certain
from what is doubtful, we may expect to find the
things certain in what can be seen from either of the

218 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

two well-lighted ends. If the same thing is visible on
looking from either end, we can have no doubt of its
existence."
it remains We proceed, then, to examine the beginnings of

to verify the . . . 3

ofchurch 8 the mmis try m other words, first, to obtain an
ory answer to the question whether the postulates of
the later Church are verified by the intention of Jesus
Christ as recorded in the Gospels : secondly, to inter
rogate the history of the apostolic Church as recorded
in the Epistles and in the Acts of the Apostles, and
draw out the witness which this record affords on the
earliest development of the Christian ministry : lastly,
to scrutinize the documents which shed a certain
amount of light on the subapostolic period, and see
whether they bear out the theory of the apostolic
succession, and whether, further, they supply the
links which enable us to form an adequate idea of the
method by which the ministry of the apostolic days
passed into the ministry of the better known period
of church history. 2

The first task before us is to investigate the inten-

1 Expositor, July 1887, P- 3 f-

2 Speaking of The Church and the Ministry, a pamphlet in review of his
Bampton Lectures, Dr. Hatch says of the author : " He begins by asserting
that he accepts the author s method, and that he wishes only to answer the
question which the author proposed, viz. What does the existing evidence
teach as to the early history of ecclesiastical organization ? but he silently,
and perhaps unconsciously, devotes the rest of his review to the consideration
of a very different question, viz. How far can the existing evidence be inter
preted on the Augustinian theory?" (B.L. pref. to 2nd ed. p. xiii). My
contention is that the evidence at certain periods teaches positively, that is
to say, the evidence collected in the last chapter and portions of the evidence
now to be produced ; but in the subapostolic period it is often necessary,
on account of the deficiency of positive evidence, to be content with finding
that what there is is consistent with the positive position, which the earlier
and later evidence so strongly suggests as almost to force it upon us.

IV.] The Institution of the Apostolate. 219

tion of Christ. It has been already pointed out that j
the method of Christ was to withdraw from the many
upon the few. While He healed widely and freely all
who had faith to be healed/ He taught those only
(except by the way) in whom He discerned the higher
sort of faith which would make them disciples. These
He trained to become a firm consolidated body, rooted
and grounded in faith in Himself, that they might
be the nucleus of His universal Church. Even within
the body of these disciples there were inner and outer
circles : there were the twelve and also they that
were with them/ * the women who ministered to them
and the seventy who shared at a certain stage the
apostolic commission. 2 Confining our attention now
to the inner circle, with whom Christ chiefly concerned The Gospels

* suggest the

Himself, we ask ourselves : Was His training of the SSS&

twelve the training merely of typical disciples ? or was

1 St. Luke xxiv. 33 ; cf. St. Mark iv. 10 : oZ Trepi avrbv ffi/v rots 3c65e/ca.

2 The seventy (or seventy-two according to another reading) of St. Luke
x. I share the earliest apostolic commission : they are sent forth (St. Luke
x. 3 : 25oi&gt; dTroorAXw upas, cf. ix. 2), with authority over the powers of Satan
(x. 17, 19, cf. ix. i), as representatives of the kingdom, endowed with its peace
and having power to communicate it (x. 9, cf. ix. 2, and observe x. 6 : tirava-
iravffeTai TT avrbv 7] eiprjvi) vfj-Civ ei 8 ^7776, e&lt;f&gt; v/j.as dpa/cd/i^et), and as represen
tatives of Christ (x. 16 : 6 aKOuuv V/JLUV 4/j.ou d/cotfet, K.T.\.). The number seventy
or seventy-two is supposed to have reference to the seventy-two heads of the
Sanhedrin ; or to the seventy-two tribes of mankind (see Godet in loc. and
Clem. Recog. ii. 42) ; or, much more naturally, to the seventy elders endued
with the spirit of prophecy (Num. xi. 16-30). Thus the later Church saw
here the institution of the presbyterate by our Lord ; see Clem. Ep. Petri i
and Jerome Ep. Ixxviii ad Fabiol. mans. 6. (The seventy elders, however,
were also regarded as the prototype of the chorepiscopi. ) In some traditions
these seventy are reckoned apostles. Thus the Syriac Teaching of the Apostles
reckons seventy-two apostles as originating the ordination to the priest
hood, " and a late Arab writer, historian of the Coptic Church, who may draw
on an earlier tradition, speaks of the apostles as seventy, besides the twelve ;
see refs. p. 131, n. 1 This suggests the apostles and prophets of the
Didache. It is important that those who accept the historical character of
St. Luke s Gospel should recollect that there must have been in the apostolic

220 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

it, over and above this, the training of ministers, of
officers in His kingdom ? This latter seems undoubtedly
the true answer. He called unto Him whom He
Himself would, . . . and He appointed twelve that
they might be with Him, and that He might send
them forth to preach and to have authority to cast
out devils. He called His disciples and He chose
from them twelve, whom also He named apostles. 1
These, as appears from His instructions to them,
are to be His authorized representatives in the
ministry of mercy and judgment. 2 " Evidently," says
Mr. Maurice, " He never separates the thought of
training them in their office from that of performing
His own. As evidently He is training them to an
office ; He is not teaching them to be great saints, to
keep up a high tone of personal holiness as if that
were the end of their lives." Thus, he adds, " if we
called the four Gospels the Institution of a Christian
Ministry/ we might not go very far wrong or lose
as one sight of many of their essential qualities." 3 Further,

element in

... ...

the church. ^ s apostolic ministry which Christ is seen to be
training, though at times it seems to constitute almost
the whole of that definite body which is being prepared

Church a number of these evangelists, who had received our Lord s com
mission, and whom we certainly cannot identify with presbyters whose
office was local.

1 St. Mark iii. 13, 14 ; St. Luke vi. 13.

- The personal and official position of the twelve appears clearly in St.
Matt, x, St. John vi. 67-70, St. Luke xxii. 29, 30 ; cf. St. Matt. iv. 19.
They are called the disciples par excellence (in e.g. St. Mark x. 23-46, St.
John xviii. i) ; so they mediated between Christ and the crowd in the feed
ing of the five thousand (St. Luke ix. 10-17), and at other times (St. Matt.
xv. 32-39, St. John xii. 20-22) ; while for their position after the resurrec
tion cf. St. Luke xxiv. 9, 33.

8 Kingdom of Christ ii. p. 118 [3d ed.].

iv. 3 The Institution of the Apostolate, 221

to be the Church, is intended to be what in history
it became not the whole Church, but only one
element in it. 1 This is implied in a striking manner
and there is no doubt that what a teacher implies
often produces as striking an effect upon the mind as
what he explicitly teaches in the parable in which
Christ gives St. Peter a picture of the divine house
hold which He is intending to establish. He had been
uttering some warnings and encouragements to His
disciples, partly in the form of parables, with reference
to the spirit of detachment and its reward, and St.
Peter questions Him whether He is speaking to them
(the twelve) only or to all. Christ answers with
another question : " Who is that faithful and wise
steward whom his Lord shall set over his household
of servants, to give them their portion of meat
in due season ? Blessed is that servant whom
his Lord, when he cometh, shall find so doing." :
Here is a picture of the household of the Church
which Christ is intending to organize, and it is
represented with a permanent distinction, enduring
till the Lord come again, the distinction between

1 Such a passage as St. Matt, xxiii. 8, referred to by Dr. Hatch B. L. p.
121, does not imply that our Lord condemned all grades and distinctions in
His Church, any more than it implies a condemnation of all grades and
distinctions in the State, or than St. Luke xiv. 26 implies a condemnation of
all human affections, or St. Luke vi. 20, 24 of all wealth, or St. John x. 8 of
all the O. T. prophets. In all these passages there is a mode of speech,
which Christ often used, and of which we have to take account. He con
demns all dignities which interfere with His unique mastership, not such as
represent it, whether in Church or State ; all wealth held as a possession or
right instead of as a trust, not all wealth absolutely ; all love which inter
feres with His divine jealousy, not domestic love in its right place ;
precursors who came with His claim, not those who came as His heralds.

2 St. Luke xii. 41-43. The future xaraa-r^o-ei is to be noticed ; it is like
the futures oi/coSo/u/jtrw, Stixrw, in St. Matt. xvi. 18, 19.

222 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

the ordinary servants and the steward who distributes
the bread of life. Thus the impression is left on us
that in the Christian household there is to be, by
distinction from the ordinary members, a stewardship,
instituted by the Master and enduring till the end. 1
TMsim- This impression, derived from a general con-

pression is

confirmed s id era tion of Christ s dealings with His Apostles, is
deepened by the study of special commissions given
to them.

a) The com- (i) We have the commission promised to St. Peter. 2

mission to x *

st. Peter, Q nr ^ me ets St. Peter s confession of His Messiahship
or Divine Sonship with a special benediction. He
pronounces him " Peter," the man of rock, and declares
that on this rock Jle will build His Church. So far
He is dealing with the human character of St. Peter.
There is in His language, as it has been admirably
explained, 3 a sense of relief, the relief that comes of
perceiving in St. Peter s deliberate acceptance of His
divine claim a solid basis on which His spiritual
fabric may be reared, or at least a basis capable of
being solidified by discipline and experience till it

1 M. Godet s comment on this parable is as follows (S. Luc. ii. p. 138) :
"This utterance seems to imply that the apostolate will perpetuate itself
till Christ s return ; and in fact it is an ii-resistible conclusion from the
figure employed, that there will remain to the end, in the Church, a ministry
of the word established by Christ. The Apostles perceived this so clearly
that, when they left the world, they were at pains to establish a ministry of
the word to take their place in the Church. This ministry was a continua
tion of their own, if not in its completeness, at any rate in one of its most
indispensable functions that of which Jesus speaks in this parable the
distribution of spiritual nourishment to the flock. . . . The theory which
makes the pastorate emanate from the Church as its representative is
not scriptural. This commission is rather an emanation from the apo
stolate, and therefore mediately an institution of Jesus Himself."

- St. Matt. xvi. 18, 19.

3 Holland Creed and Character p. 49.

iv.] The Institution of the Apostolate. 223

become a foundation stone on which the Church may
rest. The rock then, of which Christ speaks, is the rock
of a human character confessing the divine claim. It is
as men, as human characters, that the twelve Apostles
are the twelve foundation stones of the New Jerusa
lem. And, if the promise to St. Peter which follows
must be interpreted of an official position which is to
be given to him in the Church, we have here at
starting an emphatic intimation that official dignity
in the Church is meant to rest on a basis of moral
fitness. 1 But does Christ pass in His promise to St.
Peter from words which concern his moral character
to words which imply his spiritual office ? He cer
tainly does. He promises that He will give him
" the keys of the kingdom of heaven," or of the
Church, and this is in other words promising to make
him the official steward of the divine household.
When Shebna was substituted for Eliakim in the
treasurership or stewardship of the house of David,
this was the word of the Lord : 2 " I will call my servant
Eliakim the son of Hilkiah : and I will clothe him
with thy robe, and strengthen him with thy girdle,
and I will commit thy government into his hand.
. . . And the key of the house of David will I lay
upon his shoulder ; so he shall open, and none shall
shut ; and he shall shut, and none shall open." It is

1 Christ, however, in choosing Judas whom he knew from the first
among the twelve, showed that He distinguished between moral worth and
spiritual authority, and this is also implied in His words about the Jewish
authorities (St. Matt, xxiii. 2, 3) : " the scribes and the Pharisees sit in Moses
seat : all therefore whatsoever they bid you observe, that observe and do,
but do not ye after their works. "

Isai. xxii. 20 22, cf. Moberly Great Forty Day.-- pp. 127-130.

224 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

promised, then, that St. Peter shall be made the
steward of the divine household, 1 and this carries
with it an authority to bind or loose, that is to
prohibit or permit in a word, to give legislative
decisions with that heavenly sanction and authority
which is the proper endowment of the kingdom of
heaven. 2
as (&lt;o the Two questions maybe raised with reference to this

representa-

tive apostie, p rom ise. What, it may be asked first, is St. Peter s
relation in respect of this official position to the other
Apostles ? The answer seems to be that the official
position is here not given but promised, and that the
commissions actually given after the resurrection,
the commissions which are seen in action in the
apostolic history, are given to the whole apostolic
body, and acted upon by all alike with the same
authority though St. Peter is their leader. 3 A

1 Of course subordinately to Christ (Rev. iii. 7).

2 See Edersheim Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah ii. pp. 81-85.
Binding or loosing referred simply to the prohibition or else permission of
things or acts. It was one of the powers claimed by the Rabbis. But in
relation to persons it implies a judicial, administrative power.

3 St. Cyprian s opinion in this sense has been already quoted. It
coincides with Origen s in the East (in loc.) and represents in fact the
general mind of the early Church. So Theophylact (in loc.) : "They who
have obtained the grace of the episcopate as Peter had (oi Kara fltrpov TV)S
finffKoiriKfjs agiuOevTes xdpiTos) have authority to remit and bind. For though
the I will give thee was spoken to Peter alone, yet the gift has been given to
all the Apostles. When ? When He said whosesoever sins ye remit, they
are remitted. For this I will give indicates a future time the time, that
is, after the resurrection. " Perhaps the strongest evidence of the truth of this
view is the absence of any special claim made by, or for, St. Peter in the
Acts or Epistles, especially in St. Peter s own first Epistle, where (v. I, 2)
his pastoral charge (St. John xxi. 15-17) is identified with that of the elders ;
and on the other hand St. Paul s strenuous claim to be, as an apostle,
dependent on none but Christ and in no respect inferior to the others ; see
Gal. i. n, 12, ii. i-io. This of course admits of a primacy being assigned to
St. Peter so that oi trepl llerpov can be the name for all of them, as in the
conclusion of St. Mark s Gospel in L (given in Alford, and Westcott and

IV.] The Institution of the Apostolate. 225

question may be raised secondly as to St. Peter s and (&) ad -

ministrative

relation to the whole Christian community : for on church / the
another occasion, when Jesus Christ was speaking of
the duty, under which His disciples might lie from
time to time, of bringing one of their brethren under
the censure of the Church, He attributes to the
Church as a whole that authority to bind and loose
which in its application to individuals is of course a
judicial authority to which He declares the heavenly
or supernatural sanction to attach. 1 The answer to
this question has already been indicated when the
general subject of the relation of the ministry to the
Church was under discussion. The supernatural

Hort). I deal briefly with this matter because this book is meant to be
simply a vindication of the catholic idea of the ministry and not to go into
questions which arise within the area where this finds acceptance. Tertul-
lian s view of the meaning of the passage now in question, referred to 011
p. 210, is essentially the view of a Montanist.

1 St. Matt, xviii. 15-18. The declaration is still future, it is a promise.
Afterwards follows the promise which attaches to the prayer of even two
disciples (ver. 19), based on the fact that Christ s presence is with even so small
a number as two or three if they are gathered together in His Name
(ver. 20 : that is, in the knowledge of Him and in accordance with His will).
This last declaration applies primarily to the promise which attaches to
united prayer, for the two or three refers back to the if two of you
shall agree to ask. It may however also refer to the promise of judicial
authority, and would mean that this authority is not dependent on numbers,
but can be enforced by even two or three in accordance with His will, so that
they can speak with the voice of the Church and to disobey them would be
to refuse to hear the Church : cf. among the Pirqe Alioih of Dr. Taylor
p. 60 f. "When ten sit and are occupied in words of Thorah the Shekinah is
among them, for it is said, God standeth in the congregation of the mighty.
. . . And whence [is it proved of] even three ? Because it is said . . . and
hath founded his troop in the earth. And whence even two ? Because it
is said, Then they that feared the Lord spake often one to another." Cf.
note 15 : " Every ten men that are assembled in the synagogue, the Shekinah
is with them, for it is said, God standeth in the edah, etc. And whence
even three that judge, because it is said, He judges among gods, etc.," i.e.
the divine presence is amongst even three who constitute a beth din, or house
of judgment, to administer justice. So Christ may have meant that His
presence is with the smallest court of justice which represents the Church.
Cf. Expositor, March 1887, p. 229.

226 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

authority does inhere in the Church as a whole,
but the Church has (not by her own but by Christ s
authority) executive officers, and it is through them
that her judicial power is put into effect. Christ
makes two promises : He promises judicial authority
to the Church, and He promises to make St. Peter a
steward, an administrative officer in the Church, with
special reference to this power, and these two promises
are correlative, not contradictory.
\-2) The com- (2) Christ s dealings in the last days of His minis-

:inssion to x

apostolic try are wholly concentrated upon the twelve. With
the resume- them alone He celebrates the Last Supper and insti-

lion,

tutes the memorial of His death, which He commits
to them to be perpetuated in the Church 1 ; to them

1 The Eucharist was certainly regarded from the first in the Church as a
sacrifice. "The conception of the whole action of the Last Supper as a
sacrificial action (Opferhandlung) is found clearly in the Didache (c. xiv), in
Ignatius, and before all in Justin (Apol. i. 65 f.). But Clement of Rome also
expresses it when he (cc. 40-44) draws a parallel between the bishops and
deacons and the O. T. priests and Levites, and indicates the Trpo&lt;r(j&gt;tpeii&gt; TO,
5&lt;2/5a as their special function " (Harnack Dogmengesch. i. 152 n. 1 ). See
Didache xiv : Kara Kvpt.aK.rfv d KVpiov ffvvaxQtvTts /cAdVare aprov /cat evxapiaTr/-
ffare Trpo(Tf^ofjLO\oyri(rd/j.evoi TO, TrapaTrrti/xara v/jiwv, SITUS K0.6a.pat. ij Bvcria v/jiui&gt;
f) . . . ai/rrj yap etrnv i] pr/de iffa VTTO KVpiov Et&gt; iravrl Tbirui Kal XP^V Trpoefopeiv fJioi
ffvfflav Kadapdv. Justin Dial. c. Tryph. 41 : Kal rj TTJS &lt;7e/u5aXews irpoa-Qopd,
&lt;3 avSpes, ZXeyov, r/ virtp T&V Kadapi^o/J.^vuv diro rrjs X^TT/SOS irpocr&lt;f&gt;{pfffOai
jrapaSodeiffa, TVTTOS Tjv TOV &prov rrjs evxipiffTias, 6v els dvdfj.vrj&lt;riv TOV irddovs,
o5 i-Tra,0ev inrep T&V Ka0aipo/J,4vuv rds if/vx&S dTrb Tracys irovqpias dvdpuiruv,
Itjffous X/)tcn-6s 6 Kijpios rifj.lv iraptduice iroietv the offering, he explains, is to
be made in thanksgiving for the blessings of creation and redemption
through Christ s death ; he then quotes the usual passage from Malachi
i. II and continues : irepl 8 rdv kv iravrl rbirq v&lt;p rj^iav rdiv fdvwv
itpoa(f&gt;fpo^vti)v at/rip OvaiCiv, rovreari. TOV dprov TTJS evxapiffrias Kal TOU irorrjpiov
ofjioius rijs evxapiffTias, 7rpo\yfi r&re eliruv Kal TO 6vofJ.a ai/roD Bo^d^fiv TJ/JLCLS v/j.as
d J3ep7)\ovt&gt;. Irenaeus iv. 17. 5 : " Sed et suis discipulis dans consilium
primitias Deo offerre ex suis creaturis . . . eum qui ex creatura panis est,
accepit et gratias egit, dicens : Hoc est meum corpus. Et calicem similiter,
qui est ex ea creatura quae est secundum nos, suum sanguinem confessus est,
et novi testamenti novam docuit oblationem quam ecclcsia ab apostolis
accipiens in universe mundo offert Deo."

IV.] The Institution of the Apostolate. 227

He addresses the last discourses, which are calculated
to prepare them in character and intelligence for the
withdrawal of His visible presence and the substi
tution for it of that new and higher mode of inward
presence by His Spirit, which He should give to His
Church when He was glorified. In all this Christ is
dealing with them no less as apostles than as

It would not be in place here to discuss at length the sense in which the
early Church believed the Eucharist to be a sacrifice. Briefly however it is
in place to remark that

( 1 ) The whole language of the earliest Church seems most easily interpreted,
if we suppose that the bread and wine, chosen out of the general offerings
of the congregation and presented before God as a memorial of Christ s
sacrifice with accompanying prayers, were regarded as constituting the
thank-offering (Eucharist) or oblations (gifts) of the Church and as expres
sive of that relation of sonship and purity and freedom of approach to
God, which belonged to the Church in virtue of her redemption, as being the
high -priestly race. These gifts were then offered for the consecration
of the Holy Spirit. They became " no longer common bread but Eucharist,
made up of two substances, an earthly and an heavenly " : they became to
the Church the Body and Blood of Christ. This response of God to the
Church s invocation, this mingling of heavenly and earthly things, gave to
the Church s sacrifice a new power and brought it into essential union with
the One Sacrifice, with Jesus, the mediator of the new covenant, and
with the blood of sprinkling. But for this, the Church s sacrifice would
have been most Judaic in character.

(2) The consent of the Church in regarding the Eucharist as a sacrifice
appears to fix the meaning of Christ s words of institution. In this con
nection it requires to be observed (a) That Justin Martyr interprets Trotew
as = to offer (Dial. c. Tryph. 41, just quoted, and 70), and this use of the
word is common in the LXX without any qualification (Willis Sacrificial
Aspect of the Eucharist p. 49 f.). It enables us in St. Luke xxii. 19, 20,
I Cor. xi. 24, 25 to give, as is natural, the same meaning to TOVTO in both
corresponding clauses, TOVTO fffnv . . . TOVTO Troteire : and in I Cor. xi. 25
also to make TOVTO the accusative, as the sentence requires, to both verbs,
71-oten-e and irivrjTe. (b) That there is an obvious reference to the words of
Moses in Exod. xxiv. 8, I5ov TO al/j.a TTJS 5ia.diJK-rjs, and that agreeably with
this reference the word {K-xvw6/j.et&gt;ov (Matt., Mark, Luke), expresses prob
ably not the shedding of Christ s blood in death, but the sacrificial pouring
out of it. See Kendall Theol. of the Hebr. Chr. p. 123 f., and cf. Exod.
xxix. 12, Lev. iv. 7, 19, 25, 30, 34, viii. 15, ix. 9, etc., in LXX. (c) That
dvd/j,i T]&lt;ns in the 0. T. means a memorial before God, as is the case wherever
it is used (Willis I.e. p. 17 f.) ; but see Pieb. x. 3 and the reference in the
liturgies: Me/xcTj^/ ot ovv &v oC r//j.as virf utivev K.T.\. (Hammond Anc. Lit.
pp. 17, 42).

228 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

representative disciples. After His resurrection He
does not cease to deal with them in the latter capa
city, but it would appear that the commissions, which
in the great forty days were no longer promised
but given, were addressed to them in their official
character and to them alone. It would appear to
be undeniable, if it had not been so often denied,
that these commissions, taken together, are commis
sions given to an abiding cqiostolate, destined to be
permanent till the end of the world. The eleven
nsinst. disciples are expressly mentioned as the subjects of

Matthew. . .

the commission recorded by St. Matthew as given on
the mountain where Jesus had appointed them, which
invested them with His royal power to go and make
disciples of all the nations, baptizing them into the
threefold Name and teaching them to observe all His
precepts, and which was accompanied by the promise
of His presence with them all the days till the com-
st. Mart, pletion of the age. 1 The parallel account of the com
mission of Christ given in the verses which conclude
St. Mark s Gospel describes it as given to the eleven. 2
In St. Luke s narrative, where in connection with
Christ s appearance on the evening of His resurrection
mention is made of the disciples and those who were
with them, it is noticeable that, though there is a
record of encouragement and enlightenment and pro-

1 St. Matt, xxviii. i6f. It is urged that, as there were some who doubted,
so others must have been present beside the Apostles. I should have thought
that, as a matter of Greek, ol d eSicrraffav must express a subdivision of
the eleven, who are the subject of the whole sentence. See Meyer in loc.
At any rate they are the only people mentioned in connection with the com
mission given.

- St. Mark xvi. 14-18.

iv.] The Institution of the Apostolate. 229

mise, there is no record of a ministerial commission. 1
There was however such a commission, given appar- and st John
ently on this occasion, which is recorded by St. John. 2
It is there described as given to the disciples ; but
this expression at the end of St. John s Gospel com
monly refers to the twelve, who are the subjects of
His typical training. 3 The words of the commission,
moreover, and the analogy of that recorded in St.
Matthew and St. Mark, seem to make it natural to
conclude that, though others may have been present, it
was addressed to the Apostles only. 4 " As My Father

1 St. Luke xxiv. 33 f. but cf. Acts i. 1-5.

2 St. John xx. 19-23.

3 So Dr. Westcott says that by the disciples (in c. xxi. i) is meant
" in all probability the Apostles, the disciples in the narrower sense, though
the twelve were not all assembled on this occasion, but at most seven
only. " This use of the word disciples may be illustrated by a passage
closely parallel to that under discussion. Our Lord s prayer in St. John xvii
is spoken amongst the disciples (xvi. 29, xviii. i). Yet by this is meant
the twelve (St. Matt. xxvi. 20) : thus He prays for them as those whom
the Father has given Him (xvii. 6, 9, n) and whom He guarded, so that
not one of them perished but the son of perdition (ver. 12), and whom
He has sent into the world, as the Father sent Him into the world (ver.
18). These are clearly the definite body, the twelve ; and the expression As
thou didst send me, so sent I them (ver. 18) interprets that in xx. 21.

4 I am of course aware that I have Dr. Westcott against me (Revel, of the
Risen Lord pp. 81-83 and Comm. in loc.), as well as many others. On the
other hand I am following M. Godet, one of the best recent commentators on
St. John ; and the arguments which seem to me of determining force in the
matter are

(1) The parallel commissions to the eleven in St. Matt, and St. Mark.

(2) The obvious reference to the apostolate in the words of St. John xx.
21 ; cf. xvii. 1 8. (The use of ir^iru in the former case hardly weakens the
force of this. )

(3) The habitual reference of the disciples at the end of St. John s Gospel
to the Apostles.

(4) The implication of the Acts (as bearing on all the commissions taken
together) ; if the Acts is accepted as historical, undoubtedly the Apostles
must have received a commission distinct from the Church as a whole to
account for their position.

On the other hand (a) the presence of those with them does not
seem to be, in this case, more than in the case of any later ministerial
commissions, an argument against the limitation to the Apostles ; (b) the

230 Christian Ministry. [CHAP.

hath sent Me," Christ said, " even so send I you,"
and when He had said this, He breathed on them and
said : " Receive ye holy spirit : l whosesoever sins ye
remit, they are remitted unto them ; whosesoever sins
ye retain, they are retained." Here the opening words
contain a manifest reference to the apostolate, and
the subsequent act of breathing, with the words ac
companying, seems to be the actual bestowal in power
and spirit of those keys of the kingdom which
Christ had formerly promised to the chief of the
Apostles. What is bestowed is a judicial power with
a supernatural sanction the power, in pursuance of
Christ s redemptive mission, to admit men into the
new covenant of absolution and to exclude them from
it according to considerations of their moral fitness.
(3) The com- (3) If the threefold pastoral commission to St. Peter 2

mission

represents, as seems most probable, simply a personal
restoration of St. Peter to the position of trust which
his threefold denial might be supposed to have lost
him, then we shall only be justified in concluding
from our Lord s words on that occasion that the
pastoral care, to govern and to feed, was supposed
to be involved in the apostolic commission. 8
conclusion It may very well be maintained that it would be
institution impossible to draw certain conclusions on the matter

of the A

as to Christ s
institutio
of the
Apostles.

absence of St. Thomas is no hindrance to the commission having been
given to the Apostles, as such. The narratives are fragmentary, and we
cannot say but that St. Thomas may have had his