Chapter III: Front Matter (3)

The _authority_ attaching to apostles was essentially spiritual in character and in the conditions of its exercise. Anything like autocracy among his followers was alien to Jesus's own teaching (Matt, xxiii. 6-11). All Christians were "brethren," and the basis of pre-eminence among them was relative ability for service. But the personal relation of the original Palestinian apostles to Jesus himself as Master gave them a unique fitness as authorized witnesses, from which flowed naturally, by sheer spiritual influence, such special forms of authority as they came gradually to exercise in the early Church. "There is no trace in Scripture of a formal commission of authority for government from Christ Himself" (Hort, _Chr. Eccl._ p. 84) given to apostles, save as representing the brethren in their collective action. Even the "resolutions" ([Greek: dogmata]) of the Jerusalem conference were not set forth by the apostles present simply in their own name, nor as _ipso facto_ binding on the conscience of the Antiochene Church. They expressed "a claim to deference rather than a right to be obeyed" (Hort, _op. cit._ 81-85). Such was the kind of authority attaching to apostles, whether collectively or individually. It was not a fixed notion, but varied in quantity and quality with the growing maturity of converts. This is how Paul, from whom we gather most on the point, conceives the matter. The exercise of his spiritual authority is not absolute, lest he "lord it over their faith"; consent of conscience or of "faith" is ever requisite (2 Cor. i. 24; cf. Rom. xiv. 23). But the principle was elastic in application, and would take more patriarchal forms in Palestine than in the Greek world. The case was essentially the same as on the various mission-fields to-day, where the position of the "missionary" is at first one of great spiritual initiative and authority, limited only by his own sense of the fitness of things, in the light of local usages. So the notion of formal or constitutional authority attaching to the apostolate, in its various senses, is an anachronism for the apostolic age. The tendency, however, was for their authority to be conceived more and more on formal lines, and, particularly after their deaths, as absolute.

The authority attaching to apostles as writers, which led gradually to the formation of a New Testament Canon--"the Apostles" side by side with "the Books" of the Old Testament (so 2 Clement xiv., c. A.D. 120-140)--is a subject by itself (see BIBLE).

This change of conception helped to further the notion of a certain devolution of apostolic powers to successors constituted by act of ordination. The earliest idea of an _apostolical succession_ meant simply the re-emergence in others of the apostolic spirit of missionary enthusiasm. "The first rank in the succession of the apostles" consisted of men eminent as disciples of theirs, and so fitted to continue their labours (Euseb. iii. 37); and even under Commodus (A.D. 180-193) there were "evangelists of the word" possessed of "inspired zeal to emulate apostles" (v. 10). Such were perhaps the "apostles" of the _Didache_. Of the notion of apostolic succession in ministerial grace conferred by ordination, there is little or no trace before Irenaeus. The famous passage in Clement of Rome (xliv. 2) refers simply to the succession of one set of men to another in an office of apostolic institution. The grace that makes Polycarp "an apostolic and prophetic teacher" (_Mart. Polyc._ 16) is peculiar to him personally. But Irenaeus holds, apparently on _a priori_ grounds, that "elders" who stand in orderly succession to the apostolic founders of the true tradition in the churches, have, "along with the succession of oversight," also an "assured gift of (insight into) truth" by the Father's good pleasure ("cum episcopatus successione charisma veritatis certum secundum placitum Patris acceperunt"), in contrast to heretics who wilfully stand outside this approved line of transmission (_adv. Haer._ iv. 26. 2). So far, indeed, the succession is not limited to the monarchical episcopate as distinct from the presbyteral order to which it belonged (cf. "presbyterii ordo, principalis consessio" in the same context, and see iii. 14. 2), though the bishops of apostolic churches, as capable of being traced individually (iii. 3. 1), are specially appealed to as witnesses (cf. iv. 33. 8, v. 19. 2)--as earlier by Hegesippus (Euseb. iv. 22). Nor is there mention of sacerdotal grace attaching to the succession in apostolic truth.[4] But once the idea of supernatural grace going along with office as such (of which we have already a trace in the Ignatian bishop, though without the notion of actual apostolic succession) arose in connexion with _successio ab apostolis_, the full development of the doctrine was but a matter of time.[5]

LITERATURE.--In England the modern treatment of the subject dates from
J.B. Lightfoot's dissertation in his _Commentary on Galatians_, to
which Dr F.J.A. Hort's _The Christian Ecclesia_ added elements of
value; see also T.M. Lindsay, _The Church and the Ministry_, and
articles in Hastings' _Dictionary of the Bible_ and the _Ency.
Biblica_; A. Harnack, _Die Lehre der Apostel_, pp. 93 ff., and
_Dogmengeschichte_ (3rd ed.), i. 153 ff.; E. Haupt, _Zum Verstandnis
d. Apostolats in NT._ (Halle, 1896); and especially H. Monnier, _La
Notion de l'apostolat, des origines a Irenee_ (Paris, 1903). The later
legends and their sources are examined by T. Schermann, _Propheten-
und Apostellegenden_ (Leipzig, 1907). (J. V. B.)

FOOTNOTES:

[1] By analogy, that is; for the wider sense of "apostle" in the
Apostolic age need not be identical with a sub-apostolic use of the
term (see below, 4 _fin_.).

[2] The tendency is already visible in the Lucan writings. An
anologous process is seen in the use of "disciple," applicable in the
apostolic age to Christians at large, but in the course of the
sub-apostolic age restricted to personal "disciples of the Lord" or
to martyrs (Papias in Eus. iii. 39, cf. Ignatius, _Ad Eph._ i. 2).

[3] In the Edessene legend of Abgar, in Eus. i. 12, we read that
"Judas, who is also Thomas, sent Thaddaeus as apostle--one of the
Seventy," where simply an authoritative envoy of Jesus seems
intended. For traces of the wider sense of "apostle" in Gnostic,
Marcionite and Montanist circles, see Monnier (as below).

[4] The above is substantially the view taken by J.B. Lightfoot in
his essay on "The Christian Ministry" (_Comm. on Philippians_, 6th
ed., pp. 239, 252 f.), and by T.M. Lindsay, _The Church and the
Ministry_ (1902), pp. 224-228, 278 ff. Even C. Gore, _The Church and
the Ministry_ (1889), pp. 119 ff., while inferring a sacerdotal
element in Irenaeus's conception of the episcopate, says: "But it is
mainly as preserving the catholic traditions that Irenaeus regards
the apostolic succession" (p. 120).

[5] See Lightfoot's essay for Cyprian's contribution, as also for
that of the Clementines, which fix on the twofold position of James
at Jerusalem, as apostle and bishop, as bearing on apostolic
succession in the episcopate.

APOSTLE SPOONS, a set of spoons, usually of silver or silver gilt, with the handles terminating in figures of the apostles, each bearing their distinctive emblem. They were common baptismal gifts during the 15th and 16th centuries, but were dying out by 1666. Often single spoons were given, bearing the figure of the patron or name saint of the child. Sets of the twelve apostles are not common, and complete sets of thirteen, with the figure of our Lord on a larger spoon, are still rarer. The Goldsmiths' Company in London has one such set, all by the same maker and bearing the hall-mark of 1626, and a set of thirteen was sold at Christie's in 1904 for L4900.

See William Hone, _The Everyday Book_ and _Table Book_ (1831); and
W.J. Cripps, _Old English Plate_ (9th ed., 1906).

APOSTOLICAL CONSTITUTIONS ([Greek: Diatagai] _or_ [Greek: Diataxeis ton agion apostolon dia Klaementos tou Rhomaion episkopou te kai politou. Katholikae didaskalia]), a collection of ecclesiastical regulations in eight books, the last of which concludes with the eighty-five _Canons of the Holy Apostles_. By their title the Constitutions profess to have been drawn up by the apostles, and to have been transmitted to the Church by Clement of Rome; sometimes the alleged authors are represented as speaking jointly, sometimes singly. From the first they have been very variously estimated; the _Canons_, as a rule, more highly than the rest of the work. For example, the Trullan Council of Constantinople (_quini-sextum_), A.D. 692, accepts the Canons as genuine by its second canon, but rejects the Constitutions on the ground that spurious matter had been introduced into them by heretics; and whilst the former were henceforward used freely in the East, only a few portions of the latter found their way into the Greek and oriental law-books. Again, Dionysius Exiguus (c. A.D. 500) translated fifty of the Canons into Latin,[1] although under the title _Canones qui dicuntur Apostolorum_, and thus they passed into other Western collections; whilst the Constitutions as a whole remained unknown in the West until they were published in 1563 by the Jesuit Turrianus. At first received with enthusiasm, their authenticity soon came to be impugned; and their true significance was largely lost sight of as it began to be realized that they were not what they claimed to be. Vain attempts were still made to rehabilitate them, and they were, in general, more highly estimated in England than elsewhere. The most extravagant estimate of all was that of Whiston, who calls them "the most sacred standard of Christianity, equal in authority to the Gospels themselves, and superior in authority to the epistles of single apostles, some parts of them being our Saviour's own original laws delivered to the apostles, and the other parts the public acts of the apostles" (Historical preface to _Primitive Christianity Revived_, pp. 85-86). Others, however, realized their composite character from the first, and by degrees some of the component documents became known. Bishop Pearson was able to say that "the eight books of the Apostolic Constitutions have been after Epiphanius's time compiled and patched together out of the _didascaliae_ or doctrines which went under the names of the holy apostles and their disciples or successors" (_Vind. Ign._ i. cap. 5); whilst a greater scholar still, Archbishop Usher, had already gone much further, and concluded, forestalling the results of modern critical methods, that their compiler was none other than the compiler of the spurious Ignatian epistles (_Epp. Polyc. et Ign._ p. lxiii. f., Oxon. 1644). The Apostolical Constitutions, then, are spurious, and they are one of a long series of documents of like character. But we have not really gauged their significance by saying that they are spurious. They are the last stage and climax of a gradual process of compilation and crystallization, so to speak, of unwritten church custom; and a short account of this process will show their real importance and value.

Origin and real nature.

These documents are the outcome of a tendency which is found in every society, religious or secular, at some point in its history. The society begins by living in accordance with its fundamental principles. By degrees these translate themselves into appropriate action. Difficulties are faced and solved as they arise; and when similar circumstances recur they will tend to be met in the same way. Thus there grows up by degrees a body of what may be called customary law. Plainly, there is no particular point of time at which this customary law can be said to have begun. To all appearance it is there from the first in solution and gradually crystallizes out; and yet it is being continually modified as time goes on. Moreover, the time comes when the attempt is made, either by private individuals or by the society itself, to put this "customary law" into writing. Now when this is done, two tendencies will at once show themselves. (a) This "customary law" will at once become more definite: the very fact of putting it into writing will involve an effort after logical completeness. There will be a tendency on the part of the writer to fill up gaps; to state local customs as if they obtained universally; to introduce his personal equation, and to add to that which is the custom that which, in his opinion, _ought_ to be. (b) There will be a strong tendency to fortify that which has been written with great names, especially in days when there is no very clear notion of literary property. This is done, not always with any deliberate consciousness of fraud (although it must be clearly recognized that truth is not one of the "natural virtues," and that the sense of the obligations of truthfulness was far from strong), but rather to emphasize the importance of what was written, and the fact that it was no new invention of the writer's. In a non-literary age fame gathers about great names; and that which, _ex hypothesi_, has gone on since the beginning of things is naturally attributed to the founders of the society. Then come interpolations to make this ascription more probable, and the prefixing of a title, then or subsequently, which states it as a fact. This is precisely the way in which the Apostolical Constitutions and other kindred documents have come into being. They are attempts, made in various places and at different times, to put into writing the order and discipline and character of the Church; in part for private instruction and edification, but in part also with a view to actual use; frequently even with an actual reference to particular circumstances. In this lies their importance, to a degree which is only just being adequately realized. They contain evidence of the utmost value as to the order of the Church in early days; evidence, however, which needs to be sifted with the greatest care, since the personal preferences of the writer and the customs of the local church to which he belongs are continually mixed up with things which have a wider prevalence. It is only by careful investigation, by the method of comparisons, that these elements can be disentangled; but as the number of documents of this class known to us is continually increasing, their value increases even more than proportionately. And whilst their local and fugitive character must be fully recognized and allowed for, is it unjustifiable to set them aside or leave them out of account as heretical, and therefore negligible.

Other collections.

It will be sufficient here to mention shortly the chief collections of this kind which came into existence during the first four centuries; generally as the work of private individuals, and having, at any rate, no more than a local authority of some kind, (a) The earliest known to us is the _Didache_ or _Teaching of the Twelve Apostles_, itself compiled from earlier materials, and dating from about 120 (see DIDACHE). (b) _The Apostolic Church Order_ (_apostolische Kirchenordnung_ of German writers); _Ecclesiastical Canons of the Holy Apostles_ of one MS.; _Sententiae Apostolorum_ of Pitra: of about 300, and emanating probably from Asia Minor. Its earlier part, cc. 1-14, depends upon the _Didache_, and the rest of it is a book of discipline in which Harnack has attempted to distinguish two older fragments of church law (_Texte u. Unters_. ii. 5). (c) The so-called _Canones Hippolyti_, probably Alexandrian or Roman, and of the first half of the 3rd century. It will be observed that these make no claim to apostolic authorship; but otherwise their origin is like that of the rest, unless indeed, as has been suggested, they represent the work of an actual Roman synod, (d) The so-called _Egyptian Church Order_, in Coptic from a Greek pre-Nicene original (c. 310). It is part of the Egyptian Heptateuch and contains neither communion nor ordination forms, (e) The _Ethiopic Church Order_, perhaps twenty years later than (d), and forming part of the _Ethiopic Statutes_. (f) The _Verona Latin Fragments_, discovered and published by Hauler, portions of a form akin to (e), which may be dated c. 340, though possibly earlier. It has a preface which refers to a treatise _Concerning Spiritual Gifts_ as having immediately preceded it. (g) The recently discovered _Testament of the Lord_, which is somewhat later in date (c. 350), and likewise depends upon the _Canones Hippolyti_. (h) The so-called _Canons of Basil_. This is an Arabic work perhaps based on a Coptic and ultimately on a Greek original, embodying with modifications large portions of the Canons of Hippolytus. (On the relations between the six last-named, see HIPPOLYTUS, CANONS of.)

Here also may be noticed the _Didascalia Apostolorum_, originally
written in Greek, but known through a Syriac version and a fragmentary
Latin one published by Hauler. It is of the middle of the 3rd
century--in fact, a passage in the Latin translation seems to give us
the date A.D. 254. It emanates from Palestine or Syria, and is
independent of the documents already mentioned; and upon it the
_Constitutions_ themselves very largely depend. It is a mixture of
moral and ecclesiastical instruction. The _Sacramentary of Serapion_
(c. 350), _The Pilgrimage of Etheria_ (_Silvia_) (c. 385), and _The
Catechetical Lectures of Cyril of Jerusalem_ (348) are also of value
in this connexion. In the (so-called) _Constitutions through
Hippolytus_ we have possibly a preliminary draft of the famous 8th
book of the _Apostolical Constitutions_.[2]

Contents.

The Constitutions themselves fall into three main divisions. (i.) The first of these consists of books i.-vi., and throughout runs parallel to the _Didascalia_. Bickell, indeed, held that this latter was an abbreviated form of books i.-vi.; but it is now agreed on all hands that the Constitutions are based on the _Didascalia_ and not vice versa. (ii.) Then follows book vii., the first thirty-one chapters of which are an adaptation of the _Didache_, whilst the rest contain various liturgical forms of which the origin is still uncertain, though it has been acutely suggested by Achelis, and with great probability, that they originated in the schismatical congregation of Lucian at Antioch. (iii.) Book viii. is more composite, and falls into three parts. The first two chapters, [Greek: peri charismaton], may be based upon a lost work of St Hippolytus, otherwise known only by a reference to it in the preface of the _Verona Latin Fragments_; and an examination shows that this is highly probable. The next section, cc. 3-27, [Greek: peri cheirotoyioy], and cc. 28-46, [Greek: peri kayoyoy], is twofold, and is evidently that upon which the writer sets most store. The apostles no longer speak jointly, but one by one in an apostolic council, and the section closes with a joint decree of them all. They speak of the ordination of bishops (the so-called Clementine Liturgy is that which is directed to be used at the consecration of a bishop, cc. 5-15), of presbyters, deacons, deaconesses, sub-deacons and lectors, and then pass on to confessors, virgins, widows and exorcists; after which follows a series of canons on various subjects, and liturgical formulae. With regard to this section, all that can be said is that it includes materials which are also to be found elsewhere--in the _Egyptian Church Order_ and other documents already spoken of--and that the precise relation between them is at present not determined. The third section consists of the Apostolic Canons already referred to, the last and most significant of which places the Constitutions and the two epistles of Clement in the canon of Scripture, and omits the Apocalypse. They are derived in part from the preceding Constitutions, in part from the canons of the councils of Antioch, 341, Nicaea, 325, and possibly Laodicaea, 363.

A comparison of the Constitutions with the material upon which they are based will illustrate the compiler's method. (a) To begin with the _Didascalia_ already mentioned. It is unmethodical and badly digested, homiletical in style, and abounding in biblical quotations. There is no precise arrangement; but the subjects, following a general introduction, are the bishop and his duties, penance, the administration of the offerings, the settlement of disputes, the divine service, the order of widows, deacons and deaconesses, the poor, behaviour in persecution, and so forth. The compiler of the Constitutions finds here material after his own heart. He is even more discursive and more homiletical in style; he adds fresh citations of the Scriptures, and additional explanations and moral reflexions; and all this with so little judgment that he often leaves confusion worse confounded (e.g. in ii. 57, where, upon a symbolical description of the Church as a sheepfold, he has superimposed the further symbolism of a ship). (b) Passing on to books vii. and viii., we observe that the compiler's method of necessity changes with his new material. In the former book he still makes large additions and alterations, but there is less scope for his prolixity than before; and in the latter, where he is no longer dealing with generalities, but making actual definitions, the Constitutions of necessity become more precise and statutory in form. Throughout he adopts and adapts the language of his sources as far as possible, "only pruning in the most pressing cases," but towards the end he cannot avoid making larger alterations from time to time. And his alterations throughout are not made aimlessly. Where he finds things which would obviously clash with the customs of his own day, he unhesitatingly modifies them. An account of the Passion, with a curiously perverted chronology, the object of which was to justify the length of the Passion-tide fast, is entirely revised for this reason (v. 14); the direction to observe Easter according to the Jewish computation is changed into the exact contrary for the same reason (v. 17); and where his archetype lapses into speaking of a lull in persecution he naively informs us that the Romans have now given up persecuting and have adopted Christianity (vi. 26), forgetting altogether that he is speaking in the character of the apostles. Above all, he both magnifies the office of the Christian ministry as a whole and alters what is said of it in detail (for example, the deaconess loses rank not a little), to make it agree with the circumstances of his day in general, and with his own ideas of fitness in particular. It is here that his evidence is at once most valuable and needs to be used with the greatest care. To give one striking example of the value of these documents. The _Canones Hippolyti_ (vi. 43) provide that one who has been a confessor for the faith may be received as a presbyter by virtue of his confessorship and not by the laying on of the bishop's hands; but if he be chosen a bishop, he is to be ordained. This provision passes on into the Egyptian _Ecclesiastical Canons_ and other kindred documents, and even into the _Testamentum Domini_. But the corresponding passage in the Apostolical Constitutions (viii. 23) entirely reverses it: "A confessor is not ordained, for he is so by choice and patience, and is worthy of great honour.... But if there be occasion, he is to be ordained either a bishop, priest, or deacon. But if any one of the confessors who is not ordained snatches to himself any such dignity upon account of his confession, let the same person be deprived and rejected; for he is not in such an office, since he has denied the constitution of Christ, and is worse than an infidel."

Authorship, place, and date.

Who, then, is the author of the Constitutions, and what can be inferred with regard to him? (i.) By separating off the sources which he used from his own additions to them, it at once becomes clear that the latter are the work of one man: the style is unmistakable, and the method of working is the same throughout. The compiler of books i.-vi. is also the compiler of books vii., viii. (ii.) As to his theological position, different views have been held. Funk suggests Apollinarianism, which is the refuge of the destitute; and Achelis inclines in the same direction. But the affinities of the author are quite otherwise, the most pronounced of them being a strong subordinationist tendency, denial of a human soul to Christ, and the like, which suggest not indeed Arianism but an inclination towards Arianism. Above all, his polemic is directed against the dying heresies of the 3rd century; and he writes with an absence of constraint which is not the language of one who lives amidst violent controversies or who is conscious of being in a minority. All this points to the position of a "conservative" or semi-Arian of the East, one who belongs, perhaps, to the circle of Lucian of Antioch and writes before the time of Julian. It is hard to think of any other time or circumstances in which a man could write like this, (iii.) The indications of _time_ have been held to point to a different conclusion. On the one hand, the fact that the attempt to rebuild the temple by Julian in 363 is not mentioned in vi. 24 points to an earlier date; and the fact that the [Greek: kopiatai] are not mentioned amongst the church officers points in the same direction, for elsewhere they are first mentioned in a rescript of Constantius in A.D. 357. On the other hand, in the cycle of feasts occur the names of several which are probably of later date--e.g. Christmas and St Stephen, which were introduced at Antioch c. A.D. 378 and 379 respectively. Again, Epiphanius (c. A.D. 374) appears to be unacquainted with it; he still quotes from the _Didascalia_, and elaborately explains it away where it is contrary to the usages of his own day. But as regards the former point, it is possible that the Apostolical Constitutions constantly gave rise to these festivals; or, on the other hand, that the two passages were subsequently introduced either by the writer himself or by some other hand, when the last book of the Constitutions was being used as a law-book. And as regards the latter, the fact that Epiphanius does not use the Constitutions is no proof that they had not yet been compiled. (iv.) As to the region of composition there is no real doubt. It was clearly the East, Syria or Palestine. Many indications are against the latter, and Syria is strongly suggested by the use of the Syro-Macedonian calendar. Moreover, the writer represents the Roman Clement as the channel of communication between the apostles and the Church. This fact both supplies him with the name by which he is commonly known, Pseudo-Clement, and also furnishes corroboration of his Syrian birth; since the other spurious writings bearing the name of Clement, the _Homilies_ and _Recognitions_, are likewise of Syrian origin. Moreover, the spurious Ignatian epistles, which are also Syrian, depend throughout upon the Constitutions, (v.) But this is not all. It was long ago noticed that Pseudo-Clement bears a very close resemblance to Pseudo-Ignatius, the interpolator of the Ignatian Epistles in the longer Greek recension. Usher, as we have seen, identified them, and modern criticism accepts this identification as a fact (Lagarde, Harnack, Funk, Brightman). Lightfoot, indeed, still hesitated (_Ap. Fathers_, II. i. 266 n.) on the ground that Pseudo-Ignatius occasionally misunderstands the Constitutions, that the two writings give the Roman succession differently, and that Pseudo-Clement shows no knowledge of the Christological controversies of Nicaea. But as regards the first of these, it is rather a case of condensed citation than of misinterpretation; the second is explained by the writer's carelessness as shown in other passages, and all are solved if a considerable interval of time elapsed between the compilation of the Constitutions and the spurious Ignatian epistles.

It seems clear then that the compiler was a Syrian, and that he also wrote the spurious Ignatian epistles; he was likewise probably a semi-Arian of the school of Lucian of Antioch. His date is given by Harnack as A.D. 340-360, with a leaning to 340-343; by Lightfoot as the latter half of the 4th century; by Brightman, 370-380; by Maclean, 375; and by Funk as the beginning of the 5th century.

AUTHORITIES.--W. Ueltzen, _Constitutiones Apostolicae_ (Schwerin,
1853); P.A. de Lagarde, _Didascalia Apostolorum Syriace_ (Leipz.,
1854); _Constitutiones Apostolorum_ (Leipz. and Lond., 1862); M.D.
Gibson, _Didascalia Apost. Syriace_, with Eng. trans. (_Horae
Semiticae_, i. and ii., Cambridge, 1903); J.B. Pitra, _Juris
Ecclesiastici Graecorum Historia et Monumenta_, i. (Rome, 1864);
Hauler, _Didascaliae Apostolorum Fragmenta Ueronensia Latina_,
(Leipzig, 1900); Bickell, _Geschichte des Kirchenrechts_, i. (Giessen,
1843); F.X. Funk, _Die apostolischen Konstitutionen_ (Rottenb., 1891);
A. Harnack, _Geschichte d. altchristl. Litteratur_, i. 515 ff.
(Leipz., 1893); F.E. Brightman, _Liturgies Eastern and Western_, I.
xvii. ff. (Oxford, 1896); H. Achelis, in Hauck's _Realencyklopadie_,
i. 734 f., art. "Apostolische Konstitutionen und Kanones" (Leipz.,
1896); A.S. Maclean, _Recent Discoveries illustrating Early Christian
Worship_ (Lond., 1904); J. Wordsworth, _The Ministry of Grace_, pp. 18
ff; J.P. Arendzen, "The Apostolic Church Order" (Syriac Text, Eng.
trans. and notes) in _Journ. of Theol. Studies_, iii. 59. Trans. of
_Apost. Constitutions_, book viii., in Ante-Nicene Christian Library.
(W. E. Co.)

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Why he did not go on to give the remaining thirty-five is not
clear; they belong to the same date as, and are not inferior to, the
first fifty.

[2] At a later date various collections were made of the documents
above mentioned, or some of them, to serve as law-books in different
churches--e.g. the Syrian Octateuch, the Egyptian Heptateuch, and the
Ethiopic Sinodos. These, however, stand on an entirely different
footing, since they are simply collections of existing documents, and
no attempt is made to claim apostolic authorship for them.

APOSTOLIC CANONS, a collection of eighty-five rules for the regulation of clerical life, appended to the eighth book of the _Apostolical Constitutions_ (q.v.). They are couched in brief legislative form though on no definite plan, and deal with the vexed questions of ecclesiastical discipline as they were raised towards the end of the 4th century. At least half of the canons are derived from earlier constitutions, and probably not many of them are the actual productions of the compiler, whose aim was to gloss over the real nature of the _Constitutions_, and secure their incorporation with the Epistles of Clement in the New Testament of his day. The _Codex Alexandrinus_ does indeed append the Clementine Epistles to its text of the New Testament. The Canons may be a little later in date than the preceding _Constitutions_, but they are evidently from the same Syrian theological circle.

APOSTOLIC FATHERS, a term used to distinguish those early Christian writers who were believed to have been the personal associates of the original Apostles. While the title "Fathers" was given from at least the beginning of the 4th century to church writers of former days, as being the parents of Christian belief and thought for later times, the expression "Apostolic Fathers" dates only from the latter part of the 17th century. The idea of recognizing these "Fathers" as a special group exists already in the title "Patres aevi apostolici, sive SS. Patrum qui temporibus apostolicis floruerunt ... opera," under which in 1672 J.B. Cotelier published at Paris the writings current under the names of Barnabas, Clement of Rome, Hermas, Ignatius and Polycarp. But the name itself is due to their next editor, Thomas Ittig (1643-1710), in his _Bibliotheca Patrum Apostolicorum_ (1699), who, however, included under this title only Clement, Ignatius and Polycarp. Here already appears the doubt as to how many writers can claim the title, a doubt which has continued ever since, and makes the contents of the "Apostolic Fathers" differ so much from editor to editor. Thus the Oratorian Andrea Gallandi (1700-1779), in re-issuing Cotelier's collection in his _Bibliotheca Veterum Patrum_ (1765-1781), included the fragments of Papias and the Epistle to Diognetus, to which recent editors have added the citations from the "Elders" of Papias's day found in Irenaeus and, since 1883, the _Didache_.

The degree of historic claim which these various writings have to rank as the works[1] of Apostolic Fathers varies greatly on any definition of "apostolic." Originally the epithet was meant to be taken strictly, viz. as denoting those whom history could show to have been personally connected, or at least coeval, with one or more apostles; and an effort was made, as by Cotelier, to distinguish the writings rightly and wrongly assigned to such. Thus editions tended to vary with the historical views of editors. But the convenience of the category "Apostolic Fathers" to express not only those who might possibly have had some sort of direct contact with apostles--such as "Barnabas," Clement, Ignatius, Papias, Polycarp--but also those who seemed specially to preserve the pure tradition of apostolic doctrine during the sub-apostolic age, has led to its general use in a wide and vague sense.

Conventionally, then, the title denotes the group of writings which, whether in date or in internal character, are regarded as belonging to the main stream of the Church's teaching during the period between the Apostles and the Apologists (i.e. to c. A.D. 140). Or to put it more exactly, the "Apostolic Fathers" represent, chronologically in the main and still more from the religious and theological standpoint, the momentous process of transition from the type of teaching in the New Testament to that which meets us in the early Catholic Fathers, from the last quarter of the 2nd century onwards. The Apologists no doubt show us certain fresh factors entering into this development; but on the whole the Apostolic Fathers by themselves go a long way to explain the transition in question, so far as knowledge of this _saeculum obscurum_ is within our reach at all. It is true that they do not include the whole even of the ecclesiastical literature of the sub-apostolic age, not to mention what remains of Gnostic and other minority types. The _Preaching and Apocalypse_ of Peter, for instance, are quite typical of the same period, and help us to read between the lines of the Apostolic Fathers. Yet they do not really add much to what is there already, and they have the drawbacks of pseudonymity; they lack concrete and personal qualities; they are general expressions of tendencies which we cannot well locate or measure, save by means of the Apostolic Fathers themselves or of their earliest Catholic successors.

(A) In _external features_ the group is far from homogeneous, a fact which has led to their being disintegrated as a group in certain histories of early Christian literature (e.g. those of Harnack and Kruger), and classed each under its own literary type--so sacrificing to outer form, which is quite secondary in primitive Christian writings, the more significant fact of religious affinity. Its original members, those still best entitled to their name in any strict sense, are epistles, and in this respect also most akin to Apostolic writings. Indeed Ignatius takes pleasure in saluting his readers "after the apostolic stamp" (_ad Troll._ inscr.), while yet disclaiming all desire to emulate the apostolic manner in other respects, being fully conscious of the gulf between himself and apostles like Peter and Paul in claim to authority (_ib._ in. 3, _ad Rom._ iv. 3). The like holds of Polycarp, who, in explaining that he writes to exhort the Philippians only at their own request, adds, "for neither am I, nor is any other like me, able to follow the wisdom of the blessed and glorious Paul" (in. 2). Clement's epistle, indeed, conforms more to the elaborate and treatise-like form of the Epistle to the Hebrews, on which it draws so largely; and the same is true of "Barnabas." But one and all are influenced by study of apostolic epistles, and witness to the impression which these produced on the men of the next generation. Unconsciously, too, they correspond to the apostolic type of writing in another respect, viz. their occasional and practical character. They are evoked by pressing needs of the hour among some definite body of Christians and not by any literary motive.[2] This is a universal trait of primitive Christian writings; so that to speak of primitive Christian "literature" at all is hardly accurate, and tends to an artificial handling of their contents. These sub-apostolic epistles are veritable "human documents," with the personal note running through them. They are after all personal expressions of Christianity, in which are discernible also specific types of local tradition. To such spontaneous actuality a large part of their interest and value is due.

Nor is this pre-literary and vital quality really absent even from the writing which is least entitled to a place among "Apostolic Fathers," the Epistle to Diognetus. This beautiful picture of the Christian life as a realized ideal, and of Christians as "the soul" of the world, owes its inclusion to a double error: first, to the accidental attachment at the end of another fragment (S ii), which opens with the writer's claim to stand forth as a teacher as being "a disciple of apostles"; and next, to mistaken exegesis of this phrase as implying personal relations with apostles, rather than knowledge of their teaching, written or oral. Whether in form addressed to Diognetus, the tutor of Marcus Aurelius, as a typical cultured observer of Christianity, or to some other eminent person of the same name in the locality of its origin, or, as seems more likely, to cultured Greeks generally, personified under the significant name "Diognetus" ("Heaven-born," of. Acts xvii. 28 along with S iii. 4)--the epistle is in any case an "open letter" of an essentially literary type. Further, its opening seems modelled on the lines of the preface to Luke's Gospel, to which, along with Acts, it may owe something of its very conception as a reasoned appeal to the lover of truth. But while literary in form and conception, its appeal is in spirit so personal a testimony to what the Gospel has done for the writer and his fellow Christians, that it is akin to the piety of the Apostolic Fathers as a group. It is true that it has marked affinities, e.g. in its natural theology, with the earliest Apologists, Aristides and Justin, even as it is itself in substance an apology addressed not to the State, but to thoughtful public opinion. But this only means that we cannot draw a hard and fast line between groups of early Christian writings at a time when practical religious interests overshadowed all others.

If thus related to the Apologists of the middle of the 2nd century, the Epistle to Diognetus has also points of contact with one of the most practical and least literary writings found among our Apostolic Fathers, viz. the homily originally known as the Second Epistle of Clement (for this ascription, as for other details, see CLEMENTINE LITERATURE). The recovery of its concluding sections in the same MS. which brought the _Didache_ to light, proves beyond question that we have here the earliest extant sermon preached before a Christian congregation, about A.D. 120-140 (so J.B. Lightfoot). Its opening section, recalling to its hearers the passing of the mists of idolatry before the revelation in Jesus Christ, is markedly similar in tone and tenor to passages in the Epistle to Diognetus. Far closer, however, are the affinities between the homily and the _Shepherd of Hermas_, "the first Christian allegory," which as a literary whole dates from about A.D. 140, but probably represents a more or less prolonged prophetic activity on the part of its author, the brother of Pius, the Roman bishop of his day (c. 139-154). In both the primary theme is repentance, as called for by serious sins, after baptism has placed the Christian on his new and higher level of responsibility. Thus both are hortatory writings, the one argumentative in form, the other prophetic, after the manner of later Old Testament prophets whose messages came in visions and similitudes. This prophetic and apocalyptic note, which characterizes Hermas among the Apostolic Fathers (though there are traces of it also in the _Didache_ and in Ignatius, _ad Eph._ xx.), is a genuinely primitive trait and goes far to explain the vogue which the _Shepherd_ enjoyed in the generations immediately succeeding, as also the influence of its disciplinary policy, which is its prophetic "burden" (see HERMAS, SHEPHERD OF).

We come finally to the anonymous _Teaching of the Twelve Apostles_ and Papias's _Exposition of Oracles of the Lord_, so far as this is known to us. The former, besides embodying catechetical instruction in Christian conduct (the "Two Ways"), which goes back in substance to the early apostolic age and is embodied also in "Barnabas," depicts in outline the fundamental usages of church life as practised in some conservative region (probably within Syria) about the last quarter of the 1st century and perhaps even later. The whole is put forth as substantially the apostolic teaching (_Didache_) on the subjects in question. This is probably a _bona fide_ claim. It expresses the feeling common to the Apostolic Fathers and general in the sub-apostolic age, at any rate in regions where apostles had once laboured, that local tradition, as held by the recognized church leaders, did but continue apostolic doctrine and practice. Into later developments of this feeling an increasing element of illusion entered, and all other written embodiments of it known to us take the form of literary fictions, more or less bold. It is in contrast to these that the _Didache_ is justly felt to be genuinely primitive and of a piece with the Apostolic Fathers. Thus while its form would by analogy tend _per se_ to awaken suspicion, its contents remove this feeling; and we may even infer from this surviving early formulation of local ecclesiastical tradition, that others of somewhat similar character came into being in the sub-apostolic age, but failed to survive save as embodied in later local teaching, oral or written, very much as if the _Didache_ had perished and its literary offspring alone remained (see DIDACHE).

As regards Papias's _Exposition_, which Lightfoot describes as "among the earliest forerunners of commentaries, partly explanatory, partly illustrative, on portions of the New Testament," we need here only remark that, whatever its exact form may have been--as to which the extant fragments still leave room for doubt--it was in conception expository of the historic meaning of Christ's more ambiguous Sayings, viewed in the light of definitely ascertained apostolic traditions bearing on the subject. The like is true also of the fragments of the Elders preserved in Irenaeus (so far as these do not really come from Papias). Both bodies of exposition represent the traditional principle at work in the sub-apostolic age, making for the preservation in relative purity, over against merely subjective interpretations--those of the Gnostics in particular--of the historic or original sense of Christ's teaching, just as Ignatius stood for the historicity of the facts of His earthly career in their plain, natural sense.

(B) Here the question of external form passes readily over into that of the _internal character and spirit_. Indeed much has already been said or suggested bearing on these. The relation of these writers to the apostolic teaching generally has become pretty evident. It is one of absolute loyalty and deference, as to the teaching of inspiration. They are conscious, as are we in reading them, that they are not moving on the same level of insight as the Apostles; they are sub-apostolic in that sense also. Hence there appear constant traces of study of the Apostolic writings, so far as these were accessible in the locality of each writer at his date of writing (for the details of this subject, and its bearing on the history of the Canonical Scriptures of the New Testament, see _The New Testament in the Apostolic Fathers_, Oxford, 1905). As Lightfoot points out (_Apostolic Fathers_, pt. i. vol. i. p. 7), however, personality, with its variety of temperament and emphasis, largely colours the Apostolic Fathers, especially the primary group. Clement has all the Roman feeling for duly constituted order and discipline; Ignatius has the Syrian or semi-oriental passion of devotion, showing itself at once in his mystic love for his Lord and his over-strained yearning to become His very "disciple" by drinking the like cup of martyrdom; Polycarp is, above all things, steady in his allegiance to what had first won his conscience and heart, and his "passive and receptive character" comes out in the contents of his epistle. Of the rest, whose personalities are less known to us, Papias shares Polycarp's qualities and their limitations, the anonymous homilist and Hermas are marked by intense moral earnestness, while the writer to Diognetus joins to this a profound religious insight. These personal traits determine by selective affinity, working under conditions given by the special local type of tradition and piety, the elements in the Apostolic writings which each was able to assimilate and express--though we must allow also for variety in the occasions of writing. Thus one New Testament type is echoed in one and another in another; or it may be several in turn. The latter is the case in Clement, Ignatius and Polycarp; perhaps also in "Barnabas." In Hermas there is special affinity to the language and thought of the epistle of James, and in the homilist to those of Paul. Yet their very use of the same terms or ideas makes us the more aware of "a marked contrast to the depth and clearness of conception with which the several Apostolic writers place before us different aspects of the Gospel" (Lightfoot). While Apostolic phrases are used, the sense behind them is often different and less evangelic. They have not caught the Apostolic meaning, because they have not penetrated to the full religious experience which gave to the words, often words with long and varied history both in the Septuagint and in ordinary Greek usage, their specific meaning to each apostle and especially to Paul. This phenomenon was noted particularly by E. Reuss, in his _Histoire de la theologie chretienne an siecle apostolique_ (3rd ed., 1864). Take for instance Clement. Lightfoot, indeed, dwells on the all-round "comprehensiveness" with which Clement, as the mouthpiece of the early Roman Church, utters in succession phrases or ideas borrowed impartially from Peter and Paul and James and the Epistle to Hebrews. He admits, however, that such mere co-ordination of the language of Paul and James, for instance, as appears in his twice bracketing "faith and hospitality" as grounds of acceptance with God (the cases are those of Abraham and Rahab, in chs. x. and xii.), is "from a strictly dogmatic point of view" his weakness. But the weakness is more than a dogmatic one; it is one of religious experience, as the source of spiritual insight. It is not merely that "there is no _dogmatic system_ in Clement" or in any other of the Apostolic Fathers; that may favour, not hinder, religious insight. There is a want of depth in Christian experience, in the power of realizing relative spiritual values in the light of the master principle involved in the distinctively Christian consciousness, such as could raise Clement above a verbal eclecticism, rather than comprehensiveness, in the use of Apostolic language. As R.W. Dale remarks, in a note on Reuss's too severe words (Eng. trans. ii. 295): "The vital force of the Apostolic convictions gave to Apostolic thought a certain organic and consistent form." It is lack of this organic quality in the thought, not only of Clement but also of the Apostolic Fathers generally--with the possible exception of Ignatius, who seems to share the Apostolic experience more fully than any other, to which Reuss rightly directs attention. In virtue of this defect, due largely to the failure to enter into the Apostolic experience of mystic union with Christ, he can rightly speak of "an immense retrogression" in theology visible "at the end of the century, and in circles where it might have been least expected" (ii. p. 294, cf. 541).

In fact the perspective of the Gospel was seriously changed and its most distinctive features obscured. This was specially the case with the experimental doctrines of grace. Here the central glory of the Cross as "the power of God unto salvation" suffered some eclipse, although the passion of Christ was felt to be a transcendent act of Divine Grace in one way or another. But even more serious was the loss of an adequate sense of the contrast between "grace" and "works" as conditions of salvation. There was little or no sense of the danger of the _legal principle_, as related to human egoism and the instinct to seek salvation as a reward for merit. The passages in which these things are laid bare by Paul's remorseless analysis of his own experience "under Law" seem to have made practically no impression on the Apostolic Fathers as a whole. Gentile Christians had not felt the fang of the Law as the ex-Pharisee had occasion to feel it. Even if first trained in the Hellenistic synagogues of the Dispersion, as was often the case, they apprehended the Law on its more helpful and less exacting side, and had not been brought "by the Law to die unto the Law," that they might "live unto God." The result was too great a continuity between their religious conceptions before and after embracing the Gospel. Thus the latter seemed to them simply to bring forgiveness of past sins for Christ's sake, and then an enhanced moral responsibility to the New Law revealed in Him. Hence a new sort of legalism, known to recent writers as Moralism, underlies much of the piety of the Apostolic Fathers, though Ignatius is quite free from it, while Polycarp and "Barnabas" are less under its influence than are the _Didache_, Clement, the Homilist and Hermas. It conceives salvation as a "wages" ([Greek: osthos]) to be earned or forfeited; and regards certain good works, such as prayer, fasting, alms--especially the last--as efficacious to cancel sins. The reality of this tendency, particularly at Rome, betrays itself in Hermas, who teaches the supererogatory merit of alms gained by the self-denial of fasting (_Sim_. v. 3. 3 ff.). Marcion's reaction, too, against the Judaic temper in the Church as a whole, in the interests of an extravagant Paulinism, while it suggests that Paul's doctrines of grace generally were inadequately realized in the sub-apostolic age, points also to the prevalence of such moralism in particular.

(C) In attempting a final estimate of the value of the Apostolic Fathers for the historian to-day, we may sum up under these heads: ecclesiastical, theological, religious. (a) As a mine of materials for reconstructing the history of Church institutions, they are invaluable, and that largely in virtue of their spontaneous and "esoteric" character, with no view to the public generally or to posterity. (b) Theologically, as a stage in the history of Christian doctrine, their value is as great negatively as positively. Impressive as is their witness to the persistence of the Apostolic teaching in its essential features, amidst all personal and local variations, perhaps the most striking thing about these writings is the degree in which they fail to appreciate certain elements of the Apostolic teaching as embodied in the New Testament, and those its higher and more distinctively Christian elements.[3] This negative aspect has a twofold bearing. Firstly, it suggests the supernormal level to which the Apostolic consciousness was raised at a bound by the direct influence of the Founder of Christianity, and justifies the marking-off of the Apostolic writings as a Canon, or body of Christian classics of unique religious authority. To this principle Marcion's Pauline Canon is a witness, though in too one-sided a spirit. Secondly, it means that the actual development of ecclesiastical doctrine began, not from the Apostolic consciousness itself, but from a far lower level, that of the inadequate consciousness of the sub-apostolic Church, even when face to face with their written words. This theological "retrogression" is of much significance for the history of dogma, (c) On the other hand, there is great religious and moral continuity, beneath even theological discontinuity, in the life working below all conscious apprehension of the deeper ideas involved (E. von Dobschutz, _Christian Life in the Primitive Church_, 1905). There is continuity in character; the Apostolic Fathers strike us as truly good men, with a goodness raised to a new type and power. This is what the Gospel of Christ aims chiefly at producing as its proper fruit; and the Apostolic Fathers would have desired no better record than that they were themselves genuine "epistles of Christ."

LITERATURE.--This is too large to indicate even in outline, but is
given fully in the chief modern editions, viz. of Gebhardt, Harnack
and Zahn jointly (1875-1877), J.B. Lightfoot (1885-1890) and F.X. Funk
(1901); also in O. Bardenhewer, _Gesch. der altkirchlichen Litteratur_
(1902), Band i., and in _Neutestamentliche Apokryphen_, with
_Handbuch_ thereto, edited by E. Hennecke (Tubingen, 1904). The
fullest discussion in English of the teaching of Barnabas, Clement,
Ignatius and Polycarp is by J. Donaldson, _The Apostolical Fathers_
(1874), which, however, suffers from the imperfect state of the texts
when he wrote. The most useful edition for ready reference, containing
critical texts (up to date) and good translations, is Lightfoot's
one-volume edition, _The Apostolic Fathers_ (London, 1891).
(J. V. B.)

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Cotelier included the Acts of Martyrdom of Clement, Ignatius and
Polycarp; and those of Ignatius and Polycarp are still often printed
by editors.

[2] See G.A. Deissmann, _Bible Studies_, pp. 1-60, for this
distinction between the genuine "letter" and the literary "epistle,"
as applied to the New Testament in particular.

[3] One result is their inability to form a true theory of Judaism
and of the Old Testament in relation to the Gospel, a matter of great
moment for them and for their successors.