Part 26

§ 36.1. =The Agape.=--That in consequence of the imperial edict against secret societies, at least in Asia Minor, the much suspected and greatly maligned love-feasts (§ 22) were temporarily abandoned, appears from the report of Pliny to the Emperor, according to which the Christians of whom he made inquiries assured him that they had given up the _mos coeundi ad capiendum cibum promiscuum_. But in Africa they were still in use or had been revived in the time of Tertullian, who in his _Apology_ makes mention very approvingly of them, although at a later period, after he had joined the Montanists, he lashes them in his book _De Jejuniis_ with the most stinging sarcasm. Clement of Alexandria too is aware of flagrant abuses committed in connection with those feasts. They continued longest to be observed in connection with the services in commemoration of the dead and on the festivals of martyrs. The Council of Laodicæa, about the middle of the 4th century, forbade the holding of these in the churches and the Second Trullan Council in A.D. 692 renewed this prohibition. After this we find no further mention of them.

§ 36.2. =The Missa Catechumenorum.=--The reading of scripture (ἀνάγνωσις, _Lectio_,--comp. § 36, 7) formed the chief exercise during this part of the service. There was unrestricted liberty as to the choice of the portions to be read. It was the duty of the Readers, Ἀναγνώσται, to perform this part of the worship, but frequently Evangelists on the invitation of the Deacons would read, and the whole congregation showed their reverence by standing up. At the close of the reading an expository and practical address (ὁμιλία, λόγος, _Sermo_, _Tractatus_) was given by the bishop or in his absence by a presbyter or deacon, or even by a Catechist, as in the case of Origen, and soon, especially in the Greek church, this assumed the form of an artistic, rhetorical discourse. The reading and exposition of God’s word were followed by the prayers, to which the people gave responses. These were uttered partly by the bishop, partly by the deacons, and were extemporary utterances of the heart, though very soon they assumed a stereotyped form. The congregation responded to each short sentence of the prayer with Κύριε ἐλέησον. In the fully developed order of public worship of the 3rd century the prayers were arranged to correspond to the different parts of the service, for Catechumens, energumens (possessed), and penitents. After all these came the common prayer of the church for all sorts of callings, conditions, and needs in the life of the brethren.

§ 36.3. =The _Missa Fidelium_.=--The centre of this part of the service was the celebration of the Lord’s Supper. In the time of Justin Martyr the liturgy connected therewith was very simple. The brotherly kiss followed the common prayer, then the sacramental elements were brought in to the ministrant who consecrated them by the prayer of praise and thanksgiving (εὐχαριστία). The people answered Amen, and thereupon the consecrated elements were distributed to all those present. From that prayer the whole ordinance received the name εὐχαριστία, because its consecrating influence made common bread into the bread of the Supper. Much more elaborate is the liturgy in the 8th Book of the _Apostolic Constitutions_ (§ 43, 4), which may be regarded as a fair sample of the worship of the church toward the end of the 3rd century. At the close of the sermon during the prayers connected with that part of the service began the withdrawal successively of the Catechumens, the energumens and the penitents. Then the _Missa fidelium_ was commenced with the common intercessory prayer of the church. After various collects and responses there followed the brotherly kiss, exhortation against participation in unworthy pleasures, preparation of the sacramental elements, the sign of the cross, the consecration prayer, the words of institution, the elevation of the consecrated elements, all accompanied by suitable prayers, hymns, doxologies and responses. The bishop or presbyter distributed the bread with the words, Σῶμα Χριστοῦ; the deacon passed round the cup with the words, Αἷμα Χριστοῦ, ποτήριον ζωῆς. Finally the congregation kneeling received the blessing of the bishop, and the deacon dismissed them with the words, Ἀπολύεσθε ἐν εἰρήνῃ.--The bread was that commonly used, _i.e._, leavened bread (κοινὸς ἄρτος); the wine also was, according to the custom of time, mixed with water (κρᾶμα), in which Cyprian already fancied a symbol of the union of Christ and the church. In the African and Eastern churches, founding on John vi. 53, children, of course, those who had already been baptised, were allowed to partake of the communion. At the close of the service the deacons carried the consecrated sacramental elements to the sick and imprisoned. In many places a portion of the consecrated bread was taken home, that the family might use it at morning prayer for the consecration of the new day. No formal act of confession preceded the communion. The need of such an act in consequence of the existing disciplinary and liturgical ordinance had not yet made itself felt.

§ 36.4. =The Disciplina Arcani.=--The notion that the sacramental part of the divine service, including in this the prayers and hymns connected therewith, the Lord’s prayer, administration of baptism and the baptismal formula, as well as the anointing and the consecration of the priest, was a _mystery_ (μυστικὴ λατρεία, τελετή) which was to be kept secret from all unbaptised persons (ἀμύητοι) and only to be practised in presence of the baptised (συμμύσται), is quite unknown to Justin Martyr and also to Irenæus. Justin accordingly describes in his Apology, expressly intended for the heathen, in full detail and without hesitation, all the parts of the eucharistic service. It was in Tertullian’s time that this notion originated, and it had its roots in the catechumenate and the consequent partition of the service into two parts, from the second of which the unbaptised were excluded. The official Roman Catholic theology, on the other hand, regards the _disciplina arcani_ as an institution existing from the times of the Apostles, and from it accounts for the want of patristic support to certain specifically Roman Catholic dogmas and forms of worship, in order that they may, in spite of the want of such support, maintain that these had a place in primitive Christianity.

§ 36.5. =The Doctrine of the Lord’s Supper.=--Though the idea was not sharply and clearly defined, there was yet a widespread and profound conviction that the Lord’s Supper was a supremely holy mystery, spiritual food indispensable to eternal life, that the body and blood of the Lord entered into some mystical connection with the bread and wine, and placed the believing partaker of them in true and essential fellowship with Christ. It was in consequence of the adoption of such modes of expression that the pagan calumnies about _Thyestian feasts_ (§ 22) first gained currency. Ignatius calls the Lord’s Supper a φάρμακον ἀθανασίας, the cup a ποτήριον εἰς ἕνωσιν τοῦ αἵματος Χριστοῦ, and professes εὐχαριστίαν σάρκα εἶναι τοῦ σωτῆρος. Justin Martyr says: σάρκα καὶ αἷμα ἐδιδάχθημεν εἶναι. According to Irenæus, it is not _communis panis, sed eucharistia ex duabus rebus constans, terrena et cœlesti_, and our bodies by means of its use become _jam non corruptibilia, spem resurrectionis habentia_. Tertullian and Cyprian, too, stoutly maintain this doctrine, but incline sometimes to a more symbolical interpretation of it. The spiritualistic Alexandrians, Clement and Origen, consider that the feeding of the soul with the divine word is the purpose of the Lord’s Supper.[100]--Continuation § 58, 2.

§ 36.6. =The Sacrificial Theory.=--When once the sacerdotal theory had gained the ascendancy (§ 34, 4) the correlated notion of a sacrifice could not much longer be kept in the background. And it was just in the celebration of the Lord’s Supper that the most specious grounds for such a theory were to be found. First of all the prayer, which formed so important a part of this celebration that the whole service came to be called from it the Eucharist, might be regarded as a spiritual sacrifice. Then again the gifts brought by the congregation for the dispensation of the sacrament were called προσφοραί, _Oblationes_, names which were already in familiar use in connection with sacrificial worship. And just as the congregation offered their contributions to the Supper, so also the priests offered them anew in the sacramental

## action, and also to this priestly act was given the name

προσφέρειν, ἀναφέρειν. Then again, not only the prayer but the Supper itself was designated a θυσία, _Sacrificium_, though at first indeed in a non-literal, figurative sense.--Continuation § 58, 3.

§ 36.7. =The Use of Scripture.=--In consequence of their possessing but few portions of Scripture, the references of the Apostolic Fathers to the New Testament books must necessarily be only occasional. The synoptic gospels are most frequently quoted, though these are referred to only as a whole under the name τὸ εὐαγγέλιον. In Justin Martyr the references become more frequent, yet even here there are no express citation of passages; only once, in the Dialogue, is the Revelation of John named. He mentions as his special source for the life and works of Jesus the Ἀπομνημονεύματα τῶν ἀποστόλων. What he borrows from this source is for the most part to be found in our Synoptic Gospels; but we have not in this sufficient ground for identifying the one with the other. On the contrary, we find that the citations of our Lord’s words do not correspond to the text of our gospels, but are sometimes rather in verbal agreement with the Apocryphal writings, and still further, that he adopts Apocryphal accounts of the life of Jesus, _e.g._, the birth of Christ in a cave, the coming of the Magi from Arabia, the legend that Jesus as a carpenter made ploughs and yokes, etc., borrowing them from the Ἀπομνημονεύματα τῶν ἀποστόλων. If one further considers Justin’s account of the Sunday service as consisting of the reading of the Ἀπομνημονεύματα or the writings of the Prophets, and thereafter closed by the expository and hortatory address of the president (προεστώς), he will be led to the conclusion that his “Apostolic Memoirs” must have been a Gospel Harmony for church use, probably on the basis of Matthew’s Gospel drawn from our Synoptic Gospels, with the addition of some apocryphal and traditional elements. The author of the Didache too does not construct his “commands of the Lord communicated by the Apostles” directly from our Synoptic Gospels, but from a εὐαγγέλιον τοῦ κυρίου which presented a text of Matthew enriched by additions from Luke. The Diatessaron of Tatian (§ 30, 10) shows that soon after this the gospel of John, which was not regarded by Justin or the author of the Didache as a source for the evangelical history, although there are not wanting in both manifold references to it, came to be regarded as a work to be read in combination with these. It was only after a New Testament Canon had been in the Old Catholic Age gradually established, and from the vast multitude of books on gospel history, which even Luke had found existing (i. 1) and which had been multiplied to an almost incalculable extent both in the interests of heresy and of church doctrine, our four gospels were universally recognised as alone affording authentic information of the life and doctrines of the Lord, that the eclectic gospels hitherto in use had more and more withdrawn from them the favour of the church. =Tatian’s Diatessaron= maintained its place longest in the Syrian Church. Theodoret, † A.D. 457, testifies that in his diocese he had found and caused to be put away about two hundred copies. Aphraates (about A.D. 340, § 47, 13) still used it as the text of his homilies. At the time of publication of the _Doctrina Addæi_ (§ 32, 6) it was still used in the church of Edessa, and Ephraim Syrus in A.D. 360 refers to a commentary in the form of scholia on it in an Armenian translation, in which the passages commented on are literally reproduced, Theodoret’s charge against it of cutting out passages referring to the descent of Christ after the flesh from David, especially the genealogies of Matthew and Luke, is confirmed by these portions thus preserved. Otherwise however, it is free from heretical alterations, though not wholly without apocryphal additions. All the four gospels are in brief summary so skilfully wrought into one another that no joining is ever visible. What cannot be incorporated is simply left out, and the whole historical and doctrinal material is distributed over the one working year of the synoptists.

§ 36.8. =Formation of a New Testament Canon.=--The oldest collection of a New Testament Canon known to us was made by the Gnostic _Marcion_ (§ 27, 11) about A.D. 150. Some twenty years later in the so-called _Muratorian Canon_, a fragment found by Muratori in the 18th century with a catalogue in corrupt Latin justifying the reception of the New Testament writings received in the Roman church. For later times the chief witnesses are Irenæus, Tertullian, Clement of Alexandria, Origen and Eusebius. The Muratorian Canon and Eusebius are witnesses for the fact that in the 2nd century, besides the Gospels, the Apostolic Epistles and the Revelation of John, other so-called Apostolic Epistles were read at worship in the churches, for instance, the _1st Ep. of Clement of Rome_, _the Ep. of Barnabas_, _the Shepherd of Hermas_, in some churches also the apocryphal _Apocalypse of Peter_ and _Acts of Paul_, in Corinth, an Ep. of the Roman bishop Soter (A.D. 166-174) to that church, and also _Acts of the Martyrs_. Montanist as well as Gnostic excesses gave occasion for the definite fixing of the New Testament Canon by the Catholic church (§ 40). Since the time of Irenæus, the four Gospels, the Acts, the 13 Epp. of Paul, the Ep. to the Hebrews (which some in the West did not regard as Pauline), 1st Peter, and 1st John, along with the Revelation of John, were universally acknowledged. Eusebius therefore calls these ὁμολογούμενα. There was still some uncertainty as to the Ep. of James, 2nd Peter, 2nd and 3rd John and Jude (ἀντιλεγόμενα). The antilegomena of a second class, which have no claim to canonicity, although in earlier times they were much used in churches just like the canonical scriptures, were called by him νόθα, viz. the Acts of Paul, the Shepherd of Hermas, the Apocalypse of Peter, the Ep. of Barnabas, and the Didache. He would also very willingly have included among these the Revelation of John (§ 33, 9), although he acknowledged that elsewhere that is included in the Homologoumena.--=The Old Testament Canon= was naturally regarded as already completed. But since the Old Testament had come to the Greek and Latin Church Teachers in the expanded form of the LXX., they had unhesitatingly assumed that its added books were quite as sacred and as fully inspired as those of the Hebrew Canon. Melito of Sardis, however, about A.D. 170, found it desirable to make a journey of research through Palestine in order to determine the limits of the Jewish Canon, and then to draw up a list of the Holy Scriptures of the Old Testament essentially corresponding therewith. Origen too informs us that the Jews, according to the number of letters in their alphabet acknowledged only 22 books, which, however, does not lead him to condemn this reception of the additional books of the church. From the end of the 2nd century, the Western church had =Latin Translations= of the biblical books, the origin of which is to be sought in North Africa, where in consequence of prevailing ignorance of the Greek language the need of such translations was most deeply felt. Even so early as the beginning of the 5th century we find Jerome († 420) complaining of _varietas_ and _vitiositas_ of the _Codices latini_, and declaring: _Tot sunt exemplaria_ (=forms of the text) _paene quot codices_. Augustine[101] gives preference to the _Itala_ over all others. The name =Itala= is now loosely given to all fragments of Latin translations previous to that of Jerome.--The Syriac translation, =the Peshito=, plain or simple (so-called because it exactly and without paraphrasing renders the words of the Hebrew and Greek originals) belongs to the 3rd century, although first expressly referred to by Ephraim. In it 2 Peter, 2 and 3 John and Jude are not found.

§ 36.9. =The Doctrine of Inspiration.=--In earlier times it was usual, after the example of Philo, to regard the prophetic inspiration of the sacred writers as purely passive, as ἔκστασις. Athenagoras compares the soul of the prophet while prophesying to a flute; Justin Martyr in his _Cohort. ad Græc._ to a lyre, struck by the Holy Spirit as the _plectrum_, etc. The Montanist prophets first brought this theory into disrepute. The Apologist Miltiades of Asia Minor was the first Church Teacher who vindicated over against the Montanists the proposition: προφήτην μὴ δεῖν ἐν ἐκστάσει λαλεῖν. The Alexandrians who even admitted an operation of the Holy Spirit upon the nobler intellects of paganism, greatly modified the previously accepted doctrine of inspiration. Origen, for example, teaches a gradual rising or falling in the measure of inspiration even in the bible, and determines this according to the more or less prominence secured by the human individuality of the writers of scripture.

§ 36.10. =Hymnology.=--The _Carmen Christo quasi Deo dicere secum invicem_ in the report of Pliny (§ 22, 2), may be classed with the antiphonal responsive hymns of the church. Tertullian bears witness to a rich use of song in family as well as congregational worship. So too does Origen. In the composition of church hymns the heretics seem for a long while to have kept abreast of the Catholics (Bardesanes and Harmonius, § 27, 5), but the latter were thereby stirred up to greater exertions. The Martyr Athenogenes and the Egyptian bishop Nepos are named as authors of church hymns. We have still a hymn εἰς Σωτῆρα by Clement of Alexandria. Socrates ascribes to Ignatius, bishop of Antioch, the introduction of the alternate-song (between different congregational choirs). More credible is Theodoret’s statement that the Antiochean monks Flavian and Diodorus had imported it, about A.D. 260, from the National Syrian into the Greek-Syrian church.--Continuation § 59, 4, 5.

§ 37. FEASTS AND FESTIVAL SEASONS.[102]

Sunday as a day of joy was distinguished by standing at prayer, instead of kneeling as at other times, and also by the prohibition of fasting. Of the other days of the week, Wednesday, the day on which the Jewish Council decided to put Jesus to death and Judas had betrayed him, and Friday, as the day of his death, were consecrated to the memory of Christ’s suffering; hence the _Feria quarta et sexta_ were celebrated as watch days, _dies stationum_, after the symbolism of the _Militia christiana_ (Eph. vi. 10-17), by public meetings of the congregation. As days of the Passion, penitence and fasting they formed a striking contrast to the Sunday. The chief days of the Christian festival calendar, which afterwards found richer and more complete expression in the cycle of the Christian year, were thus at first associated with the weekly cycle. A long continued and wide spread controversy as to the proper time for celebrating Easter arose during the 2nd century.

§ 37.1. =The Festivals of the Christian Year.=--The thought of Christ’s suffering and death was so powerful and engrossing that even in the weekly cycle one day had not been sufficient. Still less could one festal day in the yearly cycle satisfy the hearts of believers. Hence a long preparation for the festival was arranged, which was finally fixed at forty days, and was designated the season _Quadragesima_ (τεσσαρακοστή). Its conclusion and acme was the so-called Great Week, beginning with the Sunday of the entrance into Jerusalem, culminating in the day of the crucifixion, Good Friday, and closing with the day of rest in the tomb. This Great Week or Passion Week was regarded as the antitype of the Old Testament Passover feast. The Old Catholic church did not, however, transfer this name to the festival of the resurrection (§ 56, 4). The day of the resurrection was rather regarded as the beginning of a new festival cycle consecrated to the glorification of the redeemer, viz. the season of _Quinquagesima_ (πεντηκοστή), concluding with the festival of the outpouring of the Holy Spirit on the anniversary of the founding of the Christian church, which has now come to be known _par excellence_ as _Pentecost_. The fifty intervening days were simply days of joy. There was daily communion, no fasting, only standing and not kneeling at prayer. The fortieth day, the day of the _Ascension_, had a special pre-eminence as a day of festal celebrations. The festival of Epiphany on 6th January originated in the East to celebrate the baptism of Christ in Jordan, as the manifestation of his Messianic rank. As yet there is nowhere any trace of the Christmas festival.--Continuation, § 56.

§ 37.2. =The Paschal Controversies.=--During the 2nd century, there were three different practices prevalent in regard to the observance of the Paschal festival. The Ebionite Jewish Christians (§ 28, 1) held the Paschal feast on the 14th Nisan according to the strict literal interpretation of the Old Testament precepts, maintaining also that Christ, who according to the synoptists died on the 15th, observed the Passover with his disciples on the 14th. Then again the church of Asia Minor followed another practice which was traced back to the Apostle John. Those of Asia Minor attached themselves indeed in respect of date to the Jewish festival, but gave it a Christian meaning. They let the passover alone, and pronounced the memorial of Christ’s death to be the principal thing in the festival. According to their view, based upon the fourth Gospel, Christ died upon the 14th Nisan, so that He had not during the last year of His life observed a regular Passover. On the 14th Nisan, therefore, they celebrated their Paschal festival, ending their fast at the moment of Christ’s death, three o’clock in the afternoon, and then, instead of the Jewish Passover, having an Agape with the Lord’s Supper. Those who adopted either of those two forms were at a later period called _Quartodecimans_ or _Tessareskaidekatites_. Different from both of these was a third practice followed in all the West, as also in Egypt, Palestine, Pontus and Greece, which detached itself still further from the Jewish Passover. This Western usage disregarded the day of the month in order to secure the observance of the great resurrection festival on the first day of the week. The πάσχα σταυρώσιμον, then, if the 14th did not happen to be a Friday, was always celebrated on the first Friday after the 14th, and the Easter festival with the observance of the Lord’s Supper on the immediately following Sunday. The Westerns regarded the day of Christ’s death as properly a day of mourning, and only at the end of the pre-Easter fast on the day of the Resurrection introduced the celebration of the Agape and the Lord’s Supper. These divergent practices first awakened attention on the appearing of Polycarp, bishop of Smyrna at Rome in A.D. 155. The Roman bishop Anicetus referred to the tradition of the Roman Church; Polycarp laid stress upon the fact that he himself had celebrated the Paschal festival after the manner followed in Asia Minor along with the Apostle John. No common agreement was reached at this time; but, in token of their undisturbed church fellowship, Anicetus allowed Polycarp to dispense the communion in his church. Some fifteen years later a party, not distinctly

## particularised, obtained at Laodicea in Phrygia sanction for