CH101 - The Second Century
The Persecuted Church, 90 - 202 A.D.Persecution of Roman Empire
The Apostolic Fathers
The Spirit of Martyrdom
Second Repentance
Second Century Heresies
The Apologists
New Testament Canon, Part 3
New Testament Canon, Part 4
Summary and Applications
Clement of Rome
Ignatius of Antioch
Polycarp
Marcion
Justin Martyr
Irenaeus of Lyons
Clement of Alexandria
Tertullian
The Apostolic Fathers
This set of early Christian writings, referred to as "The Apostolic Fathers," were written by the first generation of Christian leadership after the apostles, thus the term "fathers." Some of these documents, written in the end of the first century and the beginning of the second century, were considered by second and third century fathers to be sacred and were quoted as inspired text. The early church took these writings very seriously as early witnesses of the faith.
1 Clement
This letter, written by Clement of Rome, named later as the bishop of Rome, is sent to the church in Corinth probably in the 90's. Apparently the church in Corinth had moved to replace their acting leadership and Clement is writing to instruct them concerning apostolic succession. He uses the OT example of Moses, showing that God appoints leaders as He did with the priesthood and those leaders appoint the next generation "with the consent of the whole Church."
(1 Clement 44.2)
Points of Interest:
It is from 1 Clement 5 that we learn the fate of Peter and Paul in Rome,
Clement is familiar with Paul's letter to the Corinthians (1 Corinthians), referring to it in chapter 47, yet no NT text is ever quoted - his biblical citations and illustrations all come from the OT. Although he also quotes from Paul's letter to the Romans, his view of faith is more in line with James, "being justified by our works, and not our words." (1 Clement 30.3)
1 Clement is counted in the NT canon for several regions and was included in the Alexandrian Codex. Clement of Alexandria (cir. 198-202) often quotes from 1 Clement as scripture.
2 Clement
This appears to be the transcript of a sermon rather than a letter. It follows 1 Clement in the early manuscripts and has always been connected to the first letter, but the Greek is decidedly less proficient which points to a different author. This author also clearly quotes from the NT (words of Jesus) more freely, this is also different from 1 Clement.
Point of Interest:
Although this sermon contains some of the canonical sayings of Jesus, there are also some gnostic-like sayings, "For the Lord Himself, being asked by a certain person when his
kingdom would come, said, 'When the two shall be one, and the outside as the inside, and the male with the female, neither male or female'." (2Clem 12:2) This saying is very similar to Gospel of Thomas 22.
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Didache
This early document, also known as The Teaching of the Twelve Apostles, could be dated prior to 70 A.D. and bears many marks of being an early Jewish-Christian document. It opens with what is called "The Two Ways" teaching, a derivative of what is found in Qumran manuscripts and The Manual of Discipline. The Didache also relies on Matthew's gospel and does not put any emphasis on the divinity of Jesus - these characteristics are consistent with the early Jewish movement referred to as Ebionites.
Didache is something of an early Minister's Manual. It gives very practical guidelines for baptism, fasting, prayer, the Lord's Supper (the Eucharist), and how to take care of traveling preachers and prophets.
Point of Interest:
This early document gives us an example of a lack of dogmatism:
The Epistle of Barnabas
The dating for Barnabas is highly disputed, ranging from 70 to 128 A.D. Some early fathers, like Clement of Alexandria, ascribed this document to the Barnabas named in Acts with the apostle Paul. In fact, Clement refers to Barnabas as an apostle and quotes from Barnabas as inspired text. Most scholars do not accept NT Barnabas as the author.
Barnabas has a very negative view of Judaism, believing that the Jews were being punished for crucifying Jesus. The author quotes extensively from the Greek OT and rarely from the NT. The same "Two Ways" teaching found in Didache is found at the end of Barnabas.
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The Letters of Ignatius
Early in the second century, probably during the reign of Trajan, Ignatius, the bishop of Antioch is arrested and is being taken to Rome for trial. Along the way he writes letters to various churches, urging them to remain faithful and to pay respect to the bishop. These letters give us any interesting insight into this period and the development of what is now called monoepiscopacy, the idea of a single bishop over a region.
Points of Interest:
We saw in the chapter on the first century that Ignatius writes against a group that holds to some kind of docetic view of Jesus, an emphasis that denies his humanity. Perhaps to combat this doceticism, Ignatius expresses a strong christology, Johannine in nature, but even more pronounced. This represents a continued confirmation of the early church belief in the divinity of Jesus,
In the letter to the Trallians there is an interesting section that points to a very early witness of what becomes known as the Apostle's Creed:
The Martyrdom of Polycarp
This document tells the story of Polycarp's arrest and martyrdom sometime in the middle of the second century. Polycarp had a large reputation as the bishop of Smyrna - Irenaeus reports that Polycarp had been a disciple of John the Evangelist. The story related in this document is fantastic in nature and becomes part of a growing body of martyrdom accounts.
After being arrested and taken into a stadium to be executed as part of the brutal Roman entertainment, the proconsul urged Polycarp,
Polycarp is 86 years old, yet is treated roughly, urged to renounce Christ, and is threatened with being burned at the stake. His retort to the officials in the face of certain death has inspired generations of believers,
The attendants prepared the fire and as they moved to nail Polycarp to the stake he asked that he be allowed to have his hands free saying that the one who would give him the strength to endure the flames would also give him strength to remain in the fire.
Point of Interest:
This martrydom account became immediately popular among Christians of that age and fueled an already growing martyrdom cult. This will be discussed more fully in the next section, but it is important to mention here that martyrs (literally, witnesses) were being given favored status. Their bones were collected and venerated - stories of healings and miracles happening through the use of prayer and these "relics" circulated. Martyrs in prison were seen as having such a high standing that believers consistently visited them, asking for their prayers - this led to some friction within the local church leadership.
The Shepherd of Hermas
This interesting document was written in Rome sometime before the middle of the second century. The author is Hermas, brother of then bishop of Rome, Pius. This is an apocalyptic document, a series of visions and revelations given to Hermas through an angel, a shepherd.
This document seems to have been written as an encouragement to believers to endure persecution, but had a controversial aspect to it - a second chance for repentence. We will discuss this issue more fully in a later section, Second Repentence, but for now we can simply acknowledge that this caused The Shepherd of Hermas to be rejected by some early fathers.
Questions, Comments or Criticisms:
You can send an email to directly to me Al Baker, CH101.
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go to page 3 - The Spirit of Martyrdom
Questions/Answers
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was athanasius black
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tertullian/paul/marcion
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worship on sunday
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origen and universalism
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water baptism
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wine in ancient world
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fathers on NT Revelation
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fathers on holiness
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fathers on the military
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apostolic succession
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palestine or israel?
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candles in church
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pagan influences
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constantine-Sun worship
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constantine vs donatists
Book Reviews
- church traditions
- book reviews
- Buzzard - the Trinity
- David Bercot books
Biblical Issues
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what is false doctrine?
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pacifism and the NT
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who wrote NT Hebrews
- the trinity
- the apocrypha
- saul the persecutor
- NT, faith, resurrection
- NT and tithing
- Is the NT inspired?
- wine in the bible
Culture and Opinion
- christian tolerance
- faith and certainty
- end of the spear
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