Scott Harrower on the Apostolic Fathers

More information at holyjoys.org/scott-harrower-on-the-apostolic-fathers/.

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SPEAKER_00 0:00

One of the things for us who've been Christians most of our lives for a long time is that the Apostolic Fathers serve to refresh our thinking and invigorate us and motivate us to continue growing as Christians.

SPEAKER_01 0:14

You're listening to a special episode of the Holy Joys Podcast. The following talk was shared with our Ad Fun Taste Reading Group for our 2021 Survey of the Church Fathers. Visit us at holyjoys.org and stay tuned for weekly discussions of theology and ministry practice. All for Holy Happy Church. Alright, I think most of you know me. I'm Jonathan Hartle, one of the uh hosts this evening, and it's an honor to have Dr. Scott Harrer with us. Um, Dr. Fry is going to be introducing here uh in a minute, but I watched a little video uh that Ridley College had on Meet Scott Harrer, and I thought uh he seems like such a genuinely nice person, and uh I am very grateful for his mind and for his work on doctrines like the Trinity. Um, but I was just thinking here before we uh came together that I was challenged by his Christ-like spirit this afternoon. Uh so I thank the Lord for that. And of course, for us Americans, uh, your accent makes everything you say sound 10 times better. So we're really looking forward to it and we'll enjoy it this evening. Uh so very quickly, a few words about our ministry. Holy Joys is devoted to John Wesley's biblical vision of a holy, happy church. Uh, we believe that theology is for the church, especially the local church, and we enjoy helping ordinary believers to see the beauty of doctrine so that they can experience deeper satisfaction in God. This includes a strong commitment to Methodist Catholicity, tapping into the riches of our ancient faith to help serve the needs of the contemporary church. And our Ad Fontes reading group this year has been one of our efforts in this direction. Uh, only a few from our group are able to be with us live this evening, but this will be recorded and a share with the 26 pastors, students, and educators in our group, and then published online for a wider audience. Uh, you can watch for that video at holyjoys.org as well as on the Holy Joys podcast, where Dr. David Fry and I have weekly discussions on theology and ministry practice. We're about to release a series uh of conversations on William Burt Pope's Theology of Provenient Grace. So we would welcome feedback on that as well. Uh, Dr. Fry will be moderating the Q ⁇ A later this evening, and I'll turn it over to him to introduce our speaker.

SPEAKER_03 2:34

Hey, thanks, Jonathan. And again, uh thank you, uh Scott, for being with us tonight. And it's a privilege and honor to have uh Dr. Scott Harrower with us tonight uh for this first and opening session for uh 2021, the Advante's group. And uh, Dr. Harrower is the associate professor, or I think you call it lecturer in Christian theology at Ridley College in Melbourne, Australia. Uh, as I think he mentioned already, uh it's uh nearing high noon there uh in the uh Southern Hemisphere. And uh, but we're glad that this time worked out uh for you to be with us here. Uh Scott holds a PhD from uh Trinity International Uh University in Sysmatic Theology. Uh he and I were uh classmates for a few years together there. Uh he finished uh book before me. Uh and you studied under Graham Cole. Uh I actually started out uh with uh Graham Cole, and then I think he decided to move um out of Chicago and back to uh Australia there. But we have a little bit in common there. Uh good friend uh Dr. Graham Cole. Uh Scott is an ordained uh minister in the Anglican church. Uh so he uh has um experience in in uh actually several countries in ministry, pastoral ministry, and of course uh teaching theology. Uh he specializes in Trinitarian theology and Christology. Uh he uh has published uh actually several books, has uh at least two uh coming out this uh year. I you had at least two come out last year. Right, yeah. Uh God of All Comfort, uh a Trinitarian Response to the Horrors of This World, 2019 with Lexum, uh co-editor of Trinity Without Hierarchy, uh reclaiming Nicene Orthodoxy and Evangelical Theology 2019 with Kriegel. Uh coming up next month, right? Uh co-editor with Michael Byrd, uh the Cambridge Companion to the Apostolic Fathers.

SPEAKER_00 4:31

Yeah, very excited about that one.

SPEAKER_03 4:33

Yeah, I am too. I am too. Very uh excited about uh seeing that. You wrote the the opening chapter for that, and then of course co-edited that. And then you have later uh this year sometime the relevant trinity uh coming out uh by Luxem. Is that correct? When is that coming out?

SPEAKER_00 4:49

Yeah, the uh relevant trinity is uh um an ethics, a work on ethics. Um perhaps not uh later this year, perhaps next year. I'm not too sure, it just depends on on the schedule. But again, it's thinking about Trinitarian theology and the difference God makes uh to everyday Christian living. So you and your group here very interested in holiness and love and Christian character in the world, it's perfectly aligned. It's that kind of thinking. It's very much um Trinitarian thinking.

unknown 5:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 5:20

Good. Look forward to that. And of course, all of that is on top of uh those aren't all of his publications, by the way, uh, but some of the recent ones, and then of course, uh numerous um uh chapters and uh papers that have been uh given and published. And so it's uh yeah, great to have you. Great to see you, Scott. And um we uh I miss our old stopping grounds there uh north side of Chicago. Uh but we look forward to hearing what you have to say. Uh so tonight for those of you who joined us, um uh Dr. Harrow's going to be uh sharing on the state of patristic studies, uh particularly with especially in Apostolic Fathers. Uh he did write that opening chapter in the Cambridge Companion to the Apostolic Fathers. Uh the title of that is Intriguing and Enigmatic Apostolic Fathers Themselves and Current Research on Them. And so uh thank you for coming. Uh, we're going to uh turn this time over to you, and then uh we'll have what I have a few questions. I'm sure Jonathan has a few questions uh that uh you will you will help us with uh here toward the end.

SPEAKER_00 6:26

Great, thank you. Hey, uh look, thanks for your interest in um this group called the Apostolic Fathers. Um the Apostolic Fathers are a bunch of uh documents that are written around the same time as the New Testament or immediately after. Um the Apostolic Fathers include writings such as The Shepherd of Hermes, which you may have heard of, very, very popular with the early church, a devotional work that really pushed the moral life, growth in wisdom, the purity of the church. And then other documents such as the Epistle of Diognetus. Um, this is uh basically an apology that has some unique language to do with the church being throughout the world in the same way that the soul is throughout the body. So there's some documents that were very well enjoyed by the early church, and some that we barely hear about, but they've survived. So what you have is a collection of 11 documents, some of which were very popular, some we don't know that much about, and they've been compiled together in a collection. And the great thing about these documents is that they give us a window into the early church, and it also helps us understand a little bit, um, and I think this is fascinating, about the disciples of the disciples. So when we read um Eusebius's ecclesiastical history, one of the most fascinating things in my mind is reading about Saint John, um the beloved disciple, and his ministry after the ascension of Jesus. It sounds like he was a wonderful mentor. He was a great uh pastor of grace, someone who followed up people, had a deep pastoral compassion for them. And Saint John also was someone who stood for the truth of Jesus Christ. Having spent time with Jesus and his ministry and seen the resurrection, he pushed back very strongly against unchristian views of the resurrection, of the body, of who Jesus was in his ministry. So we read all about that in Eusebius, about the continuing ministry of John and Peter, for example. And what's fascinating is that these documents, the Apostolic Fathers, are documents written around the same time that the disciples of Jesus are discipling others. So we get an insight into the next generations, into what mattered for Christians. So, for example, we have um uh a whole lot of letters uh from Ignatius of Antioch, seven letters. He is known to be uh discipled by Saint John, and also to be a mate and uh writing companion of Polycarp. And Polycarp's letter to the Philippians is also in this collection. So, what you're seeing at the very least is a connection between Ignatius and Polycarp back to Saint John. They were mentored by him. So we can see what John's theology looks like in Ignatius's theology of the church, the importance of holiness and purity, um, and the importance of growing Christian communities centered around Christ as God. That's the key. So you're seeing the theology of John's gospel being expressed through John's successors in communities, in the context of persecution, in relationship to one another. These Christians were writing letters to other Christians all around the Mediterranean basin. So what you see is this continuity between Jesus, his disciples, and the disciples' disciples. And the apostolic fathers, these 11 letters give us insights into what they valued. So, for example, if I turn uh here to um Ignatius writing to the um Tralions, which is one of his uh well-known works, um, you'll see him uh introducing umself as a God-bearer. He'll speak about the love of God the Father in Jesus Christ. He'll move very smoothly into the relationship between various Christian congregations, and these are congregations that give glory to God by imitating God's character. He'll smoothly move on to respecting deacons and to having order in the church. Then he'll follow that on by speaking about gentleness. Um, and he speaks about gentleness, which will destroy the devil and the devil's works. And that's one of the interesting things about the Apostolic Fathers. Character matters. Character is the way by which you undo the very powerful works of the devil against the Christian community. He'll continue to talk about um heaven, about heresy, staying away from heresy. And then there's this wonderful line that I wanted to read out to you today. Um, it's about inseparability. We often talk about union with Christ. He puts it a little uh differently in his turn of language, but it's the same idea. He says that Christians need to be, quote, inseparable from God, from Jesus Christ, and from the bishop and from the injunctions of the apostles. The one who is inside the sanctuary is pure. So what he's saying is that Christians are deeply bound to one another. And that our unity to God isn't just a theoretical unity, but it's a unity that's expressed in purity of life, it's a unity that's expressed in relationships to church order and how we conduct ourselves. So I love the language of inseparability that Ignatius uses here on the Tralans. He uh once again will speak about gentleness as a way to avoid the devil's snares. He uh has a Christological way of speaking about good fruit. So good fruit comes from the overflow of a good heart renewed in Christ. And then there's this fascinating contrast with um death-dealing fruit. Death-dealing fruit, the kind of fruit that the devil brings about in us. What's fascinating about the Apostolic Fathers is how they receive the texts of the New Testament. So, for example, in 1 Peter, 1 Peter talks about sin warring against the devil, right? So these disciples of Peter and John and so forth, they understand theologically, yes, sin damages us, but they'll change the phraseology a bit. So instead of talking about sin wars against the soul, they will talk about it damaging your spirit and sin also uh growing in you, death dealing fruit. So, one of the things for us who've been Christians most of our lives or a long time is that the Apostolic Fathers serve to refresh our thinking and invigorate us and motivate us to continue growing as Christians. Because, in a sense, it's a very similar message, just stated in a different way. So, anyway, this is just an example of one letter. You see the continuity between being in God, connected to one another, which means a connected life in terms of virtue, character, love for one another, and an appreciation of the truth. So here you have these 11 works that represent a flow of tradition from Jesus through to the earliest Christian communities. One of the questions, of course, is about the nature of continuity and discontinuity, which I've begun to cover, across the uh Mediterranean through to India, top of Africa, moving into Nubia, and then into Europe and Spain. And so one of the key issues that David Wilhite from Baylor discusses in this volume is geographic diversity and diversity of belief. That's really one of the key issues in this volume. Um another point that I'd like to pick up is that there's a number of questions about dating to do with the Apostolic Fathers. Some of these works are written about the same time as the latter New Testament documents are composed. So, for example, I might um just uh talk about one clement for a moment. One Clement was probably written in the year 96, so it's um around the same time that Saint John uh is writing his gospel. And one Clement is written from Rome to this kind of motley crew in Corinth. So the same house, church complexes and communities to which St. Paul was writing, one and two Corinthians, um, receives a letter from Clement. And in the year 96, Clement says, Listen, yes, you've got all these young hipsters that want to take over the leadership of your church, but I'll tell you what, there are some godly leaders there who have been serving since the beginning. There's no sin in their lives, there is no reason to depose their leadership. So, what you see in that letter from the house churches in Rome to the Corinthian communities is firstly a concern across the Mediterranean. That's quite a geographic distance. Christians seem to, and a lot of uh authors in early Christianity pick this up, seem to have felt permission to speak into each other's lives because we are one body in Christ. Such is the nature of the union that we have in Christ, is that Christians it's uh have this weird sociological thing. They feel like they can speak into each other's lives and receive each other's message. So we see this, we see this unity in practice. Hey, we want to encourage you to godliness. You've had these long-term godly leaders, don't fall into fads. In the same way that Paul's like, don't buy into the super apostles when he writes uh two Corinthians, same thing when Clement of Rome writes to the uh uh when Clement of Rome writes to the Corinthians in the year 96. So some issues never change, is the second point. Some churches have a DNA that's shaped by their their uh context that needs ongoing input from other churches, and that's an encouragement from us today. Um some of us live in very, very uh secular contexts like Australia, where there's very few Christians. So we really need encouragement from Christians uh from other countries just because there's so few of us. In your context, you might need encouragement from Christians who live in a secular context to provide insight for other issues. So Christians need each other, is one of the big messages. They feel permission to write to each other. A third takeaway from Clement's uh writing to the Corinthians is that the way of Christ, the imitation of Christ, and the way that we live matters as much as doctrine. The apostolic fathers weren't just about ideas, they were about the character of the community, they were about what relationships look like. And these were standout relationships. The Christians were very different to the Roman Empire around them, which is why we have this language of Jesus of salt and light, this language that we see in the New Testament about being stars in darkness or being standout people in a crooked generation. And essentially, in the Apostolic Fathers, there's a number of writings that are promoting Christian conduct and Christian communities to be unique and distinctive. So, on the one hand, uh I've spoken about Ignatius and the chain of continuity between Jesus, John, the Apostolic Fathers and the early communities. I've spoken about one Clement and this idea that Christians are related to one another. There's another one I'd like to talk about before I open it up to questions, and this is the martyrdom of Polycarp. The martyrdom of Polycarp is one of the most important early Christian documents that we have. The martyrdom of Polycarp is an account, it's a story of his arrest. It's the story of his experiences as he's bullied and pressured by Romans to give in to pressure to worship the emperor. And it's a story about what happens when he is burnt at the stake at the end of his life. Why this document is important is that it provided for the early Christians a model of what it looked like to imitate Christ. Very clearly in the document, Polycarp says that he is going to be loyal to God, who has done him no harm over 86 years, and for that reason he is sticking with God no matter what happens to him. And the people that write the account of his capture, trial, and death, note a number of times that Polycarp is suffering according to the gospel. So it's very important for us to notice that when the Christians are developing these new forms of literature, which are exemplary lives, here's someone to imitate. The imitation isn't be merely like Polycarp, but the imitation is to imitate what Polycarp is imitating, which is there's a shape of the gospel. And this shape is to have Christ as Lord above all, be willing to give it up for him, and in the giving up, in the suffering as Christ, you suffer in the same way that he did, i.e., you do it in a blameless manner. You don't punch the German sh soldiers, you don't become a jerk in the suffering. You're you're modeling that you're saved and you are entering into the fullness of salvation and heaven through your martyrdom. So what Polycarp is showing us is that commitment to Christ involves giving up, and it also involves becoming a certain kind of person in the context of suffering, which is when it's hardest to be Christ-like. It's also a bit funny. Um the um Romans and others are calling him an atheist. The whole city is like, do away with the atheist, you know, the one who doesn't believe in the Roman gods. But then he'll flip this onto his Roman captors because he says, Look, if at the end of the day you don't acknowledge the creator who is revealed in Jesus Christ, you're the atheists. Um and this Is you know a little bit of humor inserted into the document. Another reason why Polycarp's martyrdom is so important is that it becomes the standard for other martyrdom accounts. So if you look at the Passion of Perpetua and Felicity, written at the top of North Africa in Carthage in 203, it's a story of two women and their companions who were martyred. But basically, what you can see is that that martyrdom account is following the template that's set out for us in the martyrdom of Polycarp. So one of the important things about the Apostolic Fathers as a body of literature is that just in the same way that they follow the theological template of the New Testament, the Apostolic Fathers set a way and a template that is followed by further Christian writings. So they're a bridge between the New Testament and the Christians of the fourth, fifth, sixth generation. And so, for example, um, one of the things that I really enjoy about studying Christians in the north of Africa and Carthage is that you see in this group that includes Titalian and others, for example, is a very strong continuity with the New Testament and with this corpus, the Apostolic Fathers. They are talking about it, they're engaging with it. Sometimes they they don't um appreciate it. Um, so for example, um some of the early authors are like, it's okay, the shepherd of Homas is great for you to read as a moral story, but it's certainly not scripture. So a distinction is made. Um, some authors uh in the early church were were happy for, say, one clement to be read as wisdom and instruction, but not as scripture. So what you see in the reception of these writings that will then provide a template uh for what's to come is also a weighing up and a sifting of them alongside Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, um, other writings about Jesus, um, and there's a sifting of them in order to say with respect to the apostolic fathers, these are good things, but they're not scripture. So there's a discernment that's gone on in the church in the period after the Apostolic Fathers. So it's a very interesting body of literature. It's not the New Testament, it's very close to it, it's very helpful, but it's not quite scripture. And so, as Christians um and leaders, um I would commend uh these works to you for inspiration and instruction. Um and I uh love this translation here by Rick Brannon. So if you're gonna pick up a uh a copy of the Apostolic Fathers, Rick Brannon is good. I like it because it's very smooth. I like it because he will notice at the bottom in the footnotes what are the biblical uh texts that are in play and being referred to here. Um it's it's uh very nicely produced by our friends at Lexon Press. So I would I would definitely use that one. As you can see, I I write in mine, I make annotations, um, I read it before bed. It's it's just great stuff. So I'd I'd commend this body uh of letters to you for Christian discipleship. The other thing to do would be to read Eusebius's ecclesiastical history. Um he is a historian writing in the 300s, and he gives us wonderful insights into the early church. You can actually even listen to the ecclesiastical history on audiobooks or in podcasts. It's been recorded for free for you. And that's a great way if you've got Eusebius in one ear and the apostolic fathers in another, to get a lovely entree into the second, third, fourth generations of early Christians. Um, so uh I uh I'm happy to pause there and and uh get back to rabbiting on, but maybe you've got some questions.

SPEAKER_03 26:20

Sure. Yeah, I appreciate a couple of things, especially that you emphasize throughout uh you know that survey. One is the uh the deep ethical concern of the Apostolic Fathers. And I know uh our our mutual friend Tom McCall uh has talked about uh actually um I think uh writing a uh a work on on works, uh the place of works uh in the Christian life. Uh so that's that's that's very, very interesting. And uh and then the other thing is you uh you mentioned, uh I think it was in reference to Clement, uh his letter um across the way to to uh the Corinthians, uh the the sense of dependence across those that broad geographic uh area, and that was actually one of my questions I had uh from earlier uh today that I wrote down is uh you know what how how closely related uh is the church and what is the role of obviously here Clement or the other fathers in keeping maintaining those relationships closely?

SPEAKER_00 27:34

Thanks. That is a vital question, David. Um the the early um Christian communities were basically missionary outposts and missionary teams. These missionary um outposts were people's homes, usually, and missionary teams included many bivocational business people. And because they were business people, they moved around and had wide networks anyway. So they were traders and artisans often. And he also had the odd imperial person whose career would be highly mobile, and because um Christians met in homes and it was a religion of intimacy compared to say uh Mithraism or some of the mystery cults, which were kind of impersonal at the end of the day, relationships were built amongst these people who tended to travel. So you've got wide relationships, and as the years go on and people move around, it seems like people are well known. So, for example, if we read the end of Romans, where Paul is commending all his fellow workers, there's a huge number of people and locations that are mentioned, and that seems to be reflected in the Apostolic Fathers. In the same way, David, that you and I knew each other in Chicago, but now we're in far-flung regions of the world, they had similar experiences. They did know each other and they also knew friends of friends. And this is really important in the way that the church addresses heresy and it addresses immorality. Is that if somebody knew a disciple of Jesus and had learnt a certain way of living, that was the reference point. So maybe in our community, say we're in Turkey somewhere, we know one of the disciples of Jesus' disciples, we will stick to them because it's that network of relationships through which the truth is transmitted. That's why the early Christians are so big on bishops, because you could actually identify people who were set aside for ministry by Saint Peter, Saint John, for example. You people were known. And because of their traveling networks, we've got um pretty strong uh evidence in other writings that people met when there were problems. So early on, there's a dispute about um when you should uh celebrate Easter, um, how communion, uh Lord's Supper should be celebrated, for example. And anyway, there's there's meetings in Rome and people get together to resolve these disputes. Because Christians wanted unity, purity, and love in Christ, they actually put a lot of work into it. And if it involved travel or letter writing, they did their best. You you might know that, for example, Irenaeus, I mean, he's not an apostolic father, but he's around at the end of the second century, um, his ministry in southern France uh is a ministry of leadership because he was traveling to meet with other Christians whilst his church gets wiped out. And then he comes back and there's no leaders left, he has to lead. So that's just another insight into the fact that Christians were traveling and meeting with one another to ensure unity. Um, so David, you're right, they were highly mobile, very concerned for one another.

SPEAKER_03 31:12

Thank you, thank you. And um before I ask another question, I want to uh welcome uh Jonathan Arnold, who is our co-host. And uh so if he has a question that is closely related to either where you are in the discussion or a question I have, to go ahead and chime in. And um if there's anyone from the audience that wishes to uh share a question, you can do that in the chat. And uh Jonathan, if you'll just keep an eye on that, um that would be great. Uh because I have my own list of questions here. So let's let me ask a question that I actually didn't have, but I would like to hear um hear your take, particularly as an editor of this uh of the companion that's coming soon. Um I'd like to hear from you what kind of work is being done now, and uh what what has been done here real recently, obviously in in this book too. But um, who who's working in this area and and what what's happening in Apostolic Father Studies now?

SPEAKER_00 32:21

Yeah, sure, no worries. Um so what's happening in Apostolic Uh Father's Studies uh can basically be divided into three general areas. The first one is about context. So the way that Christians related to the Roman Empire and to Judaism in particular is a very important question. Because the Apostolic Fathers, the the sort of um period in which they arise, um the second century, late first second century, is a period of relative stability with respect to the empire and persecution of Christians. So it's sort of a bit of a unique period uh before there's uh these massive persecutions. So knowing about the context helps us understand the works a bit better. The apostolic fathers is also vital for understanding the relationship between Christians and the Jewish communities. Christians came out of Judaism, as you know, but by the time of the Apostolic Fathers, there's more Gentile Christians than Jewish Christians. So there's this question of heritage. On the one hand, the Apostolic Fathers will say, hey, we've got antiquity, our faith isn't a new thing because our God is the creator who revealed themselves to Abraham. Yet on the other hand, in light of Jesus, we're we're no longer to be included in the Jewish community and have been excluded from those communities. So you've got this very tense parting of the ways, as it's called, which happens by 150. So on so one of the big deals in the study of apostolic fathers these days is Roman Empire and the relationship to Judaism. The second main area of interest is the relationship between the apostolic fathers and the New Testament corpus or documents that led to the New Testament. So, for example, what documents in particular were certain apostolic fathers using? So, for example, the the um Didarche, which is essentially a policy and procedure manual, um, is part of this collection. It uses a lot of Matthew, and that's very interesting. It tells us a little bit about the community that put together this document, tells us a lot about the value of Matthew for the second generation of Christians and the third generation in terms of how to live. It even goes through the details of how to baptize people. You know, if you've got warm water, do this, if you've got cold water, do that. If you don't have flowing water, find some water, sprinkle them, etc. etc. So it's quite detailed. Um, so the influence of different New Testament uh documents and traditions with respect to practice is another question. And then there's questions of like, what's the role of the person of Paul or Peter in apostolic documents? Are they templates, are they role models? Well, the interesting thing is actually the role models are people like Polycarp, because by the third generation of Christians, you know, you've actually got some mighty leaders, some really godly people in their midst. So it's not like early Christianity always lives in the wake of, wow, there was a Billy Graham-like figure ages ago. It wasn't that at all. It's like, no, God's raising up great people in our own time. And that's what you'll see in the Passion of Perpetua and Felicity, actually, uh, in 203, is the authors begin by saying, yes, the things in the past are great, but the Holy Spirit is raising up godly people now, and these are the martyrs. And then, you know, they get into the story of Perpetua Felicity and their companions. So there's this idea in the Apostolic Fathers and in the literature after them that God is still active. And we see that as we study who are the exemplary figures that we should imitate. It's Christ imitated in these recent examples. So that's a fascinating area for study. And then the third area for study isn't uh to do with global questions about the apostolic fathers, it's more to do with particulars. So there's a great um essay in this volume by uh Jonathan Lockadu, where he goes through uh the works, the letters of Ignatius, and he talks about the kind of issues that you deal with when you when you work on a discrete uh text within the Apostolic Fathers. Um remember, the what's important about the Apostolic Fathers is that they have a relationship to the disciples. So that's one of the criteria for identifying them. They're related to someone who knew the disciples, and it's also written between you know a hundred and two hundred or thereabouts. So what Jonathan does is he goes in and he asks questions about dating, he asks questions about in the journey to Rome, where the author's writing these seven letters, uh, what we can know about each stop and the nature of the different Christian communities in each stop. And so he takes a deep historical divide, uh dive, sorry, not divide, dive, into each of the seven letters. And so what you find in Apostolic Father studies is that people dive into each text and they find the particulars and they try to look back at how it relates to the New Testament, how it relates to the context of the time, and then its impact going forwards. So, what I've said, for example, about the martyrdom of Polycarp is that it had a massive influence going forward. So each document will bring out its particular interests, and good scholarship on those will follow those themes, locate them in context, and see what was before and what was after them. So they're the main things. It's uh firstly context, Romans, Judaism. Secondly, larger questions of how they relate to the New Testament documents, and then thirdly, there'll be particular issues within each text that needs to be pursued.

SPEAKER_03 38:49

Yeah, wow, that's that's really helpful. That's uh that's good stuff. Um, I think a question was asked as to what author you're referring to. You were talking about a chapter there within the uh the upcoming uh Cambridge Companion. I think you said Jonathan. I didn't catch the book. Jonathan Lockerdoo.

SPEAKER_00 39:05

Yeah, so so is it's L Double O K A D O. He's an American scholar who's working in Korea, and um his essay on uh Ignatius, I think is one of the the real standout uh works in this volume. Um so I I'd commend his work, his work to you. It's excellent.

SPEAKER_03 39:26

Yeah, good, good. I I I have there there's several questions that were raised uh there in that little um that answer there. Uh but I don't want to take I don't want to take all the time, but I do have two that I want to want to ask, and um, and then I want to maybe close with a general question when we get closer to to a closing, and uh that I think is gonna be helpful for for this group moving forward. Uh but let me let me go back to actually something that you wrote in your opening chapter there, as you introduced the apostolic fathers. Uh, you said they're important precursors to to the apologists. Yes. And and so we're gonna be actually moving to the apologists, I think, next month. In fact, uh, is that next month? Um, and and so I'm wondering if uh you have a comment then on that. Did did the apologists uh did they understand that uh that importance uh of those immediate fathers before them as you described described that? And what was the can you talk a little bit about that relationship moving forward then?

SPEAKER_00 40:35

Yeah, so it seems that apologies start quite early. Um, as soon as Christians are converted out of a social group that felt that they had permission to write to authorities, that begins. So Christians start to write to the authorities, whether they are governors or whether they have access to the imperial uh people, um, very early on, and they try to use lots of different metaphors to communicate the goodness of Christianity. So, in a sense, they're following the line of thought set by Luke and Acts, which is we're not a threat to the empire. In fact, we're good for the world. That's something that you'll find in Diagnetus. Christians are good for the world. He says, hey, we look like everybody else, we you know, wear the same clothes and all that kind of stuff, but watch us, we're the kind of people that you want in your empire. One of the questions about the early apologists and the kind of apologetic sections that you find in the Apostolic Fathers is that it's interesting to note that at the same time that they're writing to officials, it's very clear that they're also writing this as literature to be circulated in Christian communities. So, in the same way that John Calvin's institutes are actually addressed to the king, well, really they're also very beneficial for Christians, right? So the early apologists are writing to officials, but they're also writing to Christians that the Christians understand the kind of language, the kind of examples that may be used to communicate the healthiness of Christianity and the fact that Christians aren't a threat, but actually are the way for the Roman Empire to find um true religion, um, true life, as they would call it. Good.

SPEAKER_03 42:28

Yeah. Uh we have a question here. Uh, Jonathan, do you want to share that question?

SPEAKER_01 42:32

From uh Paul Kaufman?

SPEAKER_03 42:34

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 42:35

Yeah, so related to um what he calls racy interpretations by uh Iron A. S. Eusebius occasionally. Um, and um yeah, definitely challenges some of our you know modern sensibilities. He cites an example here. I'm not sure if you're able to see the text there uh to read the citation, but uh apostolic preaching uh 77 states that Pilate bound him, brought him as a present to Herod. His citation um refers to um speaking of carrying the I think there's a typo there, the thing itself shall be carried to Assyria as a tribute to the great kind. Um not quite sure what he's what he's getting at there, but but a jump in interpretation. This one's a little easier to get a hold of here. Uh Eusebius arrives at 318 bishops at the Council of Nicaea from the 318 servants of Abraham in Genesis 14, 13. Um, so how do how do we justify some of these big jumps?

SPEAKER_00 43:31

Okay, it is totally true that the early Christians loved their numbers. That's it's just a thing. Uh, they love the number seven. Uh and later Christians do this too, you know, seven virtues, seven vices, for example. The big idea is that Christians are trying to show a strong continuity between the Old Testament, the New Testament, and their history. So, I what I love about this is that they're trying to say we live in the same one world as the God who worked in the Old Testament, who continues to be known as Father, Son, and Spirit in the New, and works today. And what they do in their racy interpretations, where they notice connections, and there might just be numbers between their day and the old testament, they're trying to say, oh, it's the same picture. We live in the same world. It's the same God who's working and he has tendencies. He he loves, you know, um the number seven or ten. But also, God, and this is important for the early Christians, God will deliberately put markers in the Old Testament, funny numbers like 40,000 or um or 10,000, and he'll put markers in texts or or say things that are unclear so that when you read them, you stop and you go, Whoa, what's this? And then you have to think about it and make a connection to today. So Origen was huge on that. When you read unusual things in the Old Testament, it's a pointer from the Spirit Himself to stop, think about it, and see how that text applies to today. So the big burden is that scripture is highly relevant to your life. That's the burden. Now, they I think have done it in some fanciful ways. But I tell you what, if I had to choose between Christians who connect the Old and New Testament to their life today and those who don't, or who don't do it very strongly, I'd go with the ones who are seeking connection. I really would. And and it another point to make is the connections aren't just, oh, a number over there, a number over here. It's 330 back there, 330 in the present or the near present. But that three that number will be interpreted within the framework of a rule of faith. So it's that interpretation isn't going to go nuts. Because what they're wanting to say, for example, with the example of the Council of Nicaea, oh, look, there's the same number of bishops that's been anticipated. Great, but the big point is about God's providence. That's the big point. So God is providentially at work, he's providentially in our lives and the life of the larger church. So the numerology serves a larger theological purpose, which is very pastoral. So in my mind, it is fanciful, but the deeper theological point is usually healthy. And I'd also finally say, look, this isn't scripture, because they do things that are um a little bit unusual and sometimes unhelpful. So that's why this literature, in my view, and in the Anglican prayer book, we we have um a statement of faith, and in the statement of faith, we go, look, there's lots of other Christian literature that's helpful for faith, has wisdom, but it's not scripture, so it's not to be taken as a basis for doctrine. So that's that's what you're dealing with in the Apostolic Fathers. There's continuity and there's discontinuity, and we need to uh be wise in how we take it on.

SPEAKER_01 47:23

Yeah, just very quickly here, uh quick clarifying uh question. I think Paul specifically was wondering uh about how to relate these to other schools of interpretation. So he mentions the Alexandrian school, you know, we expect those kind of leaps. Um, but you know, what about these non-Alexandrian uh early interpreters and how do we kind of relate those to those interpretive schools?

SPEAKER_00 47:47

Yeah, so we can talk about you know um the Antiochan school, which is uh flatter and less fanciful. I guess what I'd say in general about the Apostolic Fathers is that they get fancy when they're using illustrations. Um so there's an illustration of the phoenix that's used using the Apostolic Fathers, but mostly they're pretty straight up. They're mostly pretty straight up. They uh will draw together texts and and mash them up in paragraphs. So when talking about the the moral life, for example, Ignatius will very quickly put together texts from one Peter and uh one Corinthians, um uh no worries, and remix them. But the remix isn't terribly fanciful, it's a remix that's coherent, uh, and remember it's a remix that they are making in contact with people that knew Jesus. So their personal contacts would have kept a check on the way that these draw they draw their text together. So they're not terribly fanciful in the use of scripture itself, but they're a little fanciful in their illustrations sometimes.

SPEAKER_01 49:04

Very helpful. Thank you. Uh quickly, if I can ask a question of my own. I'm just starting to get into um the Apostolic Fathers and trying to understand uh kind of their conception of the way the church is governed. So just from a very practical standpoint, I'm pastoring in a context where I have some flexibility now. I'm trying to figure out, you know, what do we do going forward? And uh how does this inform those decisions? So uh I kind of had a concept from reading Irenaeus that, you know, really early we had bishops developing. Um, but I'm I'm noticing like in the Vidicae, I don't know if I'm pronouncing that correctly, but um in chapter 15 it mentions appointing uh bishops plural in Shepherd of Hermas, it talks about the elders plural who are in charge of the church, seems to indicate plurality there, kind of a more Presbyterian perspective. And then I'm reading a book by um John Bear where he seems to argue that early on it was more of a Presbyterian government, more plurality of elders. So I wonder what your thoughts were on that and how that develops uh between the Apostolic Fathers and then into Irenaeus and later later fathers.

SPEAKER_00 50:08

Sure. So from Judaism, they certainly um drew this idea that you would have these teachers, but also groups of elders that ruled synagogues and so forth. And you're right, it seems that in these early Christian house churches, you'd have the the host of the house in whom they would meet, but you'd have a group of elders and also a visiting bishop for an area, essentially. So Clement was the um overseer or bishop, uh representative of the churches in Rome. So it seems that you have um that system early on. You've got the bishop in the area, elders. And then uh what you see in the early fathers in Ignatius is the development of bishop, priest, deacon. That's pretty early. And you have a differentiation between priest and deacon, uh, where early on there's some sort of flexibility in how people talk about the roles of elder, priest, deacon. Um, so what you find is a threefold ministry in Ignatius. I think the thing we need to be mindful of is um it depended on the context. It depended on uh whether or not you could travel. It depended on whether or not you're a little city relatively, like Rome, where it's easy to get around, or whether you know you've got a bishop in outer Turkey, but really he's essentially based in three house churches. So his ministry as a bishop is very different to the bishop of Rome. So it's a little bit contextually driven, but it does seem that there is this bishop, priest, deacon hierarchy, and like Presbyterians today, they were in conversation with one another for Christian support, which is why we have all these letters, and also to keep a check on each other, to be to be frank. I need to add one important point. The reason why the bishops were so important was that they knew Jesus, or they were the disciples of the disciples of Jesus, so they were the point of continuity. So in the early church, you've got this uh continuity between Jesus, his disciples, bishops, and congregations. We don't have that today. So that's one key point of differentiation is that we don't have that immediate continuity with Jesus and his disciples in the same way. We have continuity with Jesus, we're united with him, we have continuity with his disciples, we have their writings, and we even have the writings of the disciples' disciples. So we are in continuity, but it's not just the bishop who has that lived experience of Jesus or Jesus' disciples. It's actually something that the priesthood of believers have. So that alters the discussion a little bit. I should say that um a lot of uh what the early Christians did in terms of um groups is is very healthy when you think about Paul's metaphor of the body of Christ. So um, yeah, a great thing to be exploring, Jonathan. I commend you for wanting to follow a biblical and early Christian model of Christian leadership.

SPEAKER_03 53:38

Appreciate it. Thank you. Yeah, yeah, very interesting. Yeah, I have all sorts of uh ecclesiological questions, uh, but we don't have time for that. I I want to throw this out, uh, and uh we have about four four or five minutes here. Um I'm interested more broadly in hearing your uh how you would answer or direct us as people who are perhaps operating in a different theological domain than patristic studies or uh even church history or historical theology. Um what are some best practices in both retrieval theology for those of us who may be more historically uh oriented, but then also for those who may be operating out of a different theological domain, such as Old Testament or or or even New Testament, uh practices for retrieval theology.

SPEAKER_00 54:43

Thank you, um David, that's great, and I'm really glad talking about this. Um so retrieval theology is is is a mindset, a Christian mindset that recognizes that there's great wisdom in the past. So we want to go back and see, for example, what uh wisdom Saint Augustine might have to bear on our interpretation of Matthew's gospel or what Saint Augustine might say about how to handle the passions, you know, when we're suffering from temptation. There's great wisdom there. So I think the key with retrieval theology is firstly to have an empathetic reading that reads the past on their own terms first. Um if you try to go in um wanting them to merely affirm what you've read in in contemporary Christian leadership, you're not going to find that and you're gonna find it very annoying because they won't say exactly the same thing in exactly the same way. So it's a little bit, I use this analogy in my classes a lot, it's a little bit like being on a on a camp and you're sitting around a fire with other people. You just have to take them on their own terms, and these people are full-orbed um human beings with their own particularities and quirks, but they're a gift to us. So the key is to recognize where is that gift that God has for us today through each other. The second thing I'd like to say is that the discipline of history can be a little bit um picky, and people make careers out of saying outlandish things. So we've all seen the um History Channel documentary where you know Jesus never existed or you know uh Mary never existed or whatever. That's how people make money. So please be very um thoughtful when you're doing retrieval theology to be guided by good uh historians who don't need to make a career out of saying wacky things. Uh so there's a very well-known case recently where one historian said, Oh no, Chris, early Christians not persecuted, not persecuted. And so that's the CNN headline. Christians never persecuted, you know, all history is lies. Um, and what this historian was saying was they weren't persecuted, they were prosecuted. I get it, cool, right? Sells books, gets you on CNN, a lot of clickbait. That is part of the industry. Follow a wise guide, is what I would say. And there were some well-known Christian historians that don't need to make careers, um, be following uh those kind of historians. So I think you need to be a bit judicious in who your guides are, David, um, as well. Also, let me commend working across denominations in terms of retrieval uh theology. I'm an Anglican, um, but for example, Wesleans have been great in guiding me into the Wesleyan tradition and what we can learn there. Some Roman Catholics have been very helpful for getting into Irenaeus and St. Augustine in particular. So it's worth being open-minded within the Christian um family to uh to different denominations and to receive their wisdom as well. Um and what you're you're doing in your group, um, Jonathan and David, is fantastic. Having friends with whom to chew over these things is really good just to help us clarify what we're actually thinking, what what we think we've read. Um it's it's the way to do it. It's in groups, it's not just to sit there in your own study and try to work out the universe yourself. So I commend you what you're doing. Sure.

SPEAKER_03 58:26

Well, that's a very good uh ecclesial uh direction there uh to be uh maintaining conversation uh regardless of our theological domain and whether it's studying uh the Apostolic Fathers or other church early church fathers together, or even reading uh scriptures together.

SPEAKER_02 58:45

I think that's a really good idea. Thank you for listening to the Holy Joys Podcast. Email your questions to podcast at holyjoys.org, and they may be featured on a future episode. Our labors for a Holy Happy Church are supported by generous listeners like you. Please pray about partnering with us at holyjoys.org forward slash donate.