H. Dodwell, Dissertatio secunda ad S. Cypriani epistolam quartam vigesimam, De presbyteris doctoribus

SECOND DISSERTATION ON SAINT CYPRIAN'S TWENTY-FOURTH LETTER,

BY DODWELL.

ON PRESBYTER-TEACHERS, THE TEACHER OF HEARERS, AND ECCLESIASTICAL EMBASSIES.

§ 1. Presbyter-teachers older than Cyprian, of the first rank of dignity in the Church. — § 2. Contemporaries of the Apostles, derived from the Scribes, the teachers of the Jews. — § 3. Their office founded on an extraordinary gift. — §§ 4, 5, 6. That office of teaching did not belong to all presbyters, as is commonly thought. — § 7. In approving the teacher of hearers Cyprian consulted the presbyter-teachers alone. — § 8. The hearers are the same as the catechumens. — § 9. They also used the word catechumens. Whence the name of hearers is derived. — § 10. The instruction of catechumens corresponded to the mysteries. — § 11. The teacher of hearers was, for Cyprian, a subdeacon. Of Pantaenus, Clement of Alexandria and Origen, catechists in the school of Alexandria. — § 12. The ministers of the lower orders are in Cyprian now counted under the common name of the Clergy, now excluded from it. — § 13. All Cyprian's embassies, and the others mentioned in his Letters. — § 14. Embassies sent by clerics, and these, for the most part, in pairs, and in Cyprian's age seldom above the subdiaconate. — § 15. Other embassies older than Cyprian, those of Clement of Alexandria and of Irenaeus. — § 16. The embassies of the Church of Smyrna, of Polycarp's and Ignatius's time, more honourable than those of Cyprian. — § 17. The embassies of the Apostolic age. — § 18. Shaped according to the customs of the law of hospitality. — § 19. The Apostles, when travelling, were received by the Churches as governors of provinces were wont to be received by their provincials. — § 20. The embassies of that age most honourable.

§ 1.— Or when, together with the presbyter-teachers, we were carefully testing the readers, we appointed Optatus among the readers as teacher of the hearers. This office of presbyter-teachers is to be observed, which did not first arise in Cyprian's time, but was in truth carried down from the Apostles to his times. Tertullian, older than Cyprian, mentions it. (Prescription against Heretics, ch. 3.) « What then, he says, if a bishop, if a deacon, if a widow, if a virgin, if a teacher, if even a martyr, shall have fallen from the rule; shall heresies for that reason seem to hold the truth? »

Here he mentions this gift in such a way as plainly to distinguish it from the ecclesiastical offices of the episcopate and the diaconate. For what follows are gifts of persons, not of offices; and these are themselves so distinguished from one another by degrees that the teacher holds the degree next to the martyr, and is superior in dignity not only to widows but to virgins as well. The same writer later: « Is there indeed, he says, some brother, a teacher, endowed with the grace of knowledge? » etc. The martyr Saturus, a contemporary of Tertullian, mentions Aspasius, a presbyter-teacher at odds with Optatus the bishop. (In the Acts of Perpetua and Felicity, in the Vision of Saturus.) Hermas mentions them in various places, book I, vision 3: « Those stones that are square and white, and fit together at their joints, are the apostles, and bishops, and teachers, and ministers, who have walked in the clemency of God and have exercised the episcopate, and taught, and ministered holily and modestly to the elect of God, those who have fallen asleep and those who still are, and have always agreed with them, and had peace among themselves, and listened to one another. » It is strange what Blondel draws from this passage, that bishops and teachers were the same; as though those words, and have exercised the episcopate, were to be referred to the teachers, and not rather to the bishops themselves, who had also come before them: especially since there occur in the same place those words, and taught, which correspond most fittingly to the teachers. That bishops were for the most part furnished with this gift is indeed most likely, on account of the Apostle's precept by which he wills a Bishop to be διδακτικὸν [apt to teach] (1 Tim. 3:2; 2 Tim. 2:24), and hence that from among the presbyters that one in particular was promoted to the honour of the episcopate who was known to be endowed with that gift. But we have already seen examples of presbyter-teachers too, so that it is not therefore necessary that he who was a teacher should also become a bishop. Blondel refers us in vain to those authors who flourished after the gift of the teacher's office had died out in the Church. But let us return to our Hermas. The same again, book II, Mandate 4: « Even now, Lord, I have heard from certain teachers that there is no other repentance, etc. » Book III, Similitude 9: « But the forty Apostles and teachers

are of the preaching of the Son of God.' Afterwards: "And he said: Because these apostles and teachers who preached the name of the Son of God, when, having His faith and power, they had died, preached to those who had died before." Again: "But of the eighth mountain, on which there were very many springs, in which every kind of the creation of God was watered, such are those who believed the apostles, whom the Lord sent into the whole world to preach; and certain teachers who preached and taught chastely and sincerely, etc." From all of which we also understand what that teaching was from which the teachers had their name, namely that office of preaching, as Hermas puts it, and also that their dignity was so great that they are, for the most part, joined with the apostles.

§ 2.—Mention of these teachers also occurs frequently in the Sacred Scriptures: Acts 13:1, "of prophets and teachers"; 1 Cor. 12, "first of apostles, secondly of prophets, thirdly of teachers", before the other extraordinary χαρίσματα [gifts] of the Spirit, vv. 28-29; Eph. 4:11, "of apostles, of prophets, of evangelists, of pastors and of teachers". Evangelists and pastors are inserted here; gifts proper to the New Testament, and not to be traced from Pentecost, at which time the Spirit was poured out. For evangelists were necessary at that time when the gospel was to be carried over to outsiders, which I do not know whether it happened before the story of Cornelius; it can certainly scarcely be that it preceded the death of Stephen and the persecution stirred up on that occasion. The office of pastors was then necessary, when the alms of the Church were to be distributed to the poor. For that very distribution is ποιμαίνειν [to shepherd], 1 Pet. 5:2, according to what we argued above. Thus it will come about that, of the original gifts, the next place after the prophets is to be assigned to the teachers. For the pattern of this office was derived from the synagogue itself into the Church. Indeed they too had their own Rabbis, καθηγηταί [guides], συζητηταὶ τοῦ αἰῶνος τούτου [disputers of this age], Scribes, νομικοί [lawyers], νομοδιδάσκαλοι [teachers of the law] (for they are distinguished by all these titles), who are also called simply διδάσκαλοι [teachers], Luke 2:46. That this office was also a very honourable one among them is clear from Rom. 2:18-21. So that it was necessary for the Saviour to warn His disciples about it, lest they should canvass for that title. Yet there is a suspicion that this ambition too, together with the office, crept in among the Christians, St James 3:1.

§ 3.—Now just as all the offices of the Church in those first beginnings were administered by the extraordinary help of the Holy Spirit, it is certain that the same happened in this office too. The word ἔδωκε [He gave] in Eph. 4:11 indicates this, for it is to be referred to the passage of Ps. 67:19, cited in v. 8: "He gave gifts to men." Therefore teachers too are to be reckoned among those δόματα [gifts]. Accordingly, among the χαρίσματα [gifts] of the Spirit we have διδασκαλία [teaching], Rom. 12:6-7; προφητεία [prophecy] and διδαχή [teaching], 1 Cor. 14:6, in plainly the same form in which we saw above προφῆται [prophets] and διδάσκαλοι [teachers] joined together. Again, ibid., διδαχή [teaching], v. 26. Nor was the character of the African teachers any different, as is shown by what we produced above from Tertullian (Prescription, ch. 14); in which the one whom he calls a teacher,

he says that the same man was endowed with the grace of knowledge. For we have proved that charismata of the Spirit of this kind endured down to the times of our Cyprian. I confess indeed that in that age the use of extraordinary gifts was present in the administration of ordinary offices also. But that this office of teachers was in truth no less extraordinary than the very gift of teaching, we infer from this, that as gifts of this sort failed, the office itself also gradually fell into disuse. For no mention of it occurs in the canons of later centuries. Nor indeed is it anywhere in the N. T. joined with the ordinary offices of bishop, presbyter or deacon, but with those extraordinary ones of apostles, of prophets and of miracles, which all confess to have long since ceased. Nor do the fathers of the fourth century and after have even faint traces from the received customs of their own century from which to write about their office, but, just as we do, they conjecture from the text alone and from the writings of the ancients. Let the Independent brethren therefore consider on what reasoning they judge that this office should be continued, when nevertheless they themselves do not deny that those gifts, on which we have proved it rested, have ceased.

§ 4.—It must be noted moreover that, when Cyprian mentions Presbyter teachers, he at the same time hints that there were certainly others from the presbytery who were not teachers. For there was no need for him to distinguish presbyter teachers from bishops who were likewise teachers, he who wrote these things being himself a bishop. Nor did any others than the presbyters have a place in the examination of those who were to be promoted into the clergy. The same applies to Saturus, when he calls Aspasius a presbyter teacher. Since therefore we have learned from Hermas that that office of teaching was the same as that of preaching, it plainly follows that it did not belong to all presbyters to preach in the Church, much less was it so essential to the presbyteral office as the schismatics of today think, so that he who has not performed that office is not even to be held a presbyter. Nor indeed was this to be ascribed to the error of more recent centuries. That the same held even under the apostles is evident from 1 Tim. 5:17, although they wrongly infer that those presbyters who presided (προεστῶτας), who were other than those labouring in word and teaching, were laymen. As to why they so infer, they have no support from the text, none from the received customs of that century. It follows therefore that not even the apostles themselves required that gift beforehand in those to be ordained, nor did it have a place among the charismata conferred by the very imposition of hands; nor yet did God Himself, by Whose will all things were then done, and Who was doubtless not going to fail the Church in things necessary, institute this office in such a way that this gift was altogether necessary for its administration.

§ 5. — Since, moreover, Christians for the most part borrowed their usages from the received customs of their age, I hardly think there was any example in which the office of teaching was necessarily joined with the priesthood. We have said that the Jews had scribes and rabbis, these doubtless from the priestly tribe. Yet it was far from being the case that the whole priestly family were scribes or rabbis. The order of scribes from the Egyptians perhaps

the Jews received. For those people had their own hierogrammateis, men most skilled and most learned in sacred matters, so that it is most likely that they were priests. Yet not all priests were hierogrammateis on that account; rather this dignity seems to have belonged to a few, although a third part of the Egyptian people was priestly. The same must be determined concerning the hierogrammateis and hieromnemones of the Athenians too and of other nations, so that it must have been without precedent if they had nevertheless judged that these two offices, so different from each other, ought to be joined together. Yet there were very few things, if any at all, that were introduced by the Christians without precedent.

§ 6. — Since, therefore, we have proved that neither by institution nor even in fact were all presbyters endowed with the gift of teaching, it plainly follows that those who lacked that gift were so far from being bound to teach that they ought rather to have refrained from that office of teaching. For this is what the Apostle urges, that with whatever gift anyone had been furnished, to that alone he should apply himself, Rom. 12:6, 7, 8, etc.: "That each should be wise unto sobriety, and to each according as God has divided the measure of faith, v. 3; that by a certain counsel God has so distributed [His gifts] that no one himself has all the gifts, but one makes up the defects of another, and so all are mutually necessary to one another, that there be no SCHISM in the body (1 Cor. 12:18, 24, 25)." If therefore all who lacked any gift ought not even to exercise it, it follows that those to whom the gift of teaching had been denied ought not even to have taught. We acknowledge meanwhile, according to the Apostle's mind, that if any are endowed with both gifts, both of presiding and of teaching, they are deservedly worthy of that double honour of which he speaks. Nor have these things been argued by us with the intent of patronizing idleness, if anyone is not bound to the other necessary offices of the Church. Nor do we think that the Apostle wished this, or the primitive Church. Rather I would think it a matter for rejoicing and congratulation if any Church had such presbyters, all of whom could so satisfy this office of teaching that they would neither perform that very thing unbecomingly nor neglect other things. But that our adversaries make it a pretext for schism if any who lack this gift are admitted into sacred orders, or are occupied with other cares of the Church equally necessary, so that they cannot watch over this care alone; that they also neglect the remaining duties, the daily public prayers, the visitation of the faithful, the instruction of catechumens, the celebration of the sacraments, the viatica of the dying, because on the pretext of this one office they leave themselves not even spare time for discharging the remaining offices: these things are indeed so far from apostolic, so far from conformable to primitive Christianity, that they are not even to be approved.

§ 7. — We see further that in approving this teacher of the hearers no other presbyters than teachers were consulted by Cyprian. And it is indeed quite likely that the same was observed by him in other cases too, so that in whatever matter each had excelled, in that he judged him to be consulted. Accordingly he is to be understood thus when

he records that all his acts from the very beginning of his episcopate were done by the common counsel of the presbyters, so that in each matter he excluded from his counsel no one whom the matter concerned, and also admitted all when the matter was of concern to all. This indeed was required by that apostolic rule about gifts (which we mentioned just now), that with whatever gift each had been endowed, he should devote himself solely to its exercise, and not meddle in other matters having nothing to do with his gift. It follows also that the gift by which the hearers were to be taught was the same as that by which the faithful were to be taught, since in appointing a teacher of the hearers he consulted the presbyter-teachers.

§ 8.—There were indeed other hearers in the ranks of the penitents, who, when they had heard the Scriptures and the teaching (didaskalia), were to be excluded from the assemblies. And these were indeed contemporaries of our Cyprian, if the canonical epistle of Gregory Thaumaturgus is to be believed. But of these no trace survives in the African Church, so far as I know, especially in that age. Nor did they have teachers other than the faithful. For those hearings at which these were present were common to all the faithful. Nor indeed, by the usage of the African Church, were there hearers other than catechumens. We have already seen above that those who were catechumens to the Roman clergy, Ep. 3, were the same as hearers to Cyprian, Ep. 13. And it is also established from Tertullian, than whom there is no better interpreter of Cyprian. In him hearers are set against the dipped, in which sense to be dipped means the same for him as to be baptized (On Penitence, ch. 6, 7). He calls the same people auditors, and mentions also their apprenticeship, so that no one may doubt that they are none other than catechumens.

§ 9. — And indeed this very name of hearers seems to have been the most frequent. Yet there are not lacking, in that age also, examples in which the same people are called catechumens, and indeed among Latin writers too. We have already said that the Roman clergy used this name of catechumens. Cyprian himself also used it, Testimonies book 3, ch. 98; and Tertullian, On the Soldier's Crown, ch. 2; and Prescription, ch. 41. This name at length, in the fourth century of St Augustine and thereafter, alone prevailed. As for the name of hearers, I think it was certainly drawn from the sacred text, namely from those places in which faith itself is so often called akoē, which the ancient interpreters too rendered auditus, "hearing". Thus: faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word (Rom. 10:17); the hearing of faith (Gal. 3:2, 5); the word of the hearing of God (1 Thess. 2:13). And the Apostle derived it from the Old Instrument, Isa. 53:1: Who has believed our hearing? For so the interpreters of Tertullian and Cyprian too read that passage. And the Apostle has referred us to that passage of Isaiah in the most explicit words, Rom. 10:16. The common akroamata of the gentiles have nothing to do with this, being for the most part entertainments. Yet perhaps those things of the philosophers have to do with it which were entrusted to none but those about to be initiated, after the pattern of the mysteries.

§ 10.—That pattern of the mysteries was certainly reproduced by the whole method of instructing catechumens. Those about to be initiated took up a new pattern of living (Meurs.,

Eleusin., ch. 17). And indeed Clement of Alexandria is wholly occupied with it in the most ancient of his catechetical works that we have today, namely the Paedagogus. There were also in the Stromata ritual books to be read first, and then copied out, by those to be initiated (Id., ib., ch. 10). And indeed Cyril of Jerusalem and others treat in their Catecheses of the rites of baptism, of the adherence and the renunciation, of the turning towards the east and the west, etc.

§ 11. — It must be observed, finally, that that teaching of the hearers pertained to the office of the subdiaconate. That teaching of the hearers was the same for Optatus as the reading was for Saturus, who was to be promoted to the grade of reader, namely a preliminary trial of the office to come. In the Alexandrian school of catechesis, or of sacred words, the same function was perhaps sometimes assigned to presbyters. Pantaenus is commonly thought to have been a presbyter, although I do not really know whether any of the ancients calls him so (Euseb., Hist. Eccl. 5.10; 6.3, 6). Clement, his successor in that function, is called a presbyter by Alexander, Bishop of Jerusalem (Euseb., Hist. Eccl. 6.11). But by the time that letter was written by Alexander, Origen seems already to have succeeded in his place, so that it is accordingly not certain whether he was a presbyter while he himself was discharging that function. Yet it is certain that this function was not necessarily annexed to the presbyterate, since Origen was raised to it by Demetrius when he was only in his eighteenth year of age, at which time it is not certain that he had been initiated even into those inferior orders which they hold to be sacred. It is certain that the presbyterate was not received by him before his journey to Achaea under Alexander Severus. And this was perhaps instituted with the intention that the faithful, since they had already been received into the bosom of the Church, ought accordingly to have a teacher who would be a priest at least in the estimation of the Church. For that that grace of knowledge, with which Tertullian said the teacher must be endowed, belonged to priests is clear also from the prescription of the old law, Mal. 2:7. For not only the present-day old interpreter but Cyprian himself also used that very word "knowledge" in that place. But for instructing the catechumens, who were situated outside the Church, even a layman sufficed, whom nevertheless, for honour's sake, they chose as next to the clergy. Especially since, from what we have argued above concerning their opinion, it is clear that even the common run of Christians so excelled any outsiders whatever in holiness that, if they were compared with them, they would deservedly be held as priests.

§ 12. — It must be observed, moreover, from this same passage of Cyprian, that readers and subdeacons too were reckoned under the general title of clerics. He clearly hints at this when he says that writing to the Roman clergy must be done through clerics, and that for that very reason Saturus had been appointed reader, and Optatus subdeacon, by him. By a similar example Felicianus the acolyte is called a cleric, Ep. 55. As regards readers too, whose grade was nevertheless lower than the subdiaconate, the same is clear from the letters of the same [Cyprian] concerning Aurelius and Celerinus, who were advanced by him to the honour of the lectorate. Concerning Aurelius he writes thus, Ep. 33: "In clerical ordinations, dearest brothers, we are accustomed

to consult you beforehand, etc." Therefore Aurelius too was both a cleric and ordained. "He deserved," he says, "such lower grades of clerical ordination." So here too there was a certain grade of clerical ordination. Again: "Know, therefore, most beloved brethren, that he has been ordained by me and by the colleagues who were present; which I know that you both gladly welcome and wish that very many such men be ordained in our Church." Of Celerinus he says thus, Ep. 34, that he is worthy: "That he who had sublimely confessed Christ should afterwards adorn the clergy of Christ with ecclesiastical ministries." Again he speaks of the same "Celerinus, our brother," he says, "glorious alike in virtues and in conduct, joined to our clergy not by human suffrage but by divine favour." Yet the same man, in this very letter which we have in hand, says that the reader Optatus is merely next to the clergy, and numbers him among those who were being prepared for the clergy. And in his letters, whether issued in the name of the clergy or addressed to the clergy, nowhere does mention occur of any others besides presbyters and deacons. Who does not see that he uses the name of clergy now more loosely, now more strictly, according to the custom of the age, so that those who in one sense are called clerics are, if they are compared with others, to be reckoned among the laity? We could observe the same of the more recent canons of the Church. But we have resolved for the present to treat of the times of Cyprian, or even earlier ones.

§ 13. — Also worthy of observation is the custom of that age in ecclesiastical embassies. For they were most observant of rank, both of those by whom and of those to whom they were sent. The first embassy of Cyprian to the Romans was sent through Clementius the subdeacon; of which we have mention in Ep. 3, 4, 15. The second is this one to the Roman clergy through Saturus the reader and Optatus the subdeacon. He mentions it in this very letter and in Ep. 29 and 32. The third, to the same clergy through Fortunatus the subdeacon, Ep. 30. The fourth, of Novatian to Cyprian concerning his own ordination, through Maximus the presbyter and Augendus the deacon, and also a certain Machaeus and Longinus, of what order they were is not established, Ep. 41. The fifth, of Cyprian with a synod, to examine the ordination of Cornelius, through the bishops Caldonius and Fortunatus, Ep. 41, 42, 45. The sixth, of Cyprian privately to Cornelius through Primitivus the presbyter, Ep. 41. The seventh, of the same to the same through Mettius the subdeacon and Nicephorus the acolyte, Ep. 42, 43, 44. The eighth, of Cornelius to Cyprian through Augendus the confessor, Ep. 48. What place, however, he held in the Church is not clear. The ninth, of Antonianus to Cyprian through Quintus the presbyter, Ep. 52. The tenth, of Cornelius to Cyprian through Saturus the acolyte, Ep. 55. The eleventh, of Cyprian to Cornelius through Felicianus the acolyte, the same letter. The twelfth, of Pomponius the bishop with a synod to Cyprian through brother Paconius, Ep. 62; but his rank is not recorded either. The thirteenth, of the Churches of Asturica and Emerita through their bishops Felix and Sabinus, Ep. 68, in that case in which there had been dispute about the episcopate itself. For substituted

were these men in the places of Martialis and Basilides, the libellatici. Fourteenth: that of Quintus, a bishop of Mauretania, to Cyprian as primate, by Lucianus, perhaps a presbyter, Letter 71. Fifteenth: that of Cyprian, but, as it seems, in the name of the whole African Church, to Firmilian, the chief bishop, as it seems, of Cappadocia, by Rogatianus the deacon, Letter 75. Sixteenth: finally, and also the last, that of Cyprian himself, when already placed in exile, to his colleagues, likewise bishops and the same men labouring in the mines, by Victorius Herennianus the subdeacon, and Lucanus, Maximus and Amantius, acolytes, Letters 78, 79, 80.

§ 14. Those words of Cyprian, moreover, are to be noted: 'And since it was necessary for me to write by clerics,' etc. From which it is clear that, according to the custom of that age, ecclesiastical embassies were to be entrusted to none other than clerics. This was done perhaps for this reason, that greater credit might attach to messengers carrying reports to and fro. Cyprian certainly took it very hard, when in Letter 3 he held [the letter] of the Roman clergy suspect, that the credit of a clerical letter should thus be in difficulty, lest perhaps it had been corrupted by some falsehood and fraud. I know indeed that a clerical letter can be the name both for that which had been written by the Roman clergy (Letter 4) and for that which was handed to Clementius the subdeacon, himself also a cleric, as envoy. But in truth, in this passage the credit of the messenger alone, not likewise that of the writers, was called into doubt. Therefore those envoys too were clerics, about whose rank there is otherwise no certainty. And if acolytes, and any other ministers of the lower orders, undertook embassies, it must be that they too, by this very argument as well, were counted among the clerics. Let it also be noted that most embassies were entrusted to two envoys, especially those overseas. For that Novatian sent four was probably done for the sake of winning goodwill. The same perhaps is to be judged of the embassy to the martyrs: that those four envoys were sent either in honour of the martyrs, or because the martyrs had been placed in various locations, or so that more witnesses of good faith might be present at the distribution of the Church's alms. For there were, even in that age, otherwise golden, examples of bad faith in money matters. Such had been, even in the African Church itself, the presbyter Novatus, Letter 49. Such was Felicissimus, Letter 38. Such finally (who would believe it!) was Nicostratus himself, deacon and confessor, Letters 48, 49. This too is worthy of notice, that the chief of the envoys was for the most part a subdeacon, and that he did not go beyond that rank. So it was in the first, second, third, seventh and sixteenth embassies. But if at any time someone of higher rank was sent, this then happened for the most part when only one was sent, so that they might thus compensate for the lack of number by the rank of the person. So in the ninth, fourteenth and fifteenth embassies. As for our having otherwise the names of single men, even of the lower order, it is nevertheless not certain that single men only were sent. The same held good not only in embassies overseas, but also in those which were from provincial bishops to the primate of the provinces, such as was that fourteenth embassy. But as to an embassy, that the bishops themselves

undertook it, this was not done except very rarely, and for reasons otherwise most grave. In the thirteenth embassy the reason is manifest. In the fifth, too, it is easy. For a decision had to be made among bishops between Cornelius and Novatian. Care also had to be taken concerning the formal letters to be given thereafter, all exchange of which was among none other than bishops. What of the fact that [embassies] of the African synod too were sent, and to a synod, that is, to the bishops of the province, to whom the ordination of the Roman bishop pertained? For under the name of synod, as it passed from the usage of the gentiles to the Christians, all colleges of priests or fraternities are called, whether in assemblies or even individually. Nor are examples of this meaning lacking in the Church too, if that were what I were treating at present.

§ 15. Thus, then, the matter of embassies stood in the age of Cyprian. There were also some embassies older than Cyprian, framed on the same pattern. Clement of Alexandria, a presbyter, was sent as legate by Alexander, prelate of Jerusalem (Eusebius, Eccl. Hist. 6.11), to the Church of Antioch, chief [Church] of all Syria (to which Judaea too was assigned), but alone: plainly after the model of the fourteenth embassy. The presbyter Irenaeus was legate of the martyrs of Lyons and Vienne to Eleutherus the Roman pontiff (for there is no ground for Blondel to make him a bishop at that time), he too likewise alone (Eusebius, Eccl. Hist. 5.4). Of other embassies, I think, we have no examples until the times of Polycarp and Ignatius (see Valesius, Notes on the passage of Eusebius). Come, then, let us look into how those stood.

§ 16. And indeed the letter of the Church of Smyrna to the Philomelians on the martyrdom of Polycarp was written by a certain brother Marcus, after the pattern of the twelfth embassy, whom the old Latin translator calls Martianus, and about whose place in the Church nothing is established. There is a like silence about the place of Crescens, whom Polycarp himself used as messenger in that Epistle which he addressed to the Philippians. The Epistles of Ignatius (Ep. to the Smyrnaeans 12; to the Eph. 12) to the Smyrnaeans, Ephesians and Philadelphians appear to have been handed to Burrhus the deacon, but one who had been sent to him in the common name of the Smyrnaeans and Ephesians. To whom the rest were handed is not established; but that they too were handed to Burrhus is surely quite probable. For Ignatius's words in the Epistle to the Smyrnaeans are to be noted, "whom you sent with me". Burrhus, therefore, was sent not merely to Ignatius, but with him (see Ep. to the Eph. 2), to be the companion of his journey and a messenger for undertaking embassies. On this account I think those other Ephesians too (Ep. to the Rom. 10), Crocus, Onesimus, Euplus and Fronto, were sent, and so that none other than they carried the epistle to the Romans. Philo too, a deacon, a Cilician, performed the same office (Ep. to the Philadelphians 11). But not deacons alone: others too, superior to deacons, nevertheless undertook embassies in the time of Ignatius. They honoured the Saint (say the authors of the martyrdom of Ignatius, contemporaries of the martyr) through bishops, presbyters and deacons, of the city and Church of Asia (Ussher's edition, p. 5). Which custom of embassy itself certainly

savours wholly of the Ignatian age, not of some more recent one. That this was done by the Magnesians, Ignatius himself is a most ample witness (Ep. to the Magnesians, § 2), [namely] that not only Damas their bishop, but also the presbyters Bassus and Apollonius, and the deacon Sotion, had been with him at Smyrna. He asks the Churches more than once to send some legate to strengthen his Antiochene see, bereft of its bishop. This [legate] he calls now 'God's courier' (Ep. to Polycarp, § 7), now 'God's ambassador' (Ep. to the Smyrnaeans, § 11), and Polycarp too makes mention of him in the Epistle to the Philippians. But what legates those [Churches] appointed, the same most holy martyr Ignatius shows in the Epistle to the Philadelphians: 'The nearest churches,' he says, 'sent bishops, and the others presbyters and deacons' (Ep. to the Philadelphians, § 10). And in that Epistle to the Philippians which we have mentioned, Polycarp himself is in doubt whether he should undertake the legation himself, or rather send another as legate. So it was not foreign even to the episcopal rank that they should themselves discharge the office of legations. From which it is also incidentally clear how far the office of bishop was, in that age, from being so fixed as Salmasius supposed. Rather, the very name of bishop had been taken from the office of those who travelled about in the Greek cities. And the Canons call the chorepiscopi 'itinerants', whose office in the countryside was the same as that of the bishops in the cities. Now 'circuit' is that very word by which, as Salmasius himself observed, the journeys of the apostles are denoted in the more ancient monuments of the Church. Nothing therefore prevents the same men from having been both apostles and bishops, and from having been able both to travel and yet to preside over particular Churches. Especially since the journeys of the other apostles are not to be judged from the example of St Paul. The rest certainly kept themselves for the most part within particular provinces towards the end of that century, when churches had already been established, and bishops in the churches. St James seems to have travelled not far from Jerusalem, if we believe true monuments, even those of the Acts. Polycrates and Clement of Alexandria imply that Philip did not depart far from Hierapolis, nor John from proconsular Asia. Within these limits nothing in the discipline of the primitive Church prevents other bishops also from being able to travel. What of the fact that St Paul too (1 Cor. 15:10), when he contends that he surpassed the rest of the apostles in labour, certainly implies plainly that the labours of the rest of the apostles are not to be estimated from his example alone? That he surpassed each of them singly is too evident to be doubted. Thus his words can also be understood to mean that he left the labours of them all, even taken together, far behind him. If this be true, bishops could equal the labours of the rest of the apostles. Polycarp perhaps equalled them, when he made his way from his Smyrna to Rome under Anicetus, perhaps intending thence to lead into Gaul that colony of Christians of Lyons and Vienne. Certainly no undoubted monuments of the primitive Church suggest that the labours of this one man were inferior to the labours of the rest of the apostles. Yet he was far from having exceeded the bounds of the episcopal office, or from any of the ancients having reproached him on that account. Since these things thus

stood, it was certainly altogether fitting that they should employ for embassies none other than men of the higher orders, since those ministers of the lower orders whom the Church and the age of Cyprian made use of had not yet been introduced into the Church.

§ 17. Plainly these Ignatian arrangements also reflected the very recent traces of the apostolic age. The chief work of those men was directed to spreading the Churches rather than governing them. Accordingly it was fitting that the most honourable envoys possible should be chosen, especially since that very office of propagating the Gospel had belonged chiefly to those who were set in the primary dignity of the Church, such as were the apostles themselves, the evangelists, etc. The Churches therefore had, besides those apostles of Christ of primary name, their own apostles as well, whom they likewise called apostles, because, as it seems, messengers were commonly sent to represent the Churches by which they were sent. For in that age the very name of apostleship seems to hint at precisely this. These apostles are called "apostles of the churches" (2 Cor. 8:23). Thus Epaphroditus was the apostle of the Philippians (Phil. 2:25). And whatever benefits were conferred on them were believed to redound not to them alone but "to the face of the churches", because, as I have said, they represented those churches. From this we understand how far Walo Messalinus strayed from the Apostle's mind in his explanation of these apostles, when he supposes that these secondary apostles were sent by the primary ones to the churches, and not conversely by the churches to the apostles. Had that been true, that regard shown to them could not have pertained to "the face of the churches", but rather to that of the apostles by whom they had been sent. What of the fact that that whole interpretation seems rather harsh, by which those were to be called "apostles of the churches" who had been sent to plant churches, rather than those who had been sent by the churches themselves? Certainly those are called apostles of God and of Christ not who are sent to God or Christ, but who are sent by Them, so that that contrary expression is altogether novel and devoid of any example. Rather, from this representation of the person sending, the origin of the primary apostles too seems to be derived. Those are called attendants of princes whose office it is to be present before princes and constantly to move about in their sight. Hence they are said to behold the faces of princes and to proceed from their faces. What the Latin translators call faces, the Hebrews in their own idiom call panim. That word the Greek translators render prosopon. After that custom of princes the majestic presence of God too is shadowed forth in Scripture by the metaphors of countenance and face. The bread of the setting-forth is called the bread of faces, as being proper, that is, to those who became the table-companions of princes. The angel of the presence in the prophet is the same as he who in the Gospel is said to behold the face of God. And as an insult to princes was to be judged by the dignity of the messengers, the graver the more honoured the messenger had been, so that degree of honour was the highest, if anyone was most frequently in the sight of princes. Whoever therefore was said to have gone forth from the face of the prince, if anyone had treated him less honourably,

it was just as if he had shown contempt for the prince himself acting and present in person. Since, therefore, the Lord declares that honour and contempt would be shared by Himself and the apostles, He clearly intimates by this that they were to be held in the number of those messengers who were ἀπὸ προσώπου [from the face]. The same, then, must be determined of these apostles of the churches: that they were, as it were, from the faces of the churches, since upon both, that is, upon the churches themselves as well as upon the apostles sent by the churches, honours and insults redounded in common, as though both bore one and the same person. But if what Salmasius contends were true, that these secondary apostles were apostles of the churches for no other reason than that they were sent to plant churches, there would surely be no reason why they could be distinguished from the primary apostles also by this name alone. For those very apostles of Christ were themselves also sent and appointed by Christ for this same office of planting churches (Eph. 4:11–13). For they too had fixed κανόνας [rules, spheres] by agreement, lest we should think that these secondary apostles were inferior in this respect. But what office that apostleship of Epaphroditus properly concerned we readily gather from that same Epistle to the Philippians (Phil. 4:18): But I have all things, and abound: I am filled, having received from Epaphroditus the things which you sent, etc. That embassy therefore concerned a matter of money. Yet this was not to be understood as though, once that distribution was completed, they returned to their own people forthwith. Those who had been sent in this way afterwards undertook other embassies in the name of him to whom they had been sent, and that sometimes into distant regions, whenever this was in the public interest of the Catholic Church. Thus he commends those apostles of the churches to the Corinthians, sent there by him without doubt (2 Cor. 8:24). Thus Ignatius appears to have dispatched to Rome the Ephesians who had been sent to him (Ep. to the Romans, end). For those whom the Apostle mentions in the passage cited (2 Cor. 8:19) as χειροτονηθέντας ὑπὸ τῶν ἐκκλησιῶν συνεκδήμους [appointed by the churches as travelling companions] had been sent with that very purpose. Hence we understand who those apostles συνέκδημοι [travelling companions] were of whom we find mention (Acts 19:29): none other, assuredly, than those whom we have called apostles. The same are the συνέποντες [those accompanying] (Acts 20:4); the συνεξελθόντες [those going out with] (Acts 16:3); the συνελθόντες [those coming with], (Acts 15:38), to whose duty it so belonged to minister to those primary men that, if any had withdrawn, they were considered to have failed in that duty. By these the Apostle sometimes complains in his epistles that he has been deserted. The same are the διακοῦντες [those ministering] (for this supplying of alms was properly so called διακονία [ministry]) (Acts 19:22); the ὑπηρέται [attendants] (Acts 13:5). And indeed there were very many who ministered thus to St Paul, some indeed taken on by himself, some delegated to him by the churches, some also devoted and dedicated of their own accord. The same was observed by the apostles themselves, that for the weightiest matters they employed as envoys none other than those who excelled the rest. So it was done in the Council of Jerusalem, when the decree of the Apostles concerning the necessity of circumcision was to be sent to the church of Antioch: they did not appoint any chance persons who offered themselves of their own accord, but men chosen from their own number, to discharge this office.

"It seemed good," etc., "to send men chosen from among them," etc. (Acts 15:22), which they also carried out in fact, v. 25. Nor did the Jews act otherwise, from whom the example seems to have passed to the Christians. They too dispatched chosen men into all the earth, saying that a godless heresy of Christians had appeared, as Saint Justin Martyr testifies, in more than one place (Dialogue with Trypho, p. 234 E, 335 C).

§ 18. Nor indeed is it to be wondered at that the churches performed these services for the apostles, since they performed the same even for ordinary Christians, whenever these were occupied in matters touching the public affairs of Christendom. For no small part of communion lay in the law of hospitality, to which also belong the very many letters of commendation of the ancients, in imitation of which the ecclesiastical "formed letters" too were taken up and drawn up. To guests while they stayed, expenses were supplied free of charge; to them on departing, gifts of hospitality were given, and, if need be, companions for the journey were added, if they were going to travel further. These things are plain from the most ancient hospitalities of Homer, which afterwards passed into the customs of the later Greeks. This hospitality the apostles commend on several occasions, and indeed the earliest Christians held it in such esteem that sometimes wealthy private persons devoted themselves and all they had to receiving the saints travelling from every quarter. Such seems to have been Gaius, not only the private host of Saint Paul but also of the whole Church (Rom. 16:23). And on the same account he is commended by Saint John in his third Epistle, vv. 5, 6, 7, 8. Such too was Philemon, Epistle to Philemon, vv. 5, 6, 7, and Mnason the Cypriot, Acts 21:16. Yet this seems commonly to have been a public office of the churches. For we read that in those times even whole cities made use of that law of hospitality towards one another. Cicero has some examples of it, if I am not mistaken, in the Verrines. So that it could very easily have flowed down to the churches, which, according also to the custom of that age, embraced whole cities, and which are accordingly compared to cities by Origen (book 3, Against Celsus). Especially since the Jews of Jerusalem too had exercised the same offices towards the provincials of the dispersion, even before the birth of Christianity. Not to go further afield, I gather this from Acts 28:21; for this reason, to those who were appointed to the public offices of the Church these duties of hospitality chiefly belonged. Concerning the widows of the Church the Apostle writes thus (1 Tim. 5:10): If she has received [strangers] in hospitality, if she has washed the feet of the saints, if she has ministered to those suffering tribulation. Concerning the bishop: For a bishop must be irreproachable, the husband of one wife, sober, prudent, well-ordered, chaste, hospitable (1 Tim. 3:2). Again concerning the same: But hospitable, kind, sober (Titus 1:8), etc. For he was the guardian of all who are in need, as Saint Justin Martyr testifies (Apology 2).

§ 19. These, then, were the common offices of the churches towards all travellers, and there is surely no reason for us to doubt that they were rendered still more dutifully to the apostles themselves. I do not know whether there was anything by which distinguished men were customarily received, according to the custom of that age, without that same thing, in receiving the apostles and the leading men of the Church,

having been observed by the Churches also; and indeed with a mind all the readier, because they believed that they were earning the favour not only of those for whom they had performed these things, but even of God Himself, in Whose work they were occupied, and that they would themselves be sharers in their works also. When the Apostle was coming to Rome, the brethren poured out to meet him as far as the Forum of Appius and the Three Taverns (Acts 28:15). For Ignatius, however, hastening to martyrdom, [they went] as far as the harbour. The Melitians honoured him at his departure with many honours, and put on board for those sailing the things that were necessary (ibid. 28:10). These were without doubt their guest-gifts. The Ephesians accompanied him as he departed as far as the ship (Acts 20:38). This was the propompē, which the Apostle himself also mentions in very many places. Now this aimed at the honour of the one coming, in accordance with the custom of that age too, so that the more illustrious anyone was in dignity, the more illustrious also were those who were sent out to meet him. And this was observed also in receiving the governors of provinces, so that to whatever place of the province they first landed, there embassies were sent from the cities, made up of the foremost men each in his own city. The same was observed also by neighbouring cities in journeys. Since the Christians imitated this in the journeys of the apostles and of the foremost men of the Church, it is likely that they imitated this too, lest envoys should be lacking to the dignity of those coming. For although the apostles banished worldly pomp far from them, yet these same men were most observant and most retentive of decorum. This at any rate seems to have been the temper of St Paul, this his disposition. Nor indeed without reason. For although in men received in this way there was no danger of pride, especially in those ages of persecutions, yet there were many things among these indifferent matters which served to win the respect and reverence of subjects, which were certainly not to be neglected, especially since these services were not commanded, but were rendered by the most free and most ardent compliance of subjects.

§ 20. And from this we conclude that, even if we did not understand from elsewhere what place in the Church was held by those who were appointed to undertake these embassies, there is nevertheless no reason for us to doubt that it was a highly honourable one. Of these ordinary ministries of the Church, in the earliest history of that apostolic age, there occurs

rarer mention, namely of bishops, presbyters and deacons. More frequent were the extraordinary ones, apostles, evangelists, pastors and teachers and prophets, and they were altogether better known and more celebrated. And it is indeed probable that the proper, primary and most simple administration of the Church belonged to these; and then afterwards, when they had experienced it as rather disturbed and disorderly, that those ordinary ministers whom we retain today gradually succeeded in their place, and that gradually, for the sake of the discipline of the synaxes, those extraordinary ones were made subject to the ordinary ones. When therefore these extraordinary ministers discharged the duties of the synaxes, we shall look in vain for mention of the ordinary ministers. This one thing suffices, that they held not only the highest dignity but also the highest place in the administration of the Church, so that accordingly, if they discharged any embassies, those embassies must necessarily have been very honourable. And when at length, on account of the discipline of the synaxes, they were made subject to the ordinary ministers of the synaxes, they nevertheless still retained, beyond doubt, the highest honour. For they were not attached to certain particular churches, but rather were common to the whole Catholic Church, and so (in that age beyond doubt, when the labours of the highest ministers were directed rather to spreading Christianity widely than to governing churches already founded and established) it can hardly be that their office was not preferred to that of those who belonged only to single churches. And it is from this number of extraordinary ministers that those who were appointed envoys seem to have been. The apostle acknowledges that those very gifts of theirs were given for the sake of unbelievers rather than of believers, and would accordingly be more useful if they were employed in converting unbelievers rather than in confirming believers. Especially since they had been sent with this very purpose, not merely to receive those who came, but to be companions and fellow-workers of those journeying and travelling abroad. But indeed the Church of that age demanded an altogether different manner of administration from that of the following ages, so that those are wholly in vain who today permit nothing in the Church except what conforms to the example of that apostolic Church. Circumstances must by all means be considered, and prudence must be applied, which it is certain the apostles used in many matters.