and to feed, and in this sense was described as a stewardship and pastorate: in order to its function of government, a supernatural sanction was attached to its legislative and judicial authority: and finally the two great sacraments of Baptism and the Eucharist were committed to its administration.1

Whether, then, it be true or no to say that the Church began in a ministry,2 it appears certainly true to say that the Church began with a ministry. Those who had received the commission of the apostolate, and those who had not, awaited side by side the same in discipleship but different in office and function-that Pentecostal gift which was to make all alike and for the first time, in the full sense, members of the Church of Christ.

1 Nothing is said to explain the sense in which baptism and the Eucharist respectively were committed to the apostolate. As a matter of fact St. Paul regarded the actual administration of baptism as not specially characteristic of the apostolic office. On the other hand it should be noticed that there is no mention in the Gospels of the institution of that which in the Acts appears as the complement of baptism and as specially administered by the Apostles, the rite of laying-on of hands.

2 See Gladstone Ch. Princ. pp. 201-2: 'in the Apostles, then, the Christian Church properly so called potentially lay, at the moment when our Saviour uttered those sacred and momentous words which St. Matthew has conveyed to us; but it had no other existence; and if we take that moment of time for our point of view, we see the heavenly gift arrested, as it were, on its passage from God to man, given from Him, but not yet arrived at its destination; not yet communicated to us; just as the loaves and the fishes were, after Jesus had given thanks and broken, and had given them to the twelve to distribute, but before they had actually served them to the multitude. . . . And so it was to remain until the day of Pentecost.' Cf. Gleanings iii. p. 262: No doubt (as I for one believe) the Church began with a clergy; nay, began in a clergy.' I should have thought however that before the day of Pentecost there were others besides the apostolic clergy who were, in the same sense as they, themselves members of the Church. The number of names together were about an hundred and twenty.'

I

CHAPTER V

THE MINISTRY IN THE APOSTOLIC AGE

THE task now before us is to investigate the witness
of the apostolic Epistles and of the Acts of the
Apostles as to the origin and nature of the Christian
ministry and its development in the first period of
the life of the Church. The most convenient method
will be first to marshal the evidence and then to draw
the conclusions which it seems to warrant. Accord-
ingly we begin with the evidence of St. Paul's
Epistles.

dences of

I. First of all then, St. Paul gives us in each group I. The eviof his Epistles1 a vivid impression of what he under- St. Paul's stood by the ministry of an apostle.2 He is one (a) The

1 The two Epistles to the Thessalonians constitute the earliest group. Then come the two Epistles to the Corinthians, with those to the Romans and the Galatians-all bound together by close connections in subject and tone. Then follow 'the Epistles of the first captivity' to the Philippians, the Colossians, the Ephesians, and to Philemon. Last come the Pastoral Epistles. Of these Harnack recognises the first two groups as genuine, and the Epistle to the Philippians (Contemp. Review, August 1886, p. 224). I endeavour above to indicate how natural and harmonious a result is derived from the evidence of all of them, taken as genuine, on the subject of the ministry. [Harnack now admits Colossians and practically Ephesians.]

2 I.e. in the narrower sense, so that a man could rank with 'the twelve.' We find the term used also in a wider sense in 2 Cor. viii. 23: Rom. xvi. 7, where Andronicus and Junias, St. Paul's kinsmen, are spoken of as 'of note among the apostles': Phil. ii. 25, where Epaphroditus is spoken of as St. Paul's fellow-labourer and the apostle' of the Philippian brethren, ὑμῶν δὲ ἀπόστολον καὶ λειτουργὸν τῆς χρείας μου. In the latter case the word probably means no more than the messenger sent by the Philippians to minister to St. Paul's need: see Lightfoot in loc., but cf. Clem. ad Cor. 44 oi àñóσтoλoι ýμŵv. In the former cases however (and

Epistles.

apostle

213

a teacher

who, having seen Christ after His resurrection and
so become qualified to witness to that fundamental
fact, has received by no mediating hands but per-
sonally from Christ a definite mission.2 An authori-
tative mission is indeed essential for all evangelistic
work, for 'how shall men preach, except they be
sent?'-how, that is, can any one take upon himself
so responsible an office? But for an apostle it is
essential that this mission should be direct from Him
who said: 'As my Father hath sent me, so send I
you.' Such a direct mission, actual and unmistak-
able, from Christ Himself, St. Paul believed himself
to have received and was recognised as having re-
ceived by his fellow-apostles, who had been appointed
in the more normal way while Christ was still on
earth. The function of the apostle was primarily
that of proclaiming the Gospel. He had become a
'steward of the mysteries of God'—an administrator,
that is, of the divine revelations, which, having been
kept in the secret counsels of God through ages and
generations, had, now that the fulness of the time.

4

sense in which For the idea Theodoret on

possibly in the latter) the term apostle is probably used much in the
we find it in the Didache-perhaps as equivalent to 'evangelists.
that it included the seventy, see Salmasius de Episcop. p. 61.
Phil. ii. 27 says: ἀπόστολον δὲ αὐτὸν κέκληκεν αὐτῶν ὡς τὴν ἐπιμέλειαν αὐτῶν
ἐμπεπιστευμένον.

1 1 Cor. ix. 1, xv. 8.

2 Gal. i. 1: οὐκ ἀπ ̓ ἀνθρώπων οὐδὲ δι ̓ ἀνθρώπου. Timothy's mission on the other hand, though not ản' ảropónov, was dťávépúπov (2 Tim. i. 6). St. Paul cannot have regarded the event recorded in Acts xiii. 1-3 as more than a recognition by the Church of a mission which he had already received from Christ.

3 Rom. x. 15.

4 St. Paul was an exтрwμа (1 Cor. xv. 8); but he was recognised by his fellow. apostles. See Gal. ii. 7-9.

51 Cor. i. 17: 'Christ sent me not to baptize, but to preach the Gospel' (for the reason of this see vv. 14, 15). 1 Cor. ix. 14. (Alford's comment here is quite beside the mark. Preaching the Gospel' is the primary function of the apostolate, or of the general ministry, as distinguished from the local ministry, whose primary function was administration. Cf. in Clement Quis Dives 42 how St. John does not himself baptize the young man but hands him over to the local émiokоTOS.) I Thess. ii. 4-9; 1 Tim. ii. 7.

nor.

was come, been declared through the Incarnate Son.1 This office at once involved absolute subordination and lofty authority. For on the one hand the apostle was 'the slave of Jesus Christ.' As he had no personal, arbitrary lordship over the faith of the disciples, so he could proclaim nothing of his own: it was quite beyond his power to alter or innovate upon 'the tradition' which constituted his message.2 On the and gover. other hand it involved a plenary authority to teach and to govern: for the message was not one to be cast loose as a disembodied truth among mankind, it was to be the basis on which organized societies were to be built. The apostle accordingly was a founder and ruler of Churches, with divine authority given him for their edification-ruling them all alike on the basis of a common tradition of doctrine and practice, and claiming from them the obedience of affectionate children to their spiritual father. And inasmuch as the whole purpose of Christ's coming is to reconcile man to God, so of course the authority of an apostle is that of an empowered ambassador and minister of the reconciliation with God which Christ has won : 'God hath put in us,' says St. Paul, 'the word of

Cf. Eph. iii. 1-13.

11 Cor. iv. 1: oikovóμos μvoηpiwv beoû. 2 He is personally a douλos (Rom. i. 1), officially a irnpérns (1 Cor. iv. 1) or διάκονος (ο Cor. iii. 5, 2 Cor. iii. 6, iv. 1). Cf. 2 Cor. i. 24 : οὐχ ὅτι κυριεύομεν ὑμῶν τῆς πίστεως, and i Pet. v. 3. Gal. i. 8: ἐὰν ἡμεῖς ἢ ἄγγελος ἐξ οὐρανοῦ εὐαγγελίσηται [ὑμῖν] παρ' ὁ εὐηγγελισάμεθα ὑμῖν, ἀνάθεμα ἔστω. Thus again St. Paul distinguishes between his own judgment and the command of Christ (1 Cor. vii. 6, 10, 12, 25, 40). The primary requirement of his ministry is faithfulness to Christ (1 Cor. iv. 2). On the other hand for the authority of the apostle's teaching see 2 Cor. xiii. 3 : τοῦ ἐν ἐμοὶ λαλοῦντος χριστοῦ ; 2 Tim. i. 13: ὑποτύπωσιν έχε ὑγιαινόντων λόγων ὧν παρ' ἐμοῦ ἤκουσας.

32 Thess. iii. 14, ii. 15; 1 Cor. iv. 15-21, xi. 16, 34; 2 Cor. x. 8, xiii. 10:ǹ è§ovσía ἡμῶν, ὃς ἔδωκεν ὁ κύριος εἰς οἰκοδομήν. (The word εξουσία expresses also the right to be supported which accompanied the apostolate, 2 Thess. iii. 9, 1 Cor. ix. 5 f.) Cf. 2 Cor. vi. 13, xii. 14. The word of God,' which the apostles minister, is declared in 1 Cor. xiv. 36 to be authoritative over all churches alike; cf. 1 Cor. iv. 17, xi. 16, xiv. 33.

༤

reconciliation.'1 It was in him' moreover not merely in word as a message, but in power; so that he could pass sentence on the sins of individuals, to retain or forgive them, with a sanction which is not only supernatural in the spiritual sphere but miraculous also in the physical. An offender whose sins merit condign punishment can be 'delivered to Satan,' that he may be taught by physical penalties 'not to blaspheme.' This plenary authority over individuals, which St. Paul describes himself in his pastoral Epistles as exercising in the case of Hymenaeus and Alexander in his single person, we watch him in his Epistles to the Corinthians exercising in conjunction with the Corinthian congregation. He rebukes the Church there for not having 'removed out of their midst,' or, according to the later church phrase, 'excommunicated,' an incestuous man. Thus, where they had shown only too great a readiness to forgive, St. Paul proceeds, as controlling their action, to judge or to retain the sin. And, because this judgment of a sin has a miraculous physical sanction attached to it, it is described as 'delivering such an one unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh,' in order that the physical penalty may startle him to repentance, and 'his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord.'3 And accordingly in

1 2 Cor. v. 18, 19 : τὰ πάντα ἐκ τοῦ θεοῦ τοῦ ... δόντος ἡμῖν τὴν διακονίαν τῆς καταλλαγῆς, ὡς ὅτι θεὸς ἦν ... θέμενος ἐν ἡμῖν τὸν λόγον τῆς καταλλαγῆς. ὑπὲρ Χριστοῦ οὖν πρεσβεύομεν.

2 1 Tim. i. 20 : παρέδωκα τῷ Σατανά ; 1 Cor. v. 5 : παραδοῦναι τῷ Σατανά. Cf. Job ii. 6 napadidwμí σoi avróv, and Stanley s note in loc.

K.T.λ.

3 1 Cor. v. 3-5 : κέκρικα τὸν τοῦτο κατεργασάμενον ἐν τῷ ὀνόματι τοῦ κυρίου Ἰησοῦ, συναχθέντων ὑμῶν καὶ τοῦ ἐμοῦ πνεύματος σὺν τῇ δυνάμει τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν Ἰησοῦ, St. Paul seems to imply that the Corinthian Church, endowed as it was with the gift of 'government,' could have removed the evil-doer out of their midst by the disciplinary authority belonging to the community; cf. ver. 13. But probably only the apostle could inflict the physical punishment; see Alford in loc. It has been remarked above how clear cut is the distinction in this passage between 'those within,' whom the Church has a right to 'judge,' and 'those without,' over whom she has no such right (vv. 12, 13).