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who appointed bishops. When he was dead Heraclas was appointed in his place, who appointed twenty bishops.'

It will be noticed that Eutychius

(1) supports Jerome's statement, but specifies twelve presbyters, and adds that the presbyters laid on hands, which Jerome does

not say:

(2) makes the arrangement last till Alexander's time, which again contradicts Jerome and is manifestly false :

(3) speaks of the patriarch,' which is of course an anachronism: (4) adds information which, if true, would be very important, viz., that there was only one bishop in Egypt up to the days of Demetrius, who added three, and Heraclas, who increased them to twenty.

We cannot tell whence this writer derived his information. I think, however, that the following reasons are sufficient to prevent our attaching any weight to what he says:

(1) He is so ignorant of the period to which he assigns the 'ecclesiastical revolution' caused by the creation of the Egyptian episcopate, that he actually is unaware of the existence at that time of infinitely the most important man of the age-Origen. When he comes to deal with the fifth Council he writes thus: 'There was in the time of Justinian a bishop of Manbag (episcopus Manbagensis), by name Origen, who taught metempsychosis, denying a resurrection. There was also Ibas, bishop of Edessa (Rohensis), Thaddaeus, bishop of Massisa (Massisensis), and Theodoret, bishop of Ancyra, who asserted that the body of our Lord Christ was phantastic and nothing real.' This will suffice as a specimen of his historical knowledge. Pearson enlarges on his ignorance and blunders (Vindic. Ignat. part 1. p. 294 f.).

(2) But it may be answered that however ignorant of the Greek church writers, and of church history generally, he may have had access to Alexandrian traditions. Have we reason then to think that his statements represent ancient Egyptian tradition? I think not. Partly because Jerome, had he known what Eutychius relates, would not have kept silence about it. But also-and this is more important -because Severus, bishop of Asmonaei in Egypt, who wrote a history of the Alexandrian patriarchs in the same century as Eutychius (c. A.D. 978) and professes to have consulted Greek and Coptic remains in the monastery of St. Macarius, knows nothing of what Eutychius relates and gives a great many details about the election of early

1 ap. Migne .c. p. 1073.

2 Fabricius Bibl. Graec. ix. p. 349: 'Asmonaeorum episcopus' (?=Ashmuneim). 3 Condensed by Renaudot into a Latin version Historia Patriarcharum Alexandrinorum.

patriarchs quite inconsistent with the supposed position of the twelve presbyters and involving the existence of other bishops. Renaudot complains (Hist. p. 23) of Severus' ignorance and doubts his knowledge of Greek, but at least he knows more of the period of Demetrius than Eutychius does. He abuses Origen out of all reason; but he knows his period and his fame as a scholar and writer. Now Severus makes St. Mark consecrate a bishop, three presbyters, and seven deacons, and then proceed into Pentapolis and consecrate in many places bishops, priests, and deacons (Renaudot Hist. p. 4). He represents Cerdo (the third bishop), as having been elected by bishops and priests with the faithful laity and that too by lot (ib. p. 14), and Primus (the fourth) as chosen out of the 'orthodox people' not from among the presbyters (p. 15), and Claudian (the eighth) as elected by the people with the bishops (p. 17).1 Thus the complete disagreement of the more credible Severus with the statements of Eutychius seems to deprive them of the claim to represent a valid tradition.a

(3) Eutychius' information about the absence of bishops in Egypt till the times of Demetrius and Heraclas seems inconsistent with what we know of the history of the period. Photius records,3 on the authority of Pamphilus, the author of an Apology for Origen, the following facts: 'Demetrius' love is turned [by Origen's ordination] into hatred. . . . Moreover, a synod of bishops and some presbyters is gathered together against Origen. And they, as Pamphilus says, vote that Origen should be banished from Alexandria and neither live there nor teach, but that he should not be deposed from the honour of the presbyterate. But Demetrius, with some Egyptian bishops, removed him also from the priesthood, those who had formerly supported him subscribing this decree.' Now Pamphilus was an enthusiastic disciple of Origen, and if this synod of bishops who overrode the mixed synod of bishops and presbyters had been a new thing created simply by Demetrius and

1 Apparently he speaks of the election of Agrippinus the tenth patriarch in these words, as rendered by Renaudot in Latin (Coll. Lit. Orient. i. p. 381): 'convenisse populum et manus imposuisse illi atque illum ordinavisse patriarcham et in sede d. Marci collocavisse.' Renaudot thinks this phrase in Severus makes it possible that Eutychius only meant to imply that eleven presbyters 'got hands laid upon the new patriarch.' This, however, is improbable.

2 It may be said that still later historians, Georgius Homadius (El-Makin), an Arab Christian who died in 1273, and the Sheikh Taqi-ed-Din El-Maqrizi (fourteenth century-translated by Rev. S. C. Malan in Original Documents of the Coptic Church), support Eutychius in different degrees. But the former is said to be made up out of Eutychius (this portion of El-Makin is not edited), and El-Maqrizi undoubtedly depends upon him. 'A gifted man,' he describes him, 'who wrote a useful history' (Malan's translation p. 87).

8 Photius Bibliotheca cod. cxviii. ap. Migne Patrol. Graec. ciii. p. 397. Pamphilus was martyred in A.D. 309. The book was completed by his friend Eusebius, bishop of Caesarea.

lacking altogether in constitutional authority, it is very unlikely that we should not have been told so. Nay more, we should surely have been able to catch in Origen's own language about bishops subsequently some tone of disparagement, some hint of novel claims made in the name of episcopal authority; but all his language quoted on pp. 140, 141, dates from the period after his expulsion and deposition. Dr. Bigg speaks of the patriarchate of Demetrius as involving 'the bustle and excitement of a revolution,' and he alludes to 'a usurpation which lay heavy on the priests.'" Now Demetrius died in 231; this 'usurpation' was carried further, according to Jerome, in the episcopates of his successors by the abolition of the old method of appointing bishops. Yet Origen, writing about A. D. 249, speaks of the Alexandrian, among other Churches, as characterized by mildness and stability (πpaɛîa kal Evoraons, c. Cels. iii. 30), and thinks apparently that the fault Celsus is most likely to find in bishops and clergy is a want of zeal.3

(4) Eutychius' information seems inconsistent with a document which appears to let in light upon the very early days of Egyptian church history. The document known as the Apostolical Church Ordinances (which is to be distinguished both from the Apostolical Constitutions and from the Apostolical Canons) is the beginning of the canon law of the Egyptian Church. Its history indicates Egypt as its source, and Harnack, its last editor, rightly remarks that it has a provincial origin. It is a composite document, and appears to contain fragments of very different epochs; some chapters (16-21) on the election of bishops, on presbyters, readers, deacons, and widows, seem to come from very early days. The chapter on the election of a bishop is very curious: If there be a paucity of men, and anywhere the number of those able to vote for a bishop be less than twelve, let them write to the neighbouring Churches, according to where it happens to be, that three chosen men having come from thence, and having put to the test him who is worthy-namely if any one have a good report of the heathen, if he be sinless, if he be a lover of the poor, if he be temperate, not a drunkard, not a fornicator, not covetous, nor a railer, nor a respecter of persons, nor such like things: it is good that he

1 The Homilies date from A.D. 245 and after.

2 B. L. p. 100: 'the Stromateis were written during the patriarchate of Demet. rius amid the bustle and excitement of a revolution'; and p. 119.

3 It should be remembered too that in Athanasius' day there were, as he tells us, about a hundred bishops (eyyùs éκatóv) in Egypt, Libya, and Pentapolis (Apol. c. Ar. 71). The growth from four when Heraclas acceded (A.D. 232) to one hundred when Athanasius wrote (c. A.D. 350) would have been extremely rapid.

4 Texte und Untersuch. Band ii, Heft 2, p. 193 f. and Heft 5, p. 6.

5 At latest, Harnack says, 'the first third of the third century' (Heft 2, p. 212). The remarkable position of the 'reader' above the deacon to which Harnack calls attention has also to be noticed.

should be unmarried, or if not, a husband of one wife, educated, able to interpret the Scriptures, or if unlearned, meek in character, and let him abound in love towards all, lest the bishop come to be convicted in any matter by the multitude." Here we have popular election, the possibility of illiterate bishops, heathen surroundings, and every thing that points to early days and out-of-the-way communities. This makes it all the more noticeable that there is to be a bishop elected even in communities where there are not twelve voters. This is better evidence than Eutychius can offer!

On the whole, then, I think it is absurd to take Eutychius as an authority in the way in which some modern writers-notably Dr. Bigg -have done. I believe the evidence would suggest

(1) a widespread episcopacy in Egypt generally, as elsewhere, even in the smallest communities:

(2) a large degree of popular influence in the election down to the Nicene age.

But attention has recently been called to a passage in the Apophthegmata,' ascribed to the Fathers of the Egyptian desert, as supporting in some sense the statement of Jerome. Some heretics came to Pomen [one of the Fathers who was visited by Rufinus about 375 A. D.] and began to speak against the archbishop of Alexandria, on the ground that he received his ordination from (rapà) presbyters. But the old man maintained silence, and then calling his brother, said, "Lay the table and make them eat, and send them away in peace.'

This may well be an authentic memorial of an historical hermit. His meekness (which is the point of the story) unfortunately prevents us from knowing what reply he would have given to the insult. The statement of 'the heretics' (presumably Arians) is certainly unhistorical at the date at which they made it. They must have referred to Athanasius (226-373), the facts about whose consecration are certainly known. See Athan. Apol. c. Arian. c. 6. And it is much more likely that they were simply uttering one of the innumerable Arian slanders about Athanasius' consecration-all baseless-than that their statement was based on any tradition of past Alexandrian history.

1 c. 16 : . . . ἐὰν ὀλιγανδρία ὑπάρχῃ καὶ μήπου πλῆθος τυγχάνῃ τῶν δυναμένων ψηφίσασθαι περὶ ἐπισκόπου ἐντὸς δεκαδύο ἀνδρῶν, εἰς τὰς πλησίον ἐκκλησίας, ὅπου τυγχάνει πεπηγυία, γραφέτωσαν, ὅπως ἐκεῖθεν τρεῖς ἄνδρες παραγενόμενοι δοκίμῃ δοκιμάσαντες τὸν ἄξιον ὄντα, εἴ τις φήμην καλὴν ἔχει ἀπὸ τῶν ἐθνῶν, . καλὸν μὲν εἶναι ἀγύναιος, εἰ δὲ μή, ἀπὸ μιᾶς γυναικός παιδείας μέτοχος, δυνάμενος τὰς γραφὰς ἑρμηνεύειν· εἰ δὲ ἀγράμματος, πραὺς ὑπάρχων . . μήποτε περί τινος ἐλεγχθεὶς ἐπίσκοπος ἀπὸ τῶν πολλῶν γενηθείη.

...

2 By Dom Butler; see Texts and Studies (Cambridge) vol. vi. no. 1. p. 213.

C.

RITES AND PRAYERS OF ORDINATION.
(See pp. 131 ff. and 163 ff.)

A. GREEK RITES OF ORDINATION.

I.

The Ordination Prayers of Bishop Serapion (see above, p. 131) are as follows:

Laying-on of hands of the making (kåraoráσews) of Deacons.

Father of the Only-Begotten who didst send Thy Son and didst ordain the affairs (πрáyμara) on the earth, and hast given rules to Thy church and orders (rážes) for the help and salvation of the flocks, who didst choose out bishops, presbyters, and deacons for the ministry of Thy catholic Church, who didst choose through Thine Only-Begotten the seven deacons, and didst freely give to them Holy Spirit, make also this man a deacon of Thy catholic Church, and give in him a spirit of knowledge and discernment, that he may be able purely and unblameably to do service in this ministry (Necroupyla) in the midst of the holy people, through Thy Only-Begotten Jesus Christ, through whom to Thee (is) the glory and the strength in Holy Spirit both now and to all the ages of the ages. Amen.

Laying-on of hands of the making of Presbyters.

We stretch forth the hand, O Lord God of the Heavens, Father of Thy Only-Begotten, upon this man, and beseech Thee that the Spirit of Truth may dwell (¿wɩônμñoŋ) upon him. Give him the graces of prudence and knowledge and a good heart. Let a divine Spirit come to him that he may be able to be a steward over Thy people and an ambassador of Thy divine oracles, and to reconcile Thy people to Thee the uncreated God, Who didst give of the Spirit of Moses [and put] Holy Spirit upon the chosen ones. Give a portion of Holy Spirit also to this man, from the Spirit of Thy Only-Begotten, for the grace of wisdom and knowledge and right faith, that he may be able to serve Thee in a clean conscience, through Thy Only-Begotten Jesus Christ, through whom (is) to Thee the glory and the strength in Holy Spirit both now and for all the ages of the ages. Amen.

1 See also Brightman in Journal of Theol. Studies (Macmillan) Oct. 1899 pp. 88 ff.

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