Evangelical Answers : No Single Bishop of Rome Until the Middle of the Second Century

Note: The New Testament utilization of the terms πρεσβύτερος (presbyter/elder) and ἐπίσκοπος (overseer/bishop) has no direct bearing upon the question: “was there a monarchical episcopate in Rome prior to the middle of the second century?” However it does provide valuable historical context.

Jerome of Stridon (c. 342/7-420 A.D.):

For when the apostle clearly teaches that presbyters are the same as bishops, must not a mere server of tables and of widows[Acts vi. 1, 2.] be insane to set himself up arrogantly over men through whose prayers the body and blood of Christ are produced? Do you ask for proof of what I say? Listen to this passage: “Paul and Timotheus, the servants of Jesus Christ, to all the saints in Christ Jesus which are at Philippi with the bishops and deacons.”[Ph. i. 1.] Do you wish for another instance? In the Acts of the Apostles Paul thus speaks to the priests of a single church: “Take heed unto yourselves and to all the flock, in the which the Holy Ghost hath made you bishops, to feed the church of God which He purchased with His own blood.”[Acts xx. 28.] And lest any should in a spirit of contention argue that there must then have been more bishops than one in a single church, there is the following passage which clearly proves a bishop and a presbyter to be the same. Writing to Titus the apostle says: “For this cause left I thee in Crete, that thou shouldest set in order the things that are wanting, and ordain presbyters in every city, as I had appointed thee: if any be blameless, the husband of one wife, having faithful children not accused of riot or unruly. For a bishop must be blameless as the steward of God.”[Tit. i. 5–7.] And to Timothy he says: “Neglect not the gift that is in thee, which was given thee by prophecy, with the laying on of the hands of the presbytery.”[1 Tim. iv. 14.] Peter also says in his first epistle: “The presbyters which are among you I exhort, who am your fellow-presbyter and a witness of the sufferings of Christ and also a partaker of the glory that shall be revealed: feed the flock of Christ …taking the oversight thereof not by constraint but willingly, according unto God.”[1 Pet. v. 1, 2.] In the Greek the meaning is still plainer, for the word used is επισκοποῦντες, that is to say, overseeing, and this is the origin of the name overseer or bishop. But perhaps the testimony of these great men seems to you insufficient. If so, then listen to the blast of the gospel trumpet, that son of thunder,[Mark iii. 17.] the disciple whom Jesus loved[Joh. xiii. 23.] and who reclining on the Saviour’s breast drank in the waters of sound doctrine. One of his letters begins thus: “The presbyter unto the elect lady and her children whom I love in the truth;”[2 Joh. 1.] and another thus: “The presbyter unto the well-beloved Gaius whom I love in the truth.”[3 Joh. 1.] When subsequently one presbyter was chosen to preside over the rest, this was done to remedy schism and to prevent each individual from rending the church of Christ by drawing it to himself. For even at Alexandria from the time of Mark the Evangelist until the episcopates of Heraclas and Dionysius the presbyters always named as bishop one of their own number chosen by themselves and set in a more exalted position, just as an army elects a general, or as deacons appoint one of themselves whom they know to be diligent and call him archdeacon. For what function, excepting ordination, belongs to a bishop that does not also belong to a presbyter? It is not the case that there is one church at Rome and another in all the world beside. Gaul and Britain, Africa and Persia, India and the East worship one Christ and observe one rule of truth. If you ask for authority, the world outweighs its capital. Wherever there is a bishop, whether it be at Rome or at Engubium, whether it be at Constantinople or at Rhegium, whether it be at Alexandria or at Zoan, his dignity is one and his priesthood is one. Neither the command of wealth nor the lowliness of poverty makes him more a bishop or less a bishop. All alike are successors of the apostles.

(Jerome of Stridon, Letter 146.1 [To Evangelus]; trans. NPNF2, 6:288-289.) See also: ccel.org. [1.]

George Edward Dolan, S.T.L. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

In order to restore to the presbyterate its rightful place and authority Jerome pointed out that in the very early days of the Church the terms episcopus and presbyter signified the same individuals. In other words, as we interpret Jerome all were bishops in the sense in which this word is understood today, with full powers to confirm and ordain. But when the universal monarchical episcopate was introduced into the government of the Church only the chief priest (ie., the bishop) was given the full powers of confirming and ordaining, while all other priests who were subjected to him (in other words, the presbyters) were given only a limited or restricted share in the powers of the priesthood.

(George Edward Dolan, S.T.L., The Catholic University of America: Studies in Sacred Theology: (Second Series), No. 36: The Distinction Between the Episcopate and the Presbyterate According to the Thomistic Opinion: A Dissertation, [Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 1950], p. 11.)

The Catholic Encyclopedia:

To some extent, in this early period, the words bishop and priest (επίσκοπος and πρεσβύτερος) are synonymous. …In each community the authority may originally have belonged to a college of presbyter-bishops. …In other communities, it is true, no mention is made of a monarchic episcopate until the middle of the second century.

(A. Van Hove, D.C.L., “Bishop;” In: The Catholic Encyclopedia: Volume II: Special Edition, [New York: The Encyclopedia Press, Inc., 1913], p. 582.)

Note: πρεσβύτερος, presbyter (elder).

Titus 1:5-7

For this reason I left you in Crete, that you would set in order what remains and appoint elders [πρεσβυτέρους, or presbyters] in every city as I directed you, namely, if any man is above reproach, the husband of one wife, having children who believe, not accused of dissipation or rebellion. For the overseer [ἐπίσκοπον, or bishop] must be above reproach as God’s steward, not self-willed, not quick-tempered, not addicted to wine, not pugnacious, not fond of sordid gain…

(New American Standard Bible: 1995 Edition)

Cf. Msgr. Jerome D. Quinn (Roman Catholic Theologian):

The repeated Pauline “unimpeachable” of vv 6-7 suggests that the PE have combined two previously existing lists of qualifications for ecclesial ministers, the former titled “presbyters,” the latter, “a bishop.” For the purposes of the author at this point they were practically synonymous…

(Jerome D. Quinn, The Anchor Yale Bible: The Letter to Titus: A New Translation with Notes and Commentary and an Introduction to Titus, I and II Timothy, the Pastoral Epistles, [New Haven & London: Yale University Press, 2010], p. 85.)

Cf. The New American Bible (Also Found on the Official Vatican Website):

This instruction on the selection and appointment of presbyters, substantially identical with that in 1 Tm 3, 1-7 on a bishop (see the note there), was aimed at strengthening the authority of Titus by apostolic mandate; cf 2, 15. In vv 5.7 and Acts 20, 17.28, the terms episkopos and presbyteros (“bishop” and “presbyter”) refer to the same persons. Deacons are not mentioned in Titus. See also the note on Phil 1, 1.

(The New American Bible, [Nashville: Catholic Bible Press, 1987], note on Titus 1:5-9, p. 1372.) See also: vatican.va.

B. Clement of Rome, “First Epistle to the Corinthians.” Return to Outline.

Clement of Rome (c. 35-99 A.D.): [2.]

Our apostles likewise knew, through our Lord Jesus Christ, that there would be strife over the bishop’s [ἐπισκοπῆς, plural] office. For this reason, therefore, having received complete foreknowledge, they appointed the leaders mentioned earlier and afterwards they gave the offices a permanent character; that is, if they should die, other approved men should succeed to their ministry. These, therefore, who were appointed by them or, later on, by other reputable men with the consent of the whole church, and who have ministered to the flock of Christ blamelessly, humbly, peaceably, and unselfishly, and for a long time have been well-spoken of by all—these we consider to be unjustly removed from their ministry. For it will be no small sin for us if we depose from the bishop’s [ἐπισκοπῆς, plural] office those who have offered the gifts blamelessly and in holiness. Blessed are those presbyters [πρεσβύτεροι, plural] who have gone on ahead, who took their departure at a mature and fruitful age, for they need no longer fear that someone may remove them from their established place. For we see that you have removed certain people, their good conduct notwithstanding, from the ministry that had been held in honor by them blamelessly.

(Clement of Rome, 1 Clement, 44.1-6; trans. Michael W. Holmes,The Apostolic Fathers: Greek Texts and English Translations, Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2007], pp. 103, 105.) [3.]

Note: Here, as in Scripture (cf. Titus 1:5-7), Clement uses the terms interchangeably.

Robert B. Eno, S.S. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

…neither Clement nor anyone else appears in a position anything like that of the bishop as described by Ignatius.

Not surprisingly, given the purpose of the letter (to rebuke the Corinthian Christians for rebelling against their presbyters), there are several references to the leaders of the Church in Corinth, the presbyters. No indication is given of any different leadership pattern in the Roman church itself. The abstract term episkope is used in conjunction with the presbyters (44.5). Once again the picture given seems to point to the leadership being exercised by a collectivity.

(Robert B. Eno, S.S., The Rise Of The Papacy, [Wilmington: Michael Glazier, Inc., 1990], p. 28.)

Eamon Duffy (Roman Catholic Historian and Former Member of the Pontifical Historical Commission):

Ten years or so before Ignatius’ arrival in Rome, the Roman church wrote to the church at Corinth, in an attempt to quieten disputes and disorders which had broken out there. The letter is unsigned, but has always been attributed to the Roman presbyter Clement, generally counted in the ancient lists as the third Pope after St Peter. Legends would later accumulate round his name, and he was to be venerated as a martyr, exiled to the Crimea and killed by being tied to an anchor and dropped into the sea. In fact, however, Clement made no claim to write as bishop. His letter was sent in the name of the whole Roman community, he never identifies himself or writes in his own person, and we know nothing at all about him. The letter itself makes no distinction between presbyters and bishops, about which it always speaks in the plural, suggesting that at Corinth as at Rome the church at this time was organised under a group of bishops or presbyters, rather than a single ruling bishop.

(Eamon Duffy, Saints & Sinners: A History of the Popes, [New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2006], pp. 10-11.)

John P. Meier, S.S.D. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

In striking contrast to 1 and 2 Peter, where individual teachers speak not only in the name of Peter but as Peter, the anonymous author of I Clement speaks as “we,” as the whole church of Rome, which presumably, like Corinth, is led by a group of presbyter-bishops assisted by deacons. There is no sign of the monepiscopate soon to be championed by Ignatius. It is rather “the church of God sojourning in Rome” as such, and not Peter, and not some individual claiming to be the successor of Peter, that implicitly exercises authority over a distinguished Pauline church in Greece. Indeed, the final blessing of the epistle is extended not only to the Corinthians but also “to all those called by God everywhere” (1 Clement 65.2).

(John P. Meier, S.S.D., “Petrine Ministry in the New Testament and in the Early Patristic Traditions;” In: James Puglisi, S.A., ed., How Can the Petrine Ministry Be a Service to the Unity of the Universal Church? [Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 2010], p. 25.)

Allen Brent (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

Where we do have concrete information, as in the case of Clement in the third place after St Peter according to Irenaeus, the notion of the office of a single bishop in succession to a predecessor seems lacking.

In his genuine letter to the Corinthians (c. AD 95), Clement does not write in his own name but in the name of the ‘church of God whose pilgrim residence is at Rome to the church of God residing similarly at Corinth’. There is no ‘Clement bishop, servant of the servants of God’ claiming apostolic authority for his office as successor to St Peter. He is writing, as has been pointed out, not as a single monarch-bishop but as the secretary of the Roman presbyterate.

(Allen Brent, Ignatius of Antioch: A Martyr Bishop and the Origin of Episcopacy, [London: Continuum, 2007], p. 125.)

Cf. Allen Brent (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

…Clement clearly believes that there is a succession from the apostles. But that succession is not one single individual as a monarch-bishop following the other in a chain, but a group of presbyters (which he also calls ‘bishops’): he does not refer to any particular one of them. Indeed, Ignatius in his letter to the Romans . . . does not name a single bishop in Rome…

(Allen Brent, Ignatius of Antioch: A Martyr Bishop and the Origin of Episcopacy, [London: Continuum, 2007], p. 126.)

Klaus Schatz, S.J. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

…he is not named as the author of the letter; instead, the true sender is the Roman community. We probably cannot say for certain that there was a bishop of Rome at that time. It seems likely that the Roman church was governed by a group of presbyters…

(Klaus Schatz, S.J., Papal Primary: From its Origins to the Present, trans. John A. Otto & Linda M. Maloney, [Collegeville: The Liturgical Press, 1996], p. 4.)

C. The “Didache.” Return to Outline.

Note: The Didache’s use of the term ἐπίσκοπος (overseer/bishop) has no direct bearing upon the question: “was there a monarchical episcopate in Rome prior to the middle of the second century?” However it does provide valuable historical context.

Didache (1st Century A.D.):

Therefore appoint for yourselves bishops [ἐπισκόπους, plural] and deacons [διακόνους, plural] worthy of the Lord, men who are humble and not avaricious and true and approved, for they too carry out for you the ministry of the prophets and teachers.

(Didache, 15.1; trans. Michael W. Holmes,The Apostolic Fathers: Greek Texts and English Translations, [Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2007], p. 367.) [4.]

Note: Notice the lack of presbyters, as the terms bishop and presbyter were likely still synonymous.

Cf. Clement of Rome (c. 35-99 A.D.):

So, preaching both in the country and in the towns, they appointed their first fruits, when they had tested them by the Spirit, to be bishops [ἐπισκόπους, plural] and deacons [διακόνους, plural] for the future believers. And this was no new thing they did, for indeed something had been written about bishops [ἐπισκόπων, plural] and deacons [διακόνων, plural] many years ago; for somewhere thus says the scripture: “I will appoint their bishops [ἐπισκόπους, plural] in righteousness and their deacons [διακόνους, plural] in faith.”

(Clement of Rome, 1 Clement, 42.4-5; trans. Michael W. Holmes,The Apostolic Fathers: Greek Texts and English Translations, [Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2007], p. 101.) [5.]

Note: Note the parallel between Clement and the Didache. Cf. 1 Clement, 44.1-6 quoted above.

Kurt Niederwimmer:

Χειροτονεῖν here means “choose” or “elect,” not “appoint.” Those who are chosen bear the titles ἐπίσκοποι καὶ διάκονοι; this is most probably to be understood to mean that a number of ἐπίσκοποι and/or διάκονοι are to work in each community. Therefore, in the region from which the tradition of the Didache comes, (1) there is not yet a monepiscopate. (2) The community officers do not include the group called πρεσβύτεροι. The phrase in the Didache that mentions bishops and deacons recalls Phil 1:1 (σὺν ἐπισκόποις καὶ διακόνοις), and given that this parallel is not accidental we would have to recognize the retarded nature of the development of canon law in the Didache’s milieu (Philippians would have to be about a half century earlier than the redactional level of the Didache). The absence of presbyters apparently indicates that the development of the “local clergy” perceptible in the Didache’s milieu was not specifically Jewish-Christian in its influences.

(Kurt Niederwimmer, Hermeneia: A Critical and Historical Commentary on the Bible: The Didache: A Commentary, trans. Linda M. Maloney, ed. Harold W. Attridge, [Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1998], on Didache, 15.1, p. 200.)

Note: Niederwimmer asserts that there can be no parallel connection between 1 Clement, 42.4-5 and Didache, 15.1 (cf. Idem, p. 200 fn. 7), although he provides no argumentation to substantiate his claim (or if he does I am failing to comprehend it). However, if Niederwimmer is correct, and there is no connection, the context still rules out the existence of a monepiscopate (a point Niederwimmer notes).

D. Polycarp of Smyrna, “The Letter to the Philippians.” Return to Outline.

Note: Polycarp’s use of the term πρεσβύτερος (presbyter/elder) has no direct bearing upon the question: “was there a monarchical episcopate in Rome prior to the middle of the second century?” However it does provide valuable historical context.

Polycarp of Smyrna (c. 69-155 A.D.):

Similarly, the younger men must be blameless in all things; they should be concerned about purity above all, reining themselves away from all evil. For it is good to be cut off from the sinful desires in the world, because every sinful desire wages war against the spirit, and neither fornicators nor male prostitutes nor homosexuals will inherit the kingdom of God, nor those who do perverse things. Therefore one must keep away from all these things and be obedient to the presbyters [πρεσβυτέροις] and deacons as to God and Christ. The young women must maintain a pure and blameless conscience.

(Polycarp of Smyrna, The Letter to the Philippians, 5.3; trans. Michael W. Holmes,The Apostolic Fathers: Greek Texts and English Translations, Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2007], p. 287.) [6.]

Note: Only two offices are mentioned (presbyters and deacons) as the terms presbyter and bishop were likely still synonymous.

J. B. Lightfoot:

ὡς Θεῷ κ.τ.λ.] See the note on Ign. Magn. 6. The contrast to the language of Ignatius is not less significant than the resemblance. It is the ‘bishops,’ not the presbyters, who stand in God’s place in Ignatius. Either therefore there was no bishop at Philippi when Polycarp wrote, or Polycarp did not think fit to separate his claims to allegiance from those of the presbyters.

(J. B. Lightfoot, The Apostolic Fathers: Part II. S. Ignativs. S. Polycarp. Revised Texts: With Introductions, Notes, Dissertations, and Translations: Vol. III: Second Edition, [London: Macmillan and Co., 1889], on Polycarp, To the Philippians, 5, p. 190.)

Peter Oakes:

The fact of appeal to Polycarp for advice suggests that there was no ἐπίσκοπος, in the second-century sense, at Philippi at the time of Polycarp’s letter. . . . In a context where Ignatius is a key figure, a letter from a bishop to a church without a bishop, especially when the letter is in response to a request for advice, must involve the issue of the extent to which the bishop is accepting some sort of episcopal responsibility for the recipients. Polycarp’s response to this issue seems to me to be a very careful one. He gives advice, as requested, but he minimizes the exercise of episcopal authority in doing so. Moreover, this response does not seem to be designed to avoid ‘treading on the toes’ of some other bishop. Polycarp seems to downplay the need for episcopal authority for the Philippians at all.

Polycarp gives himself no title or epithet (Ignatius uses the latter, e.g., Eph. heading). Polycarp makes no reference to his episcopal role in Smyrna. He associates the πρεσβύτεροι at Smyrna, as a body, with him in the writing of the letter (1. 1). The simplicity and the collegiality of the opening take away from the impression of the letter being an episcopal pronouncement. Added to this are Polycarp’s expressions of diffidence, both in expressing his opinions to the Philippians at all (3. 1) and, curiously, in his scriptural knowledge (12. 1, see below), He is more inclined to send his hearers to the letters of Paul (3. 2) or Ignatius (13. 2) than to assert any authority of his own. Polycarp’s protestations of diffidence seem to be carried much more fully into the tone of the letter than are those of Ignatius (such as Eph. 3. 1).

The contrast between Polycarp and Ignatius in their calls for submission to church leaders is very striking. Ignatius repeatedly calls for submission to the bishop (e.g., Trall. 2), often to the bishop and the presbytery (e.g., Eph. 2. 2), and sometimes to bishop, presbytery, and deacons (Phld. 7. 1). Ignatius regards submission to the bishop as a defining characteristic of a Christian (Magn. 4). Calls for such submission are the most common refrain in Ignatius’ letters. Polycarp, on the other hand, despite the literary opportunity presented by his use of a ‘household code’ form, calls the ‘young men’ to submission only to church leaders, in this case πρεσβύτεροις (as 1 Pet. 5. 5) and διακόνοις. No mention is made of submission to an episcopal figure, an omission that Ignatius would surely not have contemplated, whatever the current pattern of leadership at Philippi. Moreover, when Polycarp calls all to submission, it is to one another (10. 2).

(Peter Oakes, “Leadership and Suffering in the Letters of Polycarp and Paul to the Philippians;” In: Trajectories Through the New Testament and the Apostolic Fathers, Andrew F. Gregory, Christopher M. Tuckett, eds., [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005], pp. 359, 359-360.)

Cf. Peter Oakes:

The closest that Polycarp comes to talking about an ἐπίσκοπος is in using the cognate verb in his instructions to the elders. However, his use of it there is to encourage them to be ἐπισκεπτόμενοι πάντας ἀσθενεῖς (6. 1). The use of the verb in such a specific sense suggests that Polycarp possibly does not commonly use the word-group in its more broad-ranging episcopal sense. The instructions to the presbyters overall seem to be aimed at controlling the use of authority rather than sustaining it (6. 1-2). The emphasis is on mercy. The same comes out in the instructions about Valens and his wife (esp. 11. 4), the implementation of which was presumably mainly in the hands of the presbyters. It is notable that the advice to presbyters does not include activities such as teaching.

The placing of the instructions to deacons is unexpected. They seem to be categorized among the congregation (between widows and young men) rather than with the elders. Moreover, the instructions to them seem not to relate particularly to leadership. The overlap between the lists for deacons and for widows is striking.

Polycarp greatly respects Ignatius, as do the Philippians. Polycarp acts on Ignatius’ wishes about envoys going to Syria (Pol. Phil. 13. 1; Ign. Pol. 7). However, Polycarp’s letter appears to encourage the Philippians to views on church leadership that differ somewhat from those of Ignatius. The first-century Philippian ἐπίσκοποι have probably become πρεσβύτεροι. Polycarp does not lead them in the direction of seeking an ἐπίσκοπος. And if the Philippians’ letter to him was effectively a call for him to take up episcopal oversight at a distance, he seems effectively to have declined the request.

E. Ignatius of Antioch, “Epistle to the Romans.” Return to Outline.

Eamon Duffy (Roman Catholic Historian and Former Member of the Pontifical Historical Commission):

(Eamon Duffy, Saints & Sinners: A History of the Popes, [New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2006], p. 10.)

Robert B. Eno, S.S. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

Ignatius wrote his letters ostensibly to thank the local communities in Asia Minor for their kind assistance to him as a prisoner for Christ but more precisely to warn them against dangers to unity and, as we have seen, to urge the importance of a single strong authoritative leader of the local community. Throughout these six letters, he broadcasts his theological views of the central importance of the bishop. But he also wrote one letter ahead, to a place which he had never visited personally but where he was to end his life as a martyr—Rome. His purpose here was quite different—to ask the Roman Christians not to interfere on his behalf to try to stop his trial and suffering. The letter is interesting because, unlike all the other letters, it contains no ecclesiological doctrine about the importance of the bishop. Of course, as he himself says, he did not presume to give the Roman Christians instructions as the Apostles had. Nevertheless it is strange that while the other letters all make frequent mention of the bishop of the community being addressed, he does not greet a bishop in Rome nor does he ever mention such a person in this letter. One might object that since Ignatius had never been in Rome, he did not know the bishop’s name. He could have spoken to or of a bishop even if he had not known his name. More importantly, if one should presume from his other letters that a strong individual bishop-leader existed everywhere in the Church of his time, then he would have known that there was such a leader in the Roman community. But we have only silence, which leads many to conclude that Ignatius did not address such a person because the Roman community of the time had no such leader.

(Robert B. Eno, S.S., The Rise Of The Papacy, [Wilmington: Michael Glazier, Inc., 1990], pp. 26-27.)

F. “The Shepherd of Hermas.” Return to Outline.

The Shepherd of Hermas [A Christian Living in Rome] (2nd Century A.D.):

Therefore you will write two little books, and you will send one to Clement and one to Grapte. Then Clement will send it to the cities abroad, because that is his job. But Grapte will instruct the widows and orphans. But you yourself will read it to this city, along with the elders [πρεσβυτέρων] who preside [προϊσταμένων] over the church.

(The Shepherd of Hermas, Vision 2.4.8.3; trans. Michael W. Holmes, The Apostolic Fathers: Greek Texts and English Translations of Their Writings, [Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2007], p. 469.) [7.]

Cf. The Shepherd of Hermas [A Christian Living in Rome] (2nd Century A.D.):

“Now hear about the stones that go into the building. The stones that are square and white and fit at their joints, these are the apostles and bishops [ἐπίσκοποι, plural] and teachers and deacons who have walked according to the holiness of God and have ministered to the elect of God as bishops [ἐπισκοπήσαντες] and teachers and deacons with purity and reverence; some have fallen asleep, while others are still living.

(The Shepherd of Hermas, Vision 3.5.13.1; trans Michael W. Holmes, The Apostolic Fathers: Greek Texts and English Translations of Their Writings, [Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2007], p. 479.) [8.]

Note: bishops (plural), note also that the terms elders and bishops are used interchangeably.

Cf. Clayton N. Jefford:

…the author does not clearly distinguish among the rulers of the church, calling them both “presbyters” and “bishops.” The evidence indicates that there is no firm understanding of two distinct offices. This suggests that the leadership of the community consisted of several individuals and did not depend on a single bishop (see 8.3; 13.1).

(Clayton N. Jefford, Reading the Apostolic Fathers: Second Edition, [Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2012], p. 147.)

Eamon Duffy (Roman Catholic Historian and Former Member of the Pontifical Historical Commission):

The visionary treatise The Shepherd of Hermas, written in Rome early in the second century, speaks always collectively of the ‘rulers of the Church’, or the ‘elders that preside over the Church’, and once again the author makes no attempt to distinguish between bishops and elders. Clement is indeed mentioned (if Hermas’ Clement is the same man as the author of the letter written at least a generation before, which we cannot assume) but not as presiding bishop. Instead, we are told that he was the elder responsible for writing ‘to the foreign cities’ — in effect the corresponding secretary of the Roman church.

Everything we know about the church in Rome during its first hundred years confirms this general picture.

(Eamon Duffy, Saints & Sinners: A History of the Popes, [New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2006], pp. 10-11.)

Robert B. Eno, S.S. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

Hermas was a farmer, an ex-slave who was a member of the Roman community who received what we would call visions and private revelations, most of which concern the problem of sin in the Church and the issue of public penance. What is of interest here are the incidental remarks which mention the leaders of the Christian community in Rome. These leaders are usually referred to by such vague titles as “the leaders” (e.g., Vision II.2.6; III.9.7). Sometimes they are called elders as “the elders who are in charge of the Church” (Vis. II.4.3). It is significant to note that these references are all in the plural. In other places, bishops are mentioned (again in the plural); they are usually linked with others, e.g., bishops, teachers and deacons (Vis. III.5.1)...

(Robert B. Eno, S.S., The Rise Of The Papacy, [Wilmington: Michael Glazier, Inc., 1990], pp. 27-28.)

Allen Brent (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

Here, then, in the Rome of the mid-second century we have not a monarch-bishop but ‘the presbyters who preside over the church’, though individually each may have presided over a single house-church in a fractionalized Roman community.

(Allen Brent, Ignatius of Antioch: A Martyr Bishop and the Origin of Episcopacy, [London: Continuum, 2007], pp. 125-126.)

G. Objection: Ignatius of Antioch, “Epistle to the Magnesians.” Return to Outline.

Note: See endnote 9 regarding the preface of Ignatius’ Letter to the Romans. [9.]

Ignatius of Antioch (c. ?-108/140 A.D.):

Since, therefore, in the persons mentioned above I have by faith seen and loved the whole congregation, I have this advice: Be eager to do everything in godly harmony, the bishop presiding in the place of God and the presbyters in the place of the council of the apostles and the deacons, who are especially dear to me, since they have been entrusted with the ministry of Jesus Christ, who before the ages was with the Father and appeared at the end of time.

(Ignatius of Antioch, Letter to the Magnesians, 6.1; trans. Michael W. Holmes,The Apostolic Fathers: Greek Texts and English Translations, [Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2007], p. 207.) [10.]

Note: This tells us nothing about Rome or the western Church at large. It tells us only that in the eastern Church the offices of “presbyter” and “bishop” were beginning to separate. However we do learn of the practices of the western Church from Ignatius’ Epistle to the Romans, which clearly demonstrates that a monarchical episcopate had not yet developed in Rome, and that the terms presbyter and bishop were still synonymous (see §§. 1A-F above, especially §. 1E).

W. H. Griffith Thomas:

The witness of Ignatius is, of course, of great importance, but it is essential to be careful not to misconstrue it and to derive from it what it does not convey. The following points seem clear:—

(a) The fact of episcopacy in Asia Minor by the time of Ignatius, 120.

(b) And yet it is purely congregational. Ignatius is attacking separatists who disobeyed an existing order, and is not referring to other Churches which may have had another order. This congregational aspect is now admitted by scholars. Ignatius bases episcopacy on two grounds: (1) Fitness. It is in harmony with the teaching of the Gospels, being regarded as analogous to Christ, while the Presbyters correspond to the Apostles. (2) Direct revelation to himself. “The Spirit said.” This argument is often overlooked, for, of course, it proves too much to claim direct Divine authority in this way.

(W. H. Griffith Thomas, The Principles of Theology: An Introduction to the Thirty-Nine Articles, [London: Church Book Room Press, Ltd., 1963], pp. 325-326.)

Henry Melvill Gwatkin:

Time after time he insists, Obey the bishop, and presses it in every way he can. His urgency has not been exaggerated; and indeed it hardly can be exaggerated. So much the more significant is the absence of the one decisive argument which would have made all the rest superfluous. With all his urgency, he never says, Obey the bishop as the Lord ordained, or as the apostles gave command. Even if this is not always the first argument of a man who believes it, he cannot get far without using it. The continued silence of so earnest an advocate as Ignatius is a plain confession that he knew of no such command: and the ignorance of one who must have known the truth of the matter would seem decisive that no such command was given.

(Henry Melvill Gwatkin, Early Church History to A.D. 313: In Two Volumes: Vol. I, [London: Macmillan and Co., Limited, 1909], p. 294.)

Cf. G. B. Caird:

The . . . theory, that episcopacy arose spontaneously out of the pressure of pastoral necessity, has the combined support of Clement and Ignatius. For Clement tells us that the apostles appointed presbyter-bishops in every church and left instructions that the office should be perpetuated; he knows nothing of the single bishop, and clearly regards the eldership as the universal apostolic ministry. Ignatius, who must have lived through the inauguration of episcopacy in his own church, sponsors it not on grounds of apostolic command or precedent, but simply because the bishop constitutes a necessary centre of unity for the church. …What Gwatkin has said about an apostolic command applies with equal force to an apostolic precedent. The obvious inference from Ignatius’ arguments is that episcopacy was first introduced for purely practical reasons as a safeguard against the danger of internal dissension or schism.

(G. B. Caird, The Apostolic Age, [London: Gerald Duckworth & Co. Ltd., 1966], pp. 153, 154.)

Darwell Stone:

The letters of St. Ignatius place the presbyters in very close relation to the bishop. Only one part of his teaching is seen in his strong emphasis on the authority of the bishop. Many times, in his seven short letters, he links together bishop and presbyters, or bishop and presbyters and deacons. To select a few instances, he writes, “That ye may obey the bishop and the presbyters;” “Be ye zealous to do all things in godly concord, the bishop presiding after the likeness of God, and the presbyters after the likeness of the council of the Apostles, with the deacons also, who are most dear to me, having been entrusted with the diaconate of Jesus Christ;” “Neither do ye anything without the bishop and the presbyters;” “Let all men respect the deacons as Jesus Christ, even as they should respect the bishop as being a type of the Father, and the presbyters as the council of God and as the college of the Apostles” (St. Ignatius, Eph., 20; Magn., 6, 7; Tral., 3).

(Darwell Stone, The Christian Church, [New York: Edwin S. Gorham, 1906], p. 335.)

Paul Foster:

What is to be made of the repeated, highly laudatory and theologically significant comments about bishops? First, the fact that Ignatius has to insist on the primacy of the episcopacy and its authority suggests that this was not a universally held view even in the cities where the various named bishops held office. In fact the epistles bear witness to opposition to the authority of the bishop. Grant notes that the clear implication of Smyr. 8.1-2 is ‘that the heterodox had their own Eucharist’. The response Ignatius presents to those who refuse the authority of Polycarp in Smyrna is to reject the validity of the opponents’ cultic rituals. As Schoedel states, ‘Ignatius wishes to make it doubly clear that only the bishop can give approval to such meals.’ Thus, Ignatius seeks to impose a standardization of structure upon the various churches he comes across during his journey. Sociologically, the epistles may be reflecting the transition of early Christian communities from a pattern of charismatic leadership to a more structured and clearly defined system of authority, and the tension resulting from this. Such routinization of the charisma is a common phenomenon in later generations of new religious movements.

(Paul Foster, “The Epistles of Ignatius of Antioch;” In: The Writings of the Apostolic Fathers, ed. Paul Foster, [London: T&T Clark, 2007], p. 95.)

G.1. Excursus: The Congregational Nature of the Episcopacy. Return to Outline.

John Brown:

Up to and even after the conversion of the Empire under Constantine bishops and presbyters were chosen by the whole body of the people by show of hands (χειροτονία)...

(John Brown, Apostolical Succession in the Light of History and Fact: The Congregational Union Lecture for 1897, [London: Congregational Union of England and Wales, 1898], Lecture III: Further Uncertainties and Objections, p. 102.)

Didache (1st Century A.D.):

Therefore appoint [χειροτονήσατε] for yourselves bishops and deacons worthy of the Lord…

(Didache, 15.1; trans. Michael W. Holmes,The Apostolic Fathers: Greek Texts and English Translations, [Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2007], p. 367.) [11.]

Cf. Kurt Niederwimmer:

Canons of the Church of Alexandria [Wrongly ascribed to Hippolytus] (c. 4th Century A.D.):

A bishop should be elected by all the people, and he should be unimpeachable, as it is written of him in the apostle; in the week in which he is ordained, the whole people should also say, We desire him; and there should be silence in the whole hall, and they should all pray in his behalf, and say, O God, stablish him whom Thou hast prepared for us, etc.

(Canons of the Church of Alexandria [Wrongly ascribed to Hippolytus], Canon Second [Of Bishops]; trans. ANF, 5:257.) See also: ccel.org.

Constitutions of the Holy Apostles (c. 375/80 A.D.):

…a bishop to be ordained is to be, as we have already, all of us, appointed, unblameable in all things, a select person, chosen by the whole people, who, when he is named and approved, let the people assemble, with the presbytery and bishops that are present, on the Lord’s day, and let them give their consent. And let the principal of the bishops ask the presbytery and people whether this be the person whom they desire for their ruler.

(Constitutions of the Holy Apostles, 8.2.4; trans. ANF, 7:481-482.) See also: ccel.org.

Cyprian, Bishop of Carthage (c. 210-258 A.D.):

In respect of that which our fellow-presbyters, Donatus and Fortunatus, Novatus and Gordius, wrote to me, I have not been able to reply by myself, since, from the first commencement of my episcopacy, I made up my mind to do nothing on my own private opinion, without your advice and without the consent of the people.

(Cyprian of Carthage, Epistle 5.4 [Oxford ed.: Ep. xiv.]; trans. ANF, 5:283.) See also: ccel.org.

Cf. Cyprian, Bishop of Carthage (c. 210-258 A.D.):

…a people obedient to the Lord’s precepts, and fearing God, ought to separate themselves from a sinful prelate, and not to associate themselves with the sacrifices of a sacrilegious priest, especially since they themselves have the power either of choosing worthy priests, or of rejecting unworthy ones.

(Cyprian of Carthage, Epistle 67.3 [Oxford ed.: Ep. lxvii.]; trans. ANF, 5:370.) See also: ccel.org.

Cf. John Brown:

Against this theory that the Unity of the Church consists in the unity and authority of the bishops is the simple fact that, even according to Cyprian’s own writings, the bishop derives his authority from the people, and is very far from being an absolute autocratic official.

(John Brown, Apostolical Succession in the Light of History and Fact: The Congregational Union Lecture for 1897, [London: Congregational Union of England and Wales, 1898], Lecture VII: Hierarchical Developments in the Church, p. 257.)

Eusebius, Bishop of Caesarea (c. 260/5-339 A.D.):

3. For when all the brethren had assembled to select by vote him who should succeed to the episcopate of the church, several renowned and honorable men were in the minds of many, but Fabianus, although present, was in the mind of none. But they relate that suddenly a dove flying down lighted on his head, resembling the descent of the Holy Spirit on the Saviour in the form of a dove.

4. Thereupon all the people, as if moved by one Divine Spirit, with all eagerness and unanimity cried out that he was worthy, and without delay they took him and placed him upon the episcopal seat.

(Eusebius of Caesarea, Church History, 6.29.3-4; trans. NPNF2, 1:275.)

Gregory of Nazianzus, Archbishop of Constantinople (c. 329/30-389 A.D.):

Thus, and for these reasons, by the vote of the whole people, not in the evil fashion which has since prevailed, nor by means of bloodshed and oppression, but in an apostolic and spiritual manner, he is led up to the throne of Saint Mark, to succeed him in piety, no less than in office; in the latter indeed at a great distance from him, in the former, which is the genuine right of succession, following him closely. For unity in doctrine deserves unity in office; and a rival teacher sets up a rival throne; the one is a successor in reality, the other but in name. For it is not the intruder, but he whose rights are intruded upon, who is the successor, not the lawbreaker, but the lawfully appointed, not the man of contrary opinions, but the man of the same faith; if this is not what we mean by successor, he succeeds in the same sense as disease to health, darkness to light, storm to calm, and frenzy to sound sense.

(Gregory of Nazianzus, Oration 21.8 [On the Great Athanasius, Bishop of Alexandria]; trans. NPNF2, 7:271.) See also: ccel.org.

Darwell Stone: (Fourth Council of Carthage, Canon 22.)

In the canons of the so-called “Fourth Council of Carthage” (see p. 331, supra), a bishop was forbidden to ordain any without the advice of his clergy, so that he might know whether the people agreed and approved (“Fourth Council of Carthage,” canon 22: see Hardouin, Concilia, i. 980), and this regulation passed into the general canon law of the Western Church (Decret., I. xxiv. 6).

(Darwell Stone, The Christian Church, [New York: Edwin S. Gorham, 1906], p. 336.)

Athanasius, Archbishop of Alexandria (c. 296/8-373 A.D.): (Letter of Julius to the Eusebians at Antioch)

But now I am ignorant under what colour these proceedings have been carried on. In the first place, if the truth must be spoken, it was not right, when we had written to summon a council, that any persons should anticipate its decisions: and in the next place, it was not fitting that such novel proceedings should be adopted against the Church. For what canon of the Church, or what Apostolical tradition warrants this, that when a Church was at peace, and so many Bishops were in unanimity with Athanasius the Bishop of Alexandria, Gregory should be sent thither, a stranger to the city, not having been baptized there, nor known to the general body, and desired neither by Presbyters, nor Bishops, nor Laity—that he should be appointed at Antioch, and sent to Alexandria, accompanied not by presbyters, nor by deacons of the city, nor by bishops of Egypt, but by soldiers? for they who came hither complained that this was the case.

(Athanasius of Alexandria, Apologia Contra Arianos (Defence Against the Arians), 1.2.30; trans. NPNF2, 4:115-116.) See also: ccel.org.

Priscillian, Bishop of Ávila (c. 340-385 A.D.):

…as a bishop’s consecration lies with the bishop, so the choice of whom to ask for lies with the people [et sicut dedicationem sacerdotis in sacerdote, sic electionem consistere petitionis <in> plebe].

(Priscilliani, Tractatus Undecim, Tractatus II: Liber ad Damasum Episcopum; CSEL, 18:40; cf. PLS, 2:1439; trans. Charles Gore, The Church and the Ministry: Fifth Edition, Revised, [London: Longmans, Green, and Co., 1902], p. 93.)

Leo I, Bishop of Rome [Leo the Great] (c. 400-461 A.D.):

In peace and quietness should they be asked for who are to be priests. The consent of the clergy, the testimony of those held in honour, the approval of the orders and the laity should be required. He who is to govern all, should be chosen by all.

(Leo the Great, Letter 10.6; trans. NPNF2, 12:11.) See also: ccel.org.

Cf. Leo I, Bishop of Rome [Leo the Great] (c. 400-461 A.D.):

When therefore the choice of the chief priest is taken in hand, let him be preferred before all whom the unanimous consent of clergy and people demands, but if the votes chance to be divided between two persons, the judgment of the metropolitan should prefer him who is supported by the preponderance of votes and merits: only let no one be ordained against the express wishes of the place: lest a city should either despise or hate a bishop whom they did not choose, and lamentably fall away from religion because they have not been allowed to have whom they wished.

(Leo the Great, Letter 14.6; trans. NPNF2, 12:18.) See also: ccel.org.

Cf. Leo I, Bishop of Rome [Leo the Great] (c. 400-461 A.D.):

No consideration permits men to be reckoned among bishops who have not been elected by the clergy, demanded by the laity, and consecrated by the bishops of the province with the assent of the metropolitan.

(Leo the Great, Letter 167.3, Question 1, Reply; trans. NPNF2, 12:110.) See also: ccel.org.

Cf. Leo I, Bishop of Rome [Leo the Great] (c. 400-461 A.D.):

And because we have learned through the diligent report of our aforementioned brother that the metropolitan of the province of Achaea has frequently performed illicit ordinations, which are forbidden by the decrees of the Fathers and by our own authority, and that he has further added to his audacity by consecrating a bishop, unknown and never before seen, for the people of Thespiae, despite their unwillingness and opposition, we allow no metropolitan whatsoever to do this, permitting him to ordain no one solely at his own discretion, without the consent of the clergy and the people. Instead, let him appoint as leader of the Church of God the one whom the consensus of the entire city has chosen. Therefore, just as we are not negligent in admonishing what must be observed and avoided, we do not allow anyone to be negligent in carrying out and upholding these matters, for those who safeguard such things shall be accompanied by most worthy praise and, as we hope, rewarded by the Lord with greater fruits of obedience. But one who strays and forgets the apostolic constitution will be subject to both ecclesiastical and divine censure. [Et quia memorati fratris nostri sollicita relatione cognovimus Achaiæ provinciæ metropolitanum illicitas et constitutis Patrum nostrisque auctoritatibus interdictas ordinationes sæpe celebrasse, illudque suis ausibus addidisse, ut Thespiensibus invitis et repugnantibus incognitum, et ante non visum episcopum consecraret; nulli prorsus metropolitano hoc licere permittimus, ut suo tantum arbitrio, sine cleri et plebis assensu quemquam ordinet sacerdotem; sed eum Ecclesiæ Dei præficiat, quem totius civitatis consensus elegerit. Ut itaque nos desides non sumus in monendo quæ custodiri debeant quæque vitari, ita in exsequendis illis atque servandis neminem esse patimur negligentem cum custodientem talia laus dignissima comitetur, et fructus, ut speramus, a Domino uberior obsequatur; devium vero et apostolicæ constitutionis oblitum, obnoxium habitura sit et ecclesiastica et divina censura.]

(S. Leonis Magni, Epistola XIII, Cap. III; PL, 54:665.)

Charles Gore:

Quotations to this effect might be greatly multiplied, and from later sources. The Latin rites of ordination are framed in recognition of this representative system. This then was undoubtedly the ideal of the bishop’s election in the early Church. The bishop was to be really the persona of the Church he ruled.

(Charles Gore, The Church and the Ministry: Fifth Edition, Revised, [London: Longmans, Green, and Co., 1902], p. 94.)

H. Historical Context (Rome). Return to Outline.

Robert B. Eno, S.S. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

(Robert B. Eno, S.S., The Rise Of The Papacy, [Wilmington: Michael Glazier, Inc., 1990], pp. 28-29.)

Cf. Peter Lampe:

The fractionation in Rome favored a collegial presbyterial system of governance and prevented for a long time, until the second half of the second century, the development of a monarchical episcopacy in the city. Victor (c. 189-99) was the first who, after faint-hearted attempts by Eleutherus (c. 175-89), Soter (c. 166-75), and Anicetus (c. 155-66), energetically stepped forward as monarchical bishop and (at times, only because he was incited from the outside) attempted to place the different groups in the city under his supervision or, where that was not possible, to draw a line by means of excommunication. Before the second half of the second century there was in Rome no monarchical episcopacy for the circles mutually bound in fellowship.

(Peter Lampe, Christians at Rome in the First Two Centuries: From Paul to Valentinus, trans. Michael Steinhauser, ed. Marshall D. Johnson, [London: Continuum, 2003], p. 397.) [12.]

Eamon Duffy (Roman Catholic Historian and Former Member of the Pontifical Historical Commission):

The Jewish Christian tent-maker Aquila and his wife Priska or Priscilla were among the victims of Claudius’ purge. They moved to Corinth, where they befriended the Apostle Paul (Acts 18:2), accompanying him when he moved on to Ephesus. They eventually returned to Rome, however, where their house became the meeting place of a church (Romans 16:3-5).

Of a church, notice, not of the Church, for Christian organisation in Rome reflected that of the Jewish community out of which it had grown. The Roman synagogues, unlike their counterparts in Antioch, had no central organisation. Each one conducted its own worship, appointed its own leaders and cared for its own members. In the same way, the ordering of the early Christian community in Rome seems to have reflected the organisation of the synagogues which had originally sheltered it, and to have consisted of a constellation of independent churches, meeting in the houses of the wealthy members of the community. Each of these house churches had its own leaders, the elders or ‘presbyters’. …Everything we know about the church in Rome during its first hundred years confirms this general picture. The Christians of the city were thought of by themselves and others as a single church, as Paul’s letter to the Romans make clear. The social reality behind this single identity, however, was not one congregation, but a loose constellation of churches based in private houses or, as time went on and the community grew, meeting in rented halls in markets and public baths. It was without any single dominant ruling officer, its elders or leaders sharing responsibility, but distributing tasks, like that of foreign correspondent. By the eve of the conversion of Constantine, there were more than two dozen of these religious community-centres or tituli.

(Eamon Duffy, Saints & Sinners: A History of the Popes, [New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2006], pp. 9, 11.)

I. The Consensus of Scholars. Return to Outline.

John P. Meier, S.S.D. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

…it is not without significance that neither the Catechism of the Catholic Church nor Pope John Paul II’s groundbreaking encyclical Ut unum sint employed certain problematic assertions like “St. Peter was the first Pope.” Granted, academics may smile at such an assertion, yet it is still often heard in the popular media, to say nothing of homilies and catechetical instruction. Hence it is at least noteworthy that some recent authoritative documents of the Roman Catholic Church have avoided certain types of claims that would not hold up under the scrutiny of critical historical research.

Francis A. Sullivan, S.J. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

Scholars differ on details, such as how soon the church of Rome was led by a single bishop, but hardly any doubt that the church of Rome was still led by a group of presbyters for at least a part of the second century.

(Francis A. Sullivan, S.J., From Apostles to Bishops: The Development of the Episcopacy in the Early Church, [New York/Mahwah: The Newman Press, 2001], p. viii. Cf. Idem, p. 217.)

William J. La Due, J.C.D. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

…it is now quite generally accepted that the monarchical episcopate in Rome did not originate much before 140-150 A.D.

(William J. La Due, J.C.D., The Chair Of Saint Peter, [Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 1999], p. 26.)

Hermann J. Pottmeyer (Roman Catholic Historian and Theologian):

(Hermann J. Pottmeyer, “Historical Development of the Forms of Authority and Jurisdiction: The Papal Ministry — an Ecumenical Approach;” In: James Puglisi, S.A., ed., How Can the Petrine Ministry Be a Service to the Unity of the Universal Church? [Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 2010], p. 98.)

Note: It is noteworthy that upon this particular question there is virtual unanimity amongst scholars of all theological backgrounds (Protestant, Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox). See §. 2 (below) for an extensive list of Roman Catholic theologians and historians confirming this claim.

J. The Burden of Proof. Return to Outline.

Fredrick W. Norris:

The burden of proof for monepiscopacy in Rome at the beginning of the second century rests on the one arguing that case, since all the evidence speaks either of a plural episcopate, or none at all. I Clement 42 mentions bishops (59,3 uses the singular form of the word for God) as does Hermas Vis. 3,5,1 and Sim. 9,27,2. Ignatius’ Romans neither argues for monepiscopacy nor mentions a bishop in that city.

(Fredrick W. Norris, “Ignatius, Polycarp, and 1 Clement: Walter Bauer Reconsidered,” In: Vigiliae Christianae, Vol. 30, No. 1 (Mar., 1976), p. 38 fn. 53. Cf. Everett Ferguson, ed., Studies in Early Christianity: Volume IV: Orthodoxy, Heresy, and Schism in early Christianity, [New York & London: Garland Publishing, Inc., 1993], Fredrick W. Norris, “Ignatius, Polycarp, and 1 Clement: Walter Bauer Reconsidered,” p. 252(38) fn. 53.)

2. No Monarchical Episcopate in Rome Prior to the Middle of the Second Century (The Testimony of Roman Catholic Scholars). Return to Outline.

Francis A. Sullivan, S.J. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

(Francis A. Sullivan, S.J., From Apostles to Bishops: The Development of the Episcopacy in the Early Church, [New York/Mahwah: The Newman Press, 2001], p. viii. Cf. Idem, p. 217.) [12.5]

William J. La Due, J.C.D. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

…it is now quite generally accepted that the monarchical episcopate in Rome did not originate much before 140-150 A.D.

(William J. La Due, J.C.D., The Chair Of Saint Peter, [Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 1999], p. 26.) [13.]

Robert B. Eno, S.S. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

A new and important study by Peter Lampe draws the picture of the early Roman community divided into a number of smaller house churches scattered throughout the city and its environs, eaeh presided over by a presbyter or perhaps more than one). There was really no united and coordinated Church leadership ad intra, i.e., within the city’s Christian community as a whole. Ad extra, however, with reference to relations with the Christian communities of other cities, there was a united face. One presbyter, e.g., Clement as specifically mentioned in the Shepherd of Hermas, was charged with corresponding with other Christian communities and probably with dispensing the apparently not inconsiderable aid sent to communities in need. Clement and other such “foreign ministers” of the Roman Church were not monarchical bishops… This evidence (Clement, Hermas, Ignatius) points us in the direction of assuming that in the first century and into the second, there was no bishop of Rome in the usual sense given to that title. The office of the single mon-episkopos was slowly emerging in the local Christian communities around the Mediterranean world. Men like Ignatius were strongly urging this development. But the evidence seems to indicate that in the earliest decades, this evolution had not yet been accomplished in Rome. This then is that missing link referred to by Rudolf Pesch. If there were no bishop of Rome, in what sense can one speak of a Petrine succession?

(Robert B. Eno, S.S., The Rise Of The Papacy, [Wilmington: Michael Glazier, Inc., 1990], pp. 28-29, 29.) [14.]

J. Michael Miller, C.S.B. (Roman Catholic Theologian, Historian and Archbishop of Vancouver):

While admitting that the monarchical episcopate came about as the result of historical choices, Catholic doctrine holds that its emergence was guided by the Spirit. …the monarchical episcopacy was not a universal and normative ecclesial structure before the mid-second century.

(J. Michael Miller, C.S.B., The Shepherd And The Rock, [Huntington: Our Sunday Visitor, 1995], pp. 60, 61.)

Klaus Schatz, S.J. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

In fact, this “letter of Clement,” written around 95, is the first document indicating that the Roman community felt responsible for other churches. Its name is a subsequent addition, of course: according to Hegesippus’s list of bishops Clement was bishop of Rome at that time, the third in succession. However, he is not named as the author of the letter; instead, the true sender is the Roman community. We probably cannot say for certain that there was a bishop of Rome at that time. It seems likely that the Roman church was governed by a group of presbyters from whom there very quickly emerged a presider or “first among equals” whose name was remembered and who was subsequently described as “bishop” after the mid-second century.

(Klaus Schatz, S.J., Papal Primary: From its Origins to the Present, trans. John A. Otto & Linda M. Maloney, [Collegeville: The Liturgical Press, 1996], p. 4.) [15.]

Eamon Duffy (Roman Catholic Historian and Former Member of the Pontifical Historical Commission):

To begin with, indeed, there was no ‘pope’, no bishop as such, for the church in Rome was slow to develop the office of chief presbyter, or bishop. By the end of the first century the loose pattern of Christian authority of the first generation of believers was giving way in many places to the more organised rule of a single bishop for each city, supported by a college of elders. This development was at least in part a response to the wildfire spread of false teaching — heresy. As conflicting teachers arose, each claiming to speak for ‘true’ Christianity, a tighter and more hierarchic structure developed, and came to seem essential to the preservation of unity and truth. The succession of a single line of bishops, handing on the teaching of the Apostles like a baton in a relay race, provided a pedigree for authentic Christian truth, and a concrete focus for unity.

(Eamon Duffy, Saints & Sinners: A History of the Popes, [New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2006], pp. 9-10.) [16.]

Raymond E. Brown, S.S. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

This survey shows that the manner and exercise of supervision varied greatly in the different places and different periods within the first century or NT era. Only at the end of the century and under various pressures was a more uniform structure of church office developing. The death of the great leaders of the early period in the 60s left a vacuum; doctrinal divisions became sharper; and there was a greater separation from Judaism and its structures. By the 80s-90s the presbyter-bishop model was becoming widespread, and with the adjustment supplied by the emergence of the single bishop that model was to dominate in the second century until it became exclusive in the ancient Churches. Many of us see the work of the Holy Spirit in this whole process, but even those who do must recognize that the author of I Clement is giving overly simplified history when he states (I Clem. 42) that the apostles (seemingly the Twelve) who came from Christ appointed their first converts to be bishops and deacons in the local Churches.

(Raymond Edward Brown, The Critical Meaning of the Bible, [New York: Paulist Press, 1981], p. 146.) [17.]

John P. Meier, S.S.D. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

…In striking contrast to 1 and 2 Peter, where individual teachers speak not only in the name of Peter but as Peter, the anonymous author of I Clement speaks as “we,” as the whole church of Rome, which presumably, like Corinth, is led by a group of presbyter-bishops assisted by deacons. There is no sign of the monepiscopate soon to be championed by Ignatius. It is rather “the church of God sojourning in Rome” as such, and not Peter, and not some individual claiming to be the successor of Peter, that implicitly exercises authority over a distinguished Pauline church in Greece. Indeed, the final blessing of the epistle is extended not only to the Corinthians but also “to all those called by God everywhere” (1 Clement 65.2).

Hermann J. Pottmeyer (Roman Catholic Historian and Theologian):

Anyone who wishes to come to an understanding of the papal ministry cannot avoid dealing with the history of this ministry. The historical facts are not disputed, but their theological evaluation is contentious. …It is sociologically explicable that leadership functions became necessary in the congregations, whether in regard to doctrine or discipline, or to representation to the outside world. In order that these responsibilities could be exercised permanently and in an orderly manner, the functions became offices. Among the various leadership models, that of the monepiscopate prevailed as the most effective. That evolved into the monarchical episcopate as the bishop combined in one individual the functions of the teacher of the congregation, of its leader or pastor, and of its priest, presiding at the celebration of the Eucharist.

Ronald Minnerath (Roman Catholic Theologian, Historian and Archbishop of Dijon):

With these second-century witnesses, attention is drawn not on the person of Peter or on a successor in a time when monarchical episcopacy was only beginning to emerge. The general consideration is that the Church of Rome is the apostolic church par excellence, and the reference for the apostolic teaching. Indeed during the second century, it was the apostolic origin of a church that conferred on it a particular authority in the transmission of the “rule of faith.”

(Archbishop Ronald Minnerath, “The Petrine Ministry in the Early Patristic Tradition;” In: James Puglisi, S.A., ed., How Can the Petrine Ministry Be a Service to the Unity of the Universal Church? [Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 2010], p. 36.)

Allen Brent (Roman Catholic Historian):

(Allen Brent, Ignatius of Antioch: A Martyr Bishop and the Origin of Episcopacy, [London: Continuum, 2007], p. 125.) [18.]

George Edward Dolan, S.T.L. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

It would appear that St. Jerome in the fourth century unwittingly laid the foundation when he wrote a defense of the presbyterate against the arrogance and abuses of certain Roman deacons. In order to restore to the presbyterate its rightful place and authority Jerome pointed out that in the very early days of the Church the terms episcopus and presbyter signified the same individuals. In other words, as we interpret Jerome all were bishops in the sense in which this word is understood today, with full powers to confirm and ordain. But when the universal monarchical episcopate was introduced into the government of the Church only the chief priest (ie., the bishop) was given the full powers of confirming and ordaining, while all other priests who were subjected to him (in other words, the presbyters) were given only a limited or restricted share in the powers of the priesthood.

The Catholic Encyclopedia:

(A. Van Hove, D.C.L., “Bishop;” In: The Catholic Encyclopedia: Volume II: Special Edition, [New York: The Encyclopedia Press, Inc., 1913], p. 582.)

Note: πρεσβύτερος, presbyter (elder).

3. Appendix: The Papacy (Quotations from Roman Catholic Historians). Return to Outline.

Hans Küng (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

In the legalistic-scholastic ideology of the church which I have known all too well since my time at the Gregorian, this model is deduced theoretically right from the top: from the pope as the source of power. …But what all too few people know is that this hierarchical mode of the church isn’t the traditionally Catholic model! Though of course it was already prepared for in Rome in the first millennium, it was implemented in the 11C by that Pope Gregory VII (Hildebrand) and the men of the ‘Gregorian Reform’ by means of excommunication, the interdict and the Inquisition (directed above all against German emperors and theologians, against the episcopate and the clergy). And this was done on the basis of the claims made by crude forgeries (above all that of pseudo-Isidore), which presented the Roman innovations of the second millennium as Catholic traditions of the first millennium. …What we hardly ever heard in Rome as students, but what I have already worked out in my Tübingen inaugural lecture, is that the New Testament, patristic and in part even the early mediaeval understanding of the church had a different orientation: not on a monarchical head but on the community of believers—the communio fidelium, and the ministries in the service of the community.

(Hans Küng, My Struggle for Freedom: Memoirs, trans. John Bowden, [London & New York: Continuum, 2004], pp. 347, 348, 348.)

Hans Küng (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

Once in an aisle of St Peter’s I put to Philips the test questions: ‘Who really celebrated the eucharist in the community of Corinth when the apostle Paul was abroad (say in Ephesus)?’ Philips—unfortunately like Congar and others later—proves perplexed, and innocently asks what I mean. I tell him that it is clear from 1 Corinthians (and this isn’t just the Tübingen perspective but that of critical exegesis generally) that in Corinth there was no bishop or Presbyter (Timothy or Titus) whom Paul could have addressed when abuses at the celebration of the eucharist were reported to him… In his letter to Corinth Paul doesn’t address any official but the community as a whole: ‘Wait for one another’ and so on. What does that mean? It means that the community of Corinth celebrated the eucharist even without the apostle, and even without a bishop or presbyter. And what follows from that for today? It follows that according to the New Testament, Catholic communities, say in Communist China, indeed if need be any group of Christians today, can celebrate a eucharist which is theologically valid even without a priest, even if perhaps it is also illegal according to church law! And Protestant communities with pastors who don’t stand in the apostolic succession of ministry can celebrate the eucharist in a quite valid way.

(Hans Küng, My Struggle for Freedom: Memoirs, trans. John Bowden, [London & New York: Continuum, 2004], pp. 350, 350-351.)

Klaus Schatz, S.J. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

Rome did not succeed in maintaining its position against the contrary opinion and praxis of a significant portion of the Church. The two most important controversies of this type were the disputes over the feast of Easter and heretical baptism. Each marks a stage in Rome’s sense of authority and at the same time reveals the initial resistance of other churches to the Roman claim.

(Klaus Schatz, S.J., Papal Primary: From its Origins to the Present, trans. John A. Otto & Linda M. Maloney, [Collegeville: The Liturgical Press, 1996], p. 11.)

Janus [Johann Joseph Ignaz von Döllinger] (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

In the first three centuries, St. Irenæus is the only writer who connects the superiority of the Roman Church with doctrine; but he places this superiority, rightly understood, only in its antiquity, its double apostolical origin, and in the circumstance of the pure tradition being guarded and maintained there through the constant concourse of the faithful from all countries. Tertullian, Cyprian, Lactantius, know nothing of special Papal prerogative, or of any higher or supreme right of deciding in matter of doctrine. In the writings of the Greek doctors, Eusebius, St. Athanasius, St. Basil the Great, the two Gregories, and St. Epiphanius, there is not one word of any prerogatives of the Roman bishop. The most copious of the Greek Fathers, St. Chrysostom, is wholly silent on the subject, and so are the two Cyrils; equally silent are the Latins, Hilary, Pacian, Zeno, Lucifer, Sulpicius, and St. Ambrose. Even the Roman writer Ursinus (about 440), in defending the Roman view of re-baptism, avoids—perhaps cannot venture upon any appeal to—the authority of the Roman Church, as final, or even of especial weight!

St. Augustine has written more on the Church, its unity and authority, than all the other Fathers put together. Yet, from all his numerous works, filling ten folios, only one sentence, in one letter, can be quoted, where he says that the principality of the Apostolic Chair has always been in Rome,—which could, of course, be said then with equal truth of Antioch, Jerusalem, and Alexandria. Any reader of his Pastoral Letter to the separated Donatists on the Unity of the Church, must find it inexplicable, on the Jesuit theory, that in these seventy-five chapters there is not a single word on the necessity of communion with Rome as the centre of unity. He urges all sorts of arguments to show that the Donatists are bound to return to the Church, but of the Papal Chair, as one of them, he knows nothing.

(Janus [Johann Joseph Ignaz von Döllinger], The Pope and the Council: New Edition, [London, Oxford and Cambridge: Rivingtons, 1873], pp. 87-89.)

Janus [Johann Joseph Ignaz von Döllinger] (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

We have a copious literature on the Christian sects and heresies of the first six centuries,—Irenaeus, Hippolytus, Epiphanius, Philastrius, St. Augustine, and, later, Leontius and Timotheus—have left us accounts of them to the number of eighty, but not a single one is reproached with rejecting the Pope’s authority in matters of faith…

(Janus [Johann Joseph Ignaz von Döllinger], The Pope and the Council: New Edition, [London, Oxford and Cambridge: Rivingtons, 1873], pp. 90-91.)

H. Burn-Murdoch, LL. D. cantab., (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

None of the writings of the first two centuries describes St Peter as a bishop of Rome. He and St Paul are coupled as the joint founders of that Church. In the third century, we find St Peter claimed as the founder, St Paul retaining a subordinate place in memory. …In the fourth century, we find an explicit statement that St Peter was bishop of Rome for twenty-five years: it appears earliest in a list of Roman bishops called the Liberian Catalogue, which was compiled in A.D. 354. According to this late ‘tradition’, St Peter went to Rome twelve years after the Crucifixion, left it because of the decree of Claudius which expelled the Jews, and was absent from it for long years.

(H. Burn-Murdoch, The Development of the Papacy, [London: Faber & Faber Limited, 1954], p. 66.)

K. The Eastern Church (Relation to Rome). Return to Outline.

Ronald Minnerath (Roman Catholic Theologian, Historian and Archbishop of Dijon):

In the first millennium there was no question of the Roman bishops governing the church in distant solitude. They used to take their decisions together with their synod, held once or twice a year. When matters of universal concern arose, they resorted to the ecumenical council. Even Leo, who struggled for the apostolic principle over the political one, acknowledged that only the emperor would have the power to convoke an ecumenical council and protect the church.

At the heart of the estrangement that progressively arose between East and West, there may be a historical misunderstanding. The East never shared the Petrine theology as elaborated in the West. It never accepted that the prōtos in the universal church could claim to be the unique successor or vicar of Peter. So the East assumed that the synodal constitution of the church would be jeopardized by the very existence of a Petrine office with potentially universal competencies in the government of the church.

Yves Congar, O.P. (Roman Catholic Theologian, Historian and Cardinal):

The East never accepted the regular jurisdiction of Rome, nor did it submit to the judgment of Western bishops. Its appeals to Rome for help were not connected with a recognition of the principle of Roman jurisdiction but were based on the view that Rome had the same truth, the same good. The East jealously protected its autonomous way of life. Rome intervened to safeguard the observation of legal rules, to maintain the orthodoxy of faith and to ensure communion between the two parts of the church, the Roman see representing and personifying the West (cf. Batiffol, p.75). In according Rome a ‘primacy of honour’, the East avoided basing this primacy on the succession and the still living presence of the apostle Peter. A modus vivendi was achieved which lasted, albeit with crises, down to the middle of the eleventh century…

(Yves Congar, Diversity and Communion, trans. John Bowden, [London: SCM Press Ltd, 1984], pp. 26-27.)

Yves Congar, O.P. (Roman Catholic Theologian, Historian and Cardinal):

Many of the Eastern Fathers who are rightly acknowledged to be the greatest and most representative and are, moreover, so considered by the universal Church, do not offer us any more evidence of the primacy. Their writings show that they recognized the primacy of the Apostle Peter, that they regarded the See of Rome as the prima sedes playing a major part in the Catholic communion—we are recalling, for example, the writings of St. John Chrysostom and of St. Basil who addressed himself to Rome in the midst of the difficulties of the schism of Antioch—but they provide us with no theological statement on the universal primacy of Rome by divine right. The same can be said of St. Gregory Nazianzen, St. Gregory of Nyssa, St. Basil, St. John Chrysostom, St. John Damascene.

(Yves Congar, After Nine Hundred Years: The Background of the Schism Between the Eastern and Western Churches, [New York: Fordham University Press, 1959], p. 61.)

Francis A. Sullivan, S.J. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

The Second Council of Constantinople (553)

Of all the ecumenical councils, this is the one which witnessed the most radical challenge to papal authority on the part of the eastern episcopate. No doubt this is largely due to the fact that this was also the only council in which the eastern bishops were united among themselves and with the emperor against the pope. The initiative for this council came from the Emperor Justinian’s determination to placate and reconcile the Monophysites by condemning three long-dead bishops: Theodore of Mopsuestia, Theodoret of Cyr, and Ibas of Edessa, whom the Monophysites accused of Nestorianism. The western church saw this move as a retreat from the orthodoxy of Chalcedon, and strongly condemned Pope Vigilius’ initial acquiescence to the emperor’s demand. When Vigilius saw how violent was the reaction of the West to his first decree, he withdrew it, whereupon Justinian summoned a council and had Vigilius forcibly brought to Constantinople to take part in it. The eastern bishops were ready to do the emperor’s bidding, but Vigilius forbade the council to proceed to the condemnation of the ‘Three Chapters’, reserving the case to his own judgment. He then issued his Constitutum in which he rejected the idea of condemning the three long-dead bishops, but did censure some of their writings. The council, under the domination of the emperor, declared Vigilius excommunicated for defying the ecumenical council, and proceeded without him to condemn the ‘Three Chapters’. The council could hardly have more strongly expressed its rejection of the papal claim to definitive teaching authority.

(Francis A. Sullivan, S.J., Magisterium: Teaching Authority in the Catholic Church, [Eugene: Wipf and Stock, 2002; previously published by Paulist Press, 1983], pp. 68-69.)

4. Appendix: Matthew 16:18 (In Church History—The Testimony of Roman Catholic Historians). Return to Outline.

Note: The Patristic writers, outside of the Church at Rome, did not understand Matthew 16:18 to be speaking of a petrine office, succession or authority. For extensive primary source documentation of this consensus see: William Webster, The Matthew 16 Controversy: Peter and the Rock, [Battle Ground: Christian Resources Inc., 1996; second printing, revised 1999]. See also: christiantruth.com - Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3.

Yves Congar, O.P. (Roman Catholic Theologian, Historian and Cardinal):

Unanimous patristic consent as a reliable locus theologicus is classical in Catholic theology; it has often been declared such by the magisterium and its value in scriptural interpretation has been especially stressed.

Application of the principle is difficult, at least at a certain level. In regard to individual texts of Scripture total patristic consensus is rare. …One example: the interpretation of Peter’s confession in Matthew 16.16-19. Except at Rome, this passage was not applied by the Fathers to the papal primacy; they worked out exegesis at the level of their own ecclesiological thought, more anthropological and spiritual than judicial.

(Yves Congar, O.P., Tradition and Traditions: An Historical and a Theological Essay, [New York: The Macmillan Company, 1967], pp. 398-399.)

Klaus Schatz, S.J. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

If we ask in addition whether the primitive Church was aware, after Peter’s death, that his authority had passed to the next bishop of Rome, or in other words that the head of the community at Rome was now the successor of Peter, the Church’s rock and hence the subject of the promise in Matthew 16:18-19, the question, put in those terms, must certainly be given a negative answer.

(Klaus Schatz, S.J., Papal Primary: From its Origins to the Present, trans. John A. Otto & Linda M. Maloney, [Collegeville: The Liturgical Press, 1996], p. 2.)

Peter Richard Kenrick (Roman Catholic Theologian, Historian and Archbishop):

If we are bound to follow the majority of the fathers in this thing, then we are bound to hold for certain that by the rock should be understood the faith professed by Peter, not Peter professing the faith.

(Leonard Woolsey Bacon, ed., An Inside View of the Vatican Council, In the Speech of the Most Reverend Archbishop Kenrick, of St. Louis, [New York: American Tract Society], Chapter VII: The Speech of Archbishop Kenrick (1870), p. 109.)

Janus [Johann Joseph Ignaz von Döllinger] (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

All this is intelligible enough, if we look at the patristic interpretation of the words of Christ to St. Peter. Of all the Fathers who interpret these passages in the Gospels (Matt. xvi.18, John xxi.17), not a single one applies them to the Roman bishops as Peter’s successors. How many Fathers have busied themselves with these texts, yet not one of them whose commentaries we possess—Origen, Chrysostom, Hilary, Augustine, Cyril, Theodoret, and those whose interpretations are collected in catenas,—has dropped the faintest hint that the primacy of Rome is the consequence of the commission and promise to Peter! Not one of them has explained the rock or foundation on which Christ would build His Church of the office given to Peter to be transmitted to his successors, but they understood by it either Christ Himself, or Peter’s confession of faith in Christ; often both together. Or else they thought Peter was the foundation equally with all the other Apostles, the twelve being together the foundation–stones of the Church (Apoc. xxi.14). The Fathers could the less recognize in the power of the keys, and the power of binding and loosing, any special prerogative or lordship of the Roman bishop, inasmuch as—what is obvious to any one at first sight—they did not regard a power first given to Peter, and afterwards conferred in precisely the same words on all the Apostles, as anything peculiar to him, or hereditary in the line of Roman bishops, and they held the symbol of the keys as meaning just the same as the figurative expression of binding and loosing.

(Janus [Johann Joseph Ignaz von Döllinger], The Pope and the Council: New Edition, [London, Oxford and Cambridge: Rivingtons, 1873], pp. 91-92.)

George Salmon:

The most elaborate examination of the opinions of the Fathers is in an Epistle [fn. *: Epist. vii., Opp. vol. v., pt. 2. p. 99: Geneva, 1731.] by the French Roman Catholic Launoy, in which, besides the interpretation that Peter was the rock, for which he produces seventeen Patristic testimonies, he gives the interpretations that the rock was the faith which Peter confessed, supported by forty-four quotations; that the rock was Christ Himself, supported by sixteen; and that the Church was built on all the Apostles, supported by eight.

(George Salmon, The Infallibility of the Church, [London: John Murray, 1888], p. 329.)

5. Endnotes (Additional Testimony and Alternate Translations). Return to Outline.

[1.] Cf. Jerome of Stridon (c. 342/7-420 A.D.):

…In writing both to Titus and to Timothy the apostle speaks of the ordination of bishops and of deacons, but says not a word of the ordination of presbyters; for the fact is that the word bishops includes presbyters also.

(Jerome of Stridon, Letter 146.2 [To Evangelus]; trans. NPNF2, 6:289.) See also: ccel.org.

Cf. Jerome of Stridon (c. 342/7-420 A.D.):

Let us attend carefully, to the words of the Apostle, that thou shouldst ordain presbyters in every city, as I have appointed thee. Pointing out afterwards what sort of presbyters should be ordained, he says, if any be blameless, the husband of one wife, &c.; after which he adds, for a bishop must be blameless, as the steward of God. A presbyter, therefore, is the same as a bishop [Idem est ergo presbyter qui et episcopus]; and before, through the instigation of the devil, there were different parties in religion, and it was said among different people (or states,) I am of Paul, I of Apollos, and I of Cephas, the Churches were governed by the common council of presbyters [communi presbyterorum consilio, Ecclesiæ gubernantur]. But afterwards, when every one thought that those whom he had baptized belonged to himself, and not to Christ, it was determined throughout the whole world, that one chosen from the presbyters should be placed over the rest, to whom the care of the whole Church should belong, and the seeds of schisms should be taken away.

If any one should think that this is merely my opinion, and not the doctrine of the Scriptures, let him read again the words of the Apostles to the Philippians, ‘Paul and Timotheus, the servants of Jesus Christ, to all the saints in Christ Jesus which are at Philippi, with the bishops and deacons, grace to you and peace,’ &c. Philippi is a single city of Macedonia; and certainly in one city there could not be several bishops, as they are now denominated, or of the kind that now exist. But because at that time they called the same persons bishops who were presbyters, he has spoken indifferently of bishops as of presbyters.

If this should still appear doubtful to any one, unless it be confirmed by another testimony, it is written in the Acts of the Apostles, that when the Apostle had come to Miletus, he sent to Ephesus, and called the presbyters of the same Church, to whom afterwards he said among other things, Take heed to yourselves, and to all the flock in which the Holy Spirit hath placed you bishops, to feed the Church of God, which he has purchased with his blood. Observe carefully, that when calling the presbyters of that one city Ephesus, he afterwards denominated the same persons bishops [Et hic diligentius observate, quomodo unius civitatis Ephesi presbyteros vocans, postea eosdem episcopos dixerit]. If any one is willing to receive that Epistle to the Hebrews, which is ascribed to Paul, there also the care of the Church is divided among a plurality of rulers; for says he, Obey them who have the rule over you, and be subject to them, for they watch for your souls, as those who must give an account, &c. And the Apostle Peter, who received his name from the firmness of his faith, speaks in the same way in his Epistle, saying, the presbyters who are among you, I beseech, who am your fellow presbyter, and a witness of the sufferings of Christ, &c. The object for which we state these things, is to show that among the ancients, presbyters and bishops were the same; but that by little and little, that the plants of dissensions might be plucked up, the whole care of the Church was committed to one [Hæc propterea, ut ostenderemus apud veteres eosdem fuisse presbyteros quos et episcopos: paulatim vero ut dissensionum plantaria evellerentur, ad unum omnem sollicitudinem esse delatam]. As the presbyters, therefore, know that they are subject by the custom [consuetudine] of the Church to him who is placed over them, so let bishops know that they are greater than presbyters, more by custom than by any real appointment of the Lord [ita episcopi noverint se magis consuetudine, quam dispositionis Dominicæ veritate, presbyteris esse majores]; and that they ought to govern the Church along with the presbyters, imitating Moses, who, when he alone was to preside over the people of Israel, chose seventy, with whom he might judge the people.

(S. Eusebii Hieronymi, Commentariorum in Epistolam ad Titum, Liber Unus, Cap. I, Vers. 5; PL, 26:562-563; trans. John Brown, The Exclusive Claims of Puseyite Episcopalians to the Christian Ministry: Indefensible: With an Inquiry Into the Divine Right of Episcopacy and the Apostolic Succession: In a Series of Letters to the Rev. Dr. Pusey, [Philadelphia: Presbyterian Board of Publication, 1844], pp. 346-348. Cf. John Harrison, Whose Are the Fathers? [London: Longmans, Green, and Co., 1867], pp. 487-488.)

Alt. Trans. Jerome of Stridon (c. 342/7-420 A.D.):

Let us pay careful attention to the words of the apostle who says, “that you should appoint priests in every city, just as I arranged for you.” He discusses what sort of priest ought to be ordained in what follows when he says, “If anyone is without fault, a husband of one wife,” and so on. Later he added, “For a bishop must be without fault, as a steward of God.” It is therefore the very same priest, who is a bishop, and before there existed men who are slanderers by instinct, [before] factions in the religion, and [before] it was said to the people, “I am of Paul, I am of Apollos, but I am of Cephas,” the churches were governed by a common council of the priests. But after each one began to think that those whom he had baptized were his own and not Christ’s, it was decreed for the whole world that one of the priests should be elected to preside over the others, to whom the entire care of the church should pertain, and the seeds of schism would be removed.”

If someone thinks that this is our opinion, but not that of the Scriptures—that bishop and priest are one, and that one is the title of age, the other of his duty—let him reread the apostle’s words to the Philippians when he says, “Paul and Timothy, slaves of Jesus Christ, to all the saints in Christ Jesus who are in Philippi, with the bishops and deacons, grace to you and peace,” and so on. Philippi is a single city in Macedonia, and at least in one city several were not able to be bishops, as they are now thought.” But because at that time they called the same men bishops whom they also called priests, therefore he has spoken indifferently of bishops as if of priests.

This may still seem doubtful to someone unless it is proven by another testimony. In the Acts of the Apostles it is written that when the apostle came to Miletus, he sent to Ephesus and summoned the priests of that church to whom later he said among other things, “Watch yourselves, and the whole flock in which the Holy Spirit appointed you bishops to feed the church of God, which he acquired through his own blood.” And observe here very carefully how, by summoning the priests of the single city of Ephesus, later he has spoken of the same men as bishops.

If anyone wants to receive that epistle which is written in Paul’s name to the Hebrews, even there care for the church is shared equally by many. For indeed he writes to the people, “Obey your leaders, and be in subjection; for they are the ones who watch over your souls, as those who will give a reckoning. Let them not do this with sighing; for indeed this is advantageous to you.” And Peter, who received his name from the firmness of his faith, speaks in his own epistle and says, “As a fellow priest, then, I plead with the priests among you, and as a witness of Christ’s sufferings, I who am a companion also of his glory that is to be revealed in the future, tend the Lord’s flock that is among you, not as though by compulsion but voluntarily.”

These things [have been said] in order to show that to the men of old the same men who were the priests were also the bishops; but gradually, as the seed beds of dissensions were eradicated, all solicitude was conferred on one man. Therefore, just as the priests know that by the custom of the church they are subject to the one who was previously appointed over them, so the bishops know that they, more by custom than by the truth of the Lord’s arrangement, are greater than the priests. And they ought to rule the Church commonly, in imitation of Moses who, when he had under his authority to preside alone over the people of Israel, he chose the seventy by whom he could judge the people. Therefore let us see what sort of priest, or bishop, ought to be ordained.

(Jerome of Stridon, Commentary on Titus, 1.5b; trans. St. Jerome’s Commentaries on Galatians, Titus, and Philemon, trans. Thomas P. Scheck, [Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 2010], pp. 288-290.) Return to Article.

[2.] Cf. Michael W. Holmes:

The unity of style suggests that the letter is the work of a single author. While the letter, which was sent οn behalf of the whole church (see the subscription), does not name its writer, well-attested ancient tradition and most manuscripts identify it as the work of Clement—whose precise identity, however, is not clear. Tradition identifιes him as the third bishop of Rome after Peter, but this is unlikely because the offιce of monarchical bishop, in the sense intended by this later tradition, does not appear to have existed in Rome at this time. Leadership seems to have been entrusted to a group of presbyters or bishops (the two appear to be synonymous in 1 Clement; see 44.1-6), among whom Clement almost certainly was a (if not the) leading fιgure.

(Michael W. Holmes, The Apostolic Fathers: Greek Texts and English Translations of Their Writings, [Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2007], “First Clement, Authorship,” pp. 34-35.)

Cf. J. N. D. Kelly:

After setting out the principle on which the orderly succession of bishops and deacons rests and tracing it back to Jesus Christ, it called for the reinstatement of the extruded presbyters. The letter is the earliest example of the intervention, fraternal but authoritative, of the Roman church, though not of the pope personally, in the affairs of another church. Widely read in Christian antiquity, it was sometimes treated as part of the NT canon.

While Clement’s position as a leading presbyter and spokesman of the Christian community at Rome is assured, his letter suggests that the monarchial episcopate had not yet emerged there, and it is therefore impossible to form any precise conception of his constitutional role.

(J. N. D. Kelly, The Oxford Dictionary of Popes, [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1986], “Clement I, St,” p. 8.)

Cf. William L. Lane:

Christians in Rome during this formative period appear to have met as “household” groups in privately owned locations scattered around the capital city. They constituted a loose network of house churches, without any central facility for worship. The absence of central coordination matches the profile of the separated synagogues in Rome during this period.

(William L. Lane, “Social Perspectives on Roman Christianity during the Formative Years from Nero to Nerva: Romans, Hebrews, 1 Clement;” In: Karl P. Donfried & Peter Richardson eds., Judaism and Christianity in First-Century Rome, [Eugene: Wipf and Stock Publishers, 2003], p. 208.)

Cf. Peter Lampe:

(Peter Lampe, Christians at Rome in the First Two Centuries: From Paul to Valentinus, trans. Michael Steinhauser, ed. Marshall D. Johnson, [London: Continuum, 2003], p. 397.) Return to Article.

[3.] Alt. Trans. Clement of Rome (c. 35-99 A.D.):

And our Apostles knew through our Lord Jesus Christ that there would be strife over the name of the bishop’s [ἐπισκοπῆς, plural] office. For this cause therefore, having received complete foreknowledge, they appointed the aforesaid persons, and afterwards they provided a continuance, that if these should fall asleep, other approved men should succeed to their ministration. Those therefore who were appointed by them, or afterward by other men of repute with the consent of the whole Church, and have ministered unblamably to the flock of Christ in lowliness of mind, peacefully and with all modesty, and for long time have borne a good report with all—these men we consider to be unjustly thrust out from their ministration. For it will be no light sin for us, if we thrust out those who have offered the gifts of the bishop’s [ἐπισκοπῆς, plural] office unblamably and holily. Blessed are those presbyters [πρεσβύτεροι, plural] who have gone before, seeing that their departure was fruitful and ripe: for they have no fear lest any one should remove them from their appointed place. For we see that ye have displaced certain persons, though they were living honorably, from the ministration which had been respected by them blamelessly.

(Clement of Rome, The First Epistle to the Corinthians, 44; trans. J. B. Lightfoot, The Apostolic Fathers: Revised Texts with Introductions and English Translations, ed. J. R. Harmer, [London: Macmillan and Co., Limited, 1912], p. 76.) See also: ccel.org. Return to Article.

[4.] Alt. Trans. Didache (1st Century A.D.):

Appoint for yourselves therefore bishops [ἐπισκόπους, plural] and deacons [διακόνους, plural] worthy of the Lord, men who are meek and not lovers of money, and true and approved; for unto you they also perform the service of the prophets and teachers.

(Didache, 15; trans. J. B. Lightfoot, The Apostolic Fathers: Revised Texts with Introductions and English Translations, ed. J. R. Harmer, [London: Macmillan and Co., Limited, 1912], p. 234.) See also: ccel.org. Return to Article.

[5.] Alt. Trans. Clement of Rome (c. 35-99 A.D.):

So preaching everywhere in country and town, they appointed their firstfruits, when they had proved them by the Spirit, to be bishops [ἐπισκόπους, plural] and deacons [διακόνους, plural] unto them that should believe. And this they did in no new fashion; for indeed it had been written concerning bishops [ἐπισκόπων, plural] and deacons [διακόνων, plural] from very ancient times; for thus saith the scripture in a certain place, I will appoint their bishops [ἐπισκόπους, plural] in righteousness and their deacons [διακόνους, plural] in faith.

(Clement of Rome, The First Epistle to the Corinthians, 42; trans. J. B. Lightfoot, The Apostolic Fathers: Revised Texts with Introductions and English Translations, ed. J. R. Harmer, [London: Macmillan and Co., Limited, 1912], p. 75.) See also: ccel.org. Return to Article.

[6.] Alt. Trans. Polycarp of Smyrna (c. 69-155 A.D.):

In like manner also the younger men must be blameless in all things, caring for purity before everything and curbing themselves from every evil. For it is a good thing to refrain from lusts in the world, for every lust warreth against the Spirit, and neither whoremongers nor effeminate persons nor defilers of themselves with men shall inherit the kingdom of God, neither they that do untoward things. Wherefore it is right to abstain from all these things, submitting yourselves to the presbyters and deacons as to God and Christ. The virgins must walk in a blameless and pure conscience.

(Polycarp of Smyrna, The Epistle to the Philippians, 5; trans. J. B. Lightfoot, The Apostolic Fathers: Revised Texts with Introductions and English Translations, ed. J. R. Harmer, [London: Macmillan and Co., Limited, 1912], p. 179.) See also: ccel.org. Return to Article.

[7.] Alt. Trans. The Shepherd of Hermas [A Christian Living in Rome] (2nd Century A.D.):

Thou shalt therefore write two little books, and shalt send one to Clement, and one to Grapte. So Clement shall send to the foreign cities, for this is his duty; while Grapte shall instruct the widows and the orphans. But thou shalt read (the book) to this city along with the elders [πρεσβυτέρων] that preside over the Church.

(The Shepherd of Hermas, Vision 2.4; trans. J. B. Lightfoot, The Apostolic Fathers: Revised Texts with Introductions and English Translations, ed. J. R. Harmer, [London: Macmillan and Co., Limited, 1912], p. 409.) See also: ccel.org.

Cf. Carolyn Osiek:

The debate has raged among scholars about this Clement: is he or is he not Clement of Rome, author of 1 Clement? Even if the two figures are identical, that does nothing to establish a monarchical episcopate at Rome at this early date; the end of v. 3 is very clear about church government. Even if there were a single bishop in Rome at this time—though all evidence is to the contrary—sending someone else’s letter to other churches would hardly be his task. The reference is more likely to the church secretary, perhaps a deacon.

(Carolyn Osiek, Hermeneia: A Critical and Historical Commentary on the Bible: Shepherd of Hermas: A Commentary, ed. Helmut Koester, [Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1999], on The Shepherd of Hermas, Vision 2.4.8.3, p. 59.) Return to Article.

[8.] Alt. Trans. The Shepherd of Hermas [A Christian Living in Rome] (2nd Century A.D.):

“Hear now concerning the stones that go to the building The stones that are squared and white, and that fit together in their joints, these are the apostles and bishops [ἐπίσκοποι, plural] and teachers and deacons, who walked after the holiness of God, and exercised their office of bishop [ἐπισκοπήσαντες, bishops] and teacher and deacon in purity and sanctity for the elect of God, some of them already fallen on sleep, and others still living.

(The Shepherd of Hermas, Vision 3.5; trans. J. B. Lightfoot, The Apostolic Fathers: Revised Texts with Introductions and English Translations, ed. J. R. Harmer, [London: Macmillan and Co., Limited, 1912], p. 413.) See also: ccel.org. Return to Article.

[9.] Ignatius of Antioch (c. ?-108/140 A.D.):

Ignatius the Image-bearer to the church that has found mercy in the majesty of the Father Most High and Jesus Christ his only son, the church beloved and enlightened through the will of the one who willed all things that exist, in accordance with faith in and love for Jesus Christ our God, which also presides [προκάθηται] in the place of the district of the Romans…

(Ignatius of Antioch, The Letter to the Romans, Preface; trans. Michael W. Holmes, The Apostolic Fathers: Greek Texts and English Translations, [Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2007], p. 225. Cf. J. B. Lightfoot, The Apostolic Fathers: Revised Texts with Introductions and English Translations, ed. J. R. Harmer, [London: Macmillan and Co., Limited, 1912], p. 149.) See also: ccel.org.

Cf. Francis A. Sullivan, S.J. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

The debate has focused on Ignatius’s use of the word prokathemai (to preside), which occurs twice: the church of Rome “presides in the place of the district of the Romans” and “presid[es] over love.” Older Catholic scholars have seen here a recognition of the primacy of the church of Rome over the church throughout the Roman world; however, the word translated “district” (chorion) means a limited area such as a city or town. Love (agape) was sometimes used as a synonym for “communion,” which in turn could mean the Christian community; hence some Catholic writers took “presiding over love” to mean “presiding over the whole church.” However, scholars now generally agree that Ignatius attributes to the church of Rome a preeminence in charitable activity rather than a juridical primacy.

In his scholarly history of papal primacy, Klaus Schatz, S.J., sees in the extraordinary language Ignatius used in the salutation of his letter to the Romans testimony to the unique religious and spiritual significance the church of Rome was even then recognized to possess. He sees this as the first step in the development of what eventually became a juridical primacy.

(Francis A. Sullivan, S.J., From Apostles to Bishops: The Development of the Episcopacy in the Early Church, [New York/Mahwah: The Newman Press, 2001], p. 112.)

Cf. Klaus Schatz, S.J. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

Much ink has been spilled especially in attempts to explain the expression “preeminent in love” (προκαθημένη τῆς ἀγάπης). Roman Catholic authors have interpreted “love” as a synonym for Church community (communio) and deduced from this that Rome has a constitutionally guaranteed position as “presider within the covenant of love,” or center of ecclesial communion. However, this kind of juridical-constitutional interpretation can scarcely correspond to the ideas of Ignatius’s contemporaries. On the Protestant side “preeminence in love” has been applied to the charitable activity of the Roman community, which even at that time because of the presence of influential and well-to-do Christians was better placed than other local churches to help poorer communities. There is certainly merit in this interpretation. It is in harmony with the text of Dionysius of Corinth quoted earlier, and it would also match the universal brotherly and sisterly responsibility and concern for other churches manifested by the Roman church, an essential element of which was material aid. But that assistance was spiritual as well as material. This is evident especially from the overall tenor of the letter: The Roman church appears as the teacher of others and not, like them, in need of instruction. In the context of this letter “preeminence” seems to mean a kind of universal religious and spiritual significance, not to be identified with “presiding” in the legal sense.

(Klaus Schatz, S.J., Papal Primary: From its Origins to the Present, trans. John A. Otto & Linda M. Maloney, [Collegeville: The Liturgical Press, 1996], pp. 5-6.)

Cf. Michael W. Holmes:

presides . . . Romans This phrase, as wordy in Greek as in English, has been the subject of considerable discussion, primarily because of its obvious bearing on the question of the primacy of the bishop of Rome. A number of alternative ways of understanding the phrase have been proposed, most of which either strain the meaning of the words or require the emendation of a well-established text, and thus have little to commend them. Here the church (not the bishop) is said to preside or rule (cf. Magn. 6), presumably over the district in which it is located. presiding over Or preeminent in.

(Michael W. Holmes, The Apostolic Fathers: Greek Texts and English Translations, [Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2007], p. 225.)

Cf. William R. Schoedel:

The exact nature of his attitude toward Rome, however, has been a matter of much dispute. But it appears that Protestant scholarship has been closer to the truth and that the best Roman Catholic commentators no longer read the text as teaching the primacy of the Roman church in a jurisdictional sense.

The Roman church “presides in the place of the district of the Romans” (προκάθηται ἐν τόπῳ χωρίου ῾Ρωμαίων). We may assume that, as in the other salutations, the geographical reference is simply to the place in which the church is located. The verb “presides,” to be sure, normally takes a genitive of the place presided over; but to read the text as saying that the Roman church presides over “the district of the Romans” would require us to take ἐν τόπῳ (with Bunsen) in some adverbial sense or to alter it (with Zahn) to ἐν τύπῳ (“as an example”); and neither suggestion has much to recommend it. The phrase “place of the district of the Romans” is as pleonastic in Greek as in English. Yet although no exact parallel has been found, similar pleonasms occur: the word “place” is occasionally found together with the name of a province or city (Eusebius Hist. eccl. 1.13.6; Ps-Clem. Hom. 1.14); and the expression ὁ τόπος τῆς χώρας sometimes means simply “region” or “country” (Plato Leg. 4, 705c; cf. Crit. 114a). The word χωρίον used by Ignatius refers to any relatively small area such as a district, city, or town. As expected, then, if Ignatius is speaking of the location of the church, he has Rome or Rome and its immediate environs (not the Roman Empire) in mind.

It follows that the verb “preside” is used absolutely here as in Mag. 6.1-2 where it refers to those who exercise authority in the Christian community. Since the latter usage is evidently the primary one, its application to the church of Rome is already more or less metaphorical. The metaphor certainly leaves the impression that the preeminence of this church is one that it enjoys in the eyes of all Christians. But its scope is defined by Ignatius himself just below as a matter of “presiding over love” (προκαθημένη τῆς ἀγάπης). At one time Roman Catholic scholars (Nirschl, Funk) considered “love” to be a term for the (universal) church (“Liebesbund”) and cited a number of parallels for the usage from Ignatius’ letters (Tr. 13.1; Rom. 9.3; Phd. 11.2; Sm. 12.1). But when Ignatius says in these passages that the love of the churches or the brethren gives its greeting, his meaning is made clear by the genitives attached to the term. That is not the case in the passage before us. Rather the metaphor of presiding is extended here to include love as the territory, so to speak, over which the Roman church holds sway. And the point has been appropriately illustrated from the letter to the Romans by Dionysius of Corinth (in Eusebius Hist. eccl. 4.23.10; cf. 1 Clem. 55.2) which attributes to this church a long history of benefactions for the poor and those in mines. The primacy of the Roman church, then, is a spiritual one, and Ignatius singles out its love (for the outcast) precisely because a paradoxical “fear” of that very love dominates the request that follows (Rom. 1.2). Thus Ignatius’ words of praise—exaggerated as they may seem—are not to be understood apart from the circumstances in which he found himself and without taking into account the importance of the city as the place in which he was to attain God. The apostolic church of Rome, like the apostolic church of Ephesus, must play its role—a final and decisive one—in lending significance and meaning to the bishop’s triumphant march to death (cf. Eph. 11.2-12.2). This attitude dominates Ignatius’ other comments on the Roman church in what follows (see on Rom. 3.1; 4.3; 9.1).

(William R. Schoedel, Hermeneia: A Critical and Historical Commentary on the Bible: Ignatius of Antioch: A Commentary on the Letters of Ignatius of Antioch, ed. Helmut Koester, [Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1985], on The Epistle to the Romans, Preface, pp. 165-166.)

Cf. J. B. Lightfoot:

ἐν τόπῳ κ.τ.λ.] These words probably describe the limits over which the supremacy or jurisdiction extends; comp. Tert. de Præscr. 36 ‘percurre ecclesias apostolicas apud quas ipsæ adhuc cathedræ apostolorum suis locis præsident.’ In this case it might be thought that there was a reference more especially to the presidency of the Roman see over the suburbicarian bishops, who formed a sort of college under the bishop of Rome as their head—a constitution out of which the later college of Cardinals grew. But, not to mention that the presidency is here assigned not to the Roman bishop but to the Roman Church, such a reference would probably be a great anachronism.

(J. B. Lightfoot, The Apostolic Fathers: Part II. S. Ignativs. S. Polycarp. Revised Texts: With Introductions, Notes, Dissertations, and Translations: Vol. II: Second Edition, [London: Macmillan and Co., 1889], on Ignatius, To the Romans, Preface, p. 190.) Return to Article.

[10.] Alt. Trans. Ignatius of Antioch (c. ?-108/140 A.D.):

Seeing then that in the aforementioned persons I beheld your whole people in faith and embraced them, I advise you, be ye zealous to do all things in godly concord, the bishop presiding after the likeness of God and the presbyters after the likeness of the council of the Apostles, with the deacons also who are most dear to me, having been entrusted with the diaconate of Jesus Christ, who was with the Father before the worlds and appeared at the end of time.

(Ignatius of Antioch, The Epistle to the Magnesians, 6; trans. J. B. Lightfoot, The Apostolic Fathers: Revised Texts with Introductions and English Translations, ed. J. R. Harmer, [London: Macmillan and Co., Limited, 1912], p. 144.) See also: ccel.org.

Cf. William R. Schoedel:

A more fundamental question is what kind of legitimation of the authority of the ministry Ignatius has in mind when he says that bishop and elders stand “in the place” of God and the apostles. Does this passage determine the meaning of the many parallels in which a comparison involving the particle ὡς “as” is made? Or is it just the reverse, that the expression before us is merely a more elaborate version of a simple comparison? A study of the relevant passages suggests the following classification: (1) direct comparisons—for example, obey the bishop as Jesus Christ (such comparisons sometimes involve all three orders: Tr. 2.1—2; 3.1; Sm. 8.1; sometimes bishops and presbyters: Mag. 2; Tr. 13.2; cf. Phd. 5.1); (2) comparison of pairs (a) in which the pairs stand apart—for example, be united with your bishop as Jesus Christ is united with the Father (Eph. 5.1; Mag. 13.2; Sm. 8.1; Pol. 1.2; cf. Mag. 7.1); (b) in which the pairs are interconnected in step-wise progression—for example, Jesus Christ is the purpose of God as the bishops are in the purpose of Jesus Christ; or, you received them as the Lord received you (Eph. 3.2; Phd. 11.1; Pol. 1.2; cf. Eph. 2.1); (c) in which the pairs are interconnected in step-wise progression in such a way that they are virtually resolved into a direct comparison—receive the one sent as the one who sent him (Eph. 6.1). These types seem to be complexly interrelated. Especially interesting is Sm. 8.1, which begins with a comparison of type (2a)—follow the bishop as Jesus Christ followed the Father—but goes on with comparisons of type (1)—follow the presbytery as the apostles and respect the deacons as God’s commandment. Evidently the two types of comparison are to be regarded as fundamentally the same. Since type (2a) comparisons call for the imitation of exemplary relations in the sphere of the divine or of the idealized past (the Father and Christ, Christ and the church, Christ and the apostles), it seems unlikely that in type (1) comparisons Ignatius meant to present God, Christ, or the apostles as mystically present in the ministry itself. Or if we interpret type (2a) comparisons in light of type (1) comparisons in such a way that the relation between people and bishop is thought to embody the relation between the Father and Christ, then the divine must be thought of as present just as much in the community as in the bishop (see on Mag. 7.1). Some of the topics to which the comparisons are applied also suggest that Ignatius does not sharply distinguish the ministry from other Christians in terms of a special indwelling of the divine: thus the Magnesians are to obey the bishop and one another as Christ obeys the Father (Mag. 13.2); husbands are to love their wives as the Lord loves the church (Pol. 5.1); the Philadelphians received the messengers as the Lord received them (Phd. 11.1); Polycarp is to endure all people as the Lord endured him (Pol. 1.2). The last two examples (type 2b), in turn, seem to overlap with Eph. 6.1 (type 2c); and in the latter passage Ignatius not only states that we must receive the one sent as the one who sent him, but also goes on to draw the conclusion that we must view the bishop as the Lord himself. Here we apparently have an illustration of how a complex comparison is reduced to a direct one. The latter serves to dramatize the former, and such dramatization probably accounts for other direct comparisons in Ignatius’ treatment of the ministry. It would be idle to deny that episcopal authority thereby receives sharper definition in Ignatius, but the comparisons apparently remain true comparisons in spite of the strong formulation of the idea in our passage.

[11.] Alt. Trans. Didache (1st Century A.D.):

Appoint [χειροτονήσατε] for yourselves therefore bishops and deacons worthy of the Lord…

[12.] Cf. Peter Lampe:

Thesis: The fractionation in Rome favored a collegial presbyterial system of governance and prevented for a long time, until the second half of the second century, the development of a monarchical episcopacy in the city. Victor (c. 189-99) was the first who, after faint-hearted attempts by Eleutherus (c. 175-89), Soter (c. 166-75), and Anicetus (c. 155-66), energetically stepped forward as monarchical bishop and (at times, only because he was incited from the outside) attempted to place the different groups in the city under his supervision or, where that was not possible, to draw a line by means of excommunication. Before the second half of the second century there was in Rome no monarchical episcopacy for the circles mutually bound in fellowship.

It would be presumptuous here to wish to write again a history of the ecclesiastical offices that are mentioned especially in 1 Clement and Hermas. My concern is to describe the correlation between fractionation and one factor of ecclesiastical order, the monarchical episcopate. This bridge should be illuminated. What happens across the bridge in the field of the history of ecclesiastical offices can only be here briefly sketched — and perhaps motivate one to further investigation.

1. Fractionation into house congregations does not exclude that the Christian islands scattered around the capital city were aware of being in spiritual fellowship with each other, of perceiving themselves as cells. of one church, and of being united by common bonds.

Paul writes to several house communities in Rome (Rom 16; see above, chap. 36) and presupposes that these send his letter, with the greetings, from one to another (cf. similarly Col 4:16). The continually repeated ἀσπάσασθε receives meaning if there were messengers between the various, topographically separate groups. In other words, not only were eucharistic gifts sent to and fro (see above, chap. 40) but also letters and greetings from outside the city were exchanged.

That means that people writing from outside of Rome could address the Roman Christians as a unity. Not only Paul but also Ignatius and Dionysius of Corinth did this. Conversely, the Roman Christians as an entirety could send letters to those outside: 1 Clement and a further letter to Corinth around 170 C.E. (Eusebius, Ecc. Hist. 4.23.11). The totality of Roman Christianity undertook shipments of aid to those outside (see above on Dionysius, in Eusebius, Ecc. Hist. 4.23.10). People from the outside consequently spoke of the Roman church (e.g.. Ignatius, Rom. praescr.).

It was useful to assign to someone in Rome the work connected with external communication. Hermas knows such a person by the name of Clement. In Vis. 2.4.3, Hermas prepares two copies of his small book and sends (πέμπω, within the city) one of them to Clement, who forwards it “to the cities outside, for he is entrusted with that task” (πέμψει Κλήμης εἰς τὰς ἔξω πόλεις, ἐκείνῳ γὰρ ἐπιτέτραπται).

It is important to note that Hermas’s “minister of external affairs” is not a monarchical bishop. In the second next sentence, Hermas describes how he circulates his little book within the city. He makes it known “to this city together with the presbyters who preside over the church” (εἰς ταύτην τὴν πόλιν μετὰ τῶν πρεσβυτέρων τῶν προϊσταμένων τῆς ἐκκλησίας). A plurality of presbyters leads Roman Christianity. This Christianity, conscious of spiritual fellowship within the city, is summed up under the concept “ecclesia,” but that changes nothing in regard to the plurality of those presiding over it. In Vis. 3.9.7, Hermas also calls them προηγούμενοι or πρωτοκαθεδρίται.

Hermas knows to report the human side of the presiders: they quarrel (διχοστασίαι) about status and honor (περὶ πρωτείων καὶ περὶ δόξης; Vis. 3.9.7-10; Sim. 8.7.4-6). What are πρωτεῖα? Are the presbyters “wrangling” for first place within their own ranks, for the place of primus inter pares? Whatever the answer may be, Hermas in the — first half of the second century — never mentions the success of such efforts, the actual existence of a single leader. Instead, he speaks of προϊστάμενοι, προηγούμενοι, πρωτοκαθεδρίται, πρεσβύτεροι, all in the plural (Vis. 2.4.2f.; 2.2.6; 3.1.8).

(Peter Lampe, Christians at Rome in the First Two Centuries: From Paul to Valentinus, trans. Michael Steinhauser, ed. Marshall D. Johnson, [London: Continuum, 2003], pp. 397-399.)

Cf. Peter Lampe:

Correspondingly, we find in Paul’s and Ignatius’s letters to the Romans nothing of a Roman monarchical leader, even though Ignatius knew of a monarchical bishop’s office from his experience in the east.[fn. 5: Whether the monarchical episcopacy was established everywhere in the east is, however, questionable. Ignatius, Phil. 7-8 (cf. Magn. 6-8) presupposes Christians who do not wish to be under a bishop. In Ancyra around 190 C.E. there was still no bishop presiding but only a group of presbyters; anonymous, in Eusebius, Ecc. Hist. 5.16.5. 6.] In the year 144 Marcion, at the Roman synod meeting that he initiated (see above, chap. 40), also saw himself facing “presbyters and teachers” and not a monarchical bishop.

First Clement presupposes the same presbyterial governance: ἡγούμενοι (1:3); προηγούμενοι (21:6); πρεσβύτεροι (44:5; 47:6, 54:2; 57:1); ἐπίσκοποι (42:4f. = Isa 60:17; LXX). As in Hermas (Vis. 3.5.1; Sim. 9.27.1; cf. 9.31.5f.), the word “bishop” is in the plural. And First Clement 44:5 clarifies who exercises ἐπισκοπή (44:1, 4): the πρεσβύτεροι! A number of them (ἐνίους), who simultaneously had ἐπισκοπή in Corinth, were dismissed by the Corinthians (44:4, 6; cf. also 54:2). In 47:6; 57:1 the dismissed men are called πρεσβύτεροι.[fn. 6: Cf. also 42:4 with 54:2: the appointed bishops in 42:4 are, according to 54:2, the appointed πρεσβύτεροι. The same verb is encountered in both places (καθίστανον — καθεσταμένοι).] In short, by πρεσβύτεροι and ἐπίσκοποι 1 Clem. designates the same persons.[fn. 7: According to 42:4; 44:2 they were — just like the deacons — already instituted by the apostles as their rightful successors. As such, they are the legitimate carriers of the tradition who pass down the correct doctrine of faith (42:1, 3f.: εὐηγγελίσθησαν, εὐαγγελιζόμενοι, κηρύσσοντες). In this regard, thus, they stand in the succession of the apostles, according to 1 Clement. There is nothing that attests to the apostolic succession of a monarchical bishop.] The two terms are interchangeable, as in Hermas (Vis. 3.5.1).

“Bishops” are presbyters with a special function. With what function are they entrusted? Hermas in Mand. 8.10; Vis. 3.9.2; Sim. 1.8 uses the verb ἐπισκέπτεσθαι not in relation to an office but referring to all Christians in the sense of “to care for the needy, to visit them.” Sim. 9.27.2f. portrays the official “bishops” correspondingly as those who care for (διακονία) the needy (ὑστερημένους) and the widows (χήρας). In this work they are supported by the deacons (Sim. 9.26.2). Our comparison of ἐπισκέπτεσθαι and ἐπίσκοποι shows that Hermas with the functional term “episkopos” still clearly associates ἐπισκέπτεσθαι and its social-diaconal content. The wordplay ἐπίσκοποι — ἐσκέπασαν in Sim. 9.27.2 demonstrates the same.

(Peter Lampe, Christians at Rome in the First Two Centuries: From Paul to Valentinus, trans. Michael Steinhauser, ed. Marshall D. Johnson, [London: Continuum, 2003], p. 399.) Return to Article.

[12.5] Francis A. Sullivan, S.J. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

The question whether the episcopate is of divine institution continues to divide the churches, even though Christian scholars from both sides agree that one does not find the threefold structure of ministry, with a bishop in each local church assisted by presbyters and deacons, in the New Testament. They agree, rather, that the historic episcopate was the result of a development in the post-New Testament period, from the local leadership of a college of presbyters, who were sometimes also called bishops (episkopoi), to the leadership of a single bishop. They also agree that this development took place earlier in the churches of Syria and western Asia Minor, than it did in those of Philippi, Corinth and Rome. Scholars differ on details, such as how soon the church of Rome was led by a single bishop, but hardly any doubt that the church of Rome was still led by a group of presbyters for at least a part of the second century.

The question that divides Catholics and Protestants is not whether, or how rapidly, the development from the local leadership of a college of presbyters to that of a single bishop took place, but whether the result of that development is rightly judged an element of the divinely willed structure of the church.

(Francis A. Sullivan, S.J., From Apostles to Bishops: The Development of the Episcopacy in the Early Church, [New York/Mahwah: The Newman Press, 2001], p. viii. Cf. Idem, pp. 217-218.) Return to Article.

[13.] Cf. William J. La Due, J.C.D. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

The notion of apostolic succession . . . was clearly shifting from emphasis on the authentic teaching, which was handed down from generation to generation, to the list of teachers—one succeeding the other in an unbroken chain. The names prior to Anicetus that Hegesippus enumerated—people such as Linus, Clement, Evaristus, Telesphorus, etc.—were in all probability historical figures who were in one way or another prominent presbyters or presbyter-bishops in the Roman congregation. However, to position them in a continuous line of monarchical heads from Peter to Anicetus is not historically justifiable.

(William J. La Due, J.C.D., The Chair Of Saint Peter, [Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 1999], p. 26.) Return to Article.

[14.] Cf. Robert B. Eno, S.S. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

(Robert B. Eno, S.S., The Rise Of The Papacy, [Wilmington: Michael Glazier, Inc., 1990], pp. 26-27.)

Cf. Robert B. Eno, S.S. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

(Robert B. Eno, S.S., The Rise Of The Papacy, [Wilmington: Michael Glazier, Inc., 1990], pp. 27-28.)

Cf. Robert B. Eno, S.S. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

Hermas claimed to be a lay member of the community. On the other hand, Clement is a member of the leadership group . . . neither Clement nor anyone else appears in a position anything like that of the bishop as described by Ignatius.

(Robert B. Eno, S.S., The Rise Of The Papacy, [Wilmington: Michael Glazier, Inc., 1990], p. 28.) Return to Article.

[15.] Cf. Klaus Schatz, S.J. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

There appears at the present time to be increasing consensus among Catholic and non-Catholic exegetes regarding the Petrine office in the New Testament. …The further question whether there was any notion of an enduring office beyond Peter’s lifetime, if posed in purely historical terms, should probably be answered in the negative. That is, if we ask whether the historical Jesus, in commissioning Peter, expected him to have successors, or whether the author of the Gospel of Matthew, writing after Peter’s death, was aware that Peter and his commission survived in the leaders of the Roman community who succeeded him, the answer in both cases is probably “no.” …If we ask in addition whether the primitive Church was aware, after Peter’s death, that his authority had passed to the next bishop of Rome, or in other words that the head of the community at Rome was now the successor of Peter, the Church’s rock and hence the subject of the promise in Matthew 16:18-19, the question, put in those terms, must certainly be given a negative answer.

(Klaus Schatz, S.J., Papal Primary: From its Origins to the Present, trans. John A. Otto & Linda M. Maloney, [Collegeville: The Liturgical Press, 1996], pp. 1, 1-2, 2.) Return to Article.

[16.] Cf. Eamon Duffy (Roman Catholic Historian and Former Member of the Pontifical Historical Commission):

A key figure in this development was Ignatius of Antioch, a bishop from Asia Minor arrested and brought to Rome to be executed around the year 107. En route he wrote a series of letters to other churches, largely consisting of appeals to them to unite round their bishops. His letter to the Roman church, however, says nothing whatever about bishops, a strong indication that the office had not yet emerged at Rome. Paradoxically, this impression is borne out by a document which has sometimes been thought of as the first papal encyclical. Ten years or so before Ignatius’ arrival in Rome, the Roman church wrote to the church at Corinth, in an attempt to quieten disputes and disorders which had broken out there. The letter is unsigned, but has always been attributed to the Roman presbyter Clement, generally counted in the ancient lists as the third Pope after St Peter. Legends would later accumulate round his name, and he was to be venerated as a martyr, exiled to the Crimea and killed by being tied to an anchor and dropped into the sea. In fact, however, Clement made no claim to write as bishop. His letter was sent in the name of the whole Roman community, he never identifies himself or writes in his own person, and we know nothing at all about him. The letter itself makes no distinction between presbyters and bishops, about which it always speaks in the plural, suggesting that at Corinth as at Rome the church at this time was organised under a group of bishops or presbyters, rather than a single ruling bishop.

A generation later, this was still so in Rome. The visionary treatise The Shepherd of Hermas, written in Rome early in the second century, speaks always collectively of the ‘rulers of the Church’, or the ‘elders that preside over the Church’, and once again the author makes no attempt to distinguish between bishops and elders. Clement is indeed mentioned (if Hermas’ Clement is the same man as the author of the letter written at least a generation before, which we cannot assume) but not as presiding bishop. Instead, we are told that he was the elder responsible for writing ‘to the foreign cities’ — in effect the corresponding secretary of the Roman church.

Everything we know about the church in Rome during its first hundred years confirms this general picture. The Christians of the city were thought of by themselves and others as a single church, as Paul’s letter to the Romans make clear. The social reality behind this single identity, however, was not one congregation, but a loose constellation of churches based in private houses or, as time went on and the community grew, meeting in rented halls in markets and public baths. It was without any single dominant ruling officer, its elders or leaders sharing responsibility, but distributing tasks, like that of foreign correspondent. By the eve of the conversion of Constantine, there were more than two dozen of these religious community-centres or tituli.

(Eamon Duffy, Saints & Sinners: A History of the Popes, [New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2006], pp. 10-11.)

Cf. Eamon Duffy (Roman Catholic Historian and Former Member of the Pontifical Historical Commission):

(Eamon Duffy, Saints & Sinners: A History of the Popes, [New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2006], p. 9.) Return to Article.

[17.] Cf. Raymond E. Brown, S.S. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

The Lucan statement in Acts 14:23 that Barnabas and Paul appointed “presbyters in every Church” is probably anachronistic in the title it gives and in the universality of the practice, but probably quite correct in that during his lifetime Paul sometimes appointed local church leaders in communities he evangelized. …One may support this conclusion from a convergence of scattered evidence: from the instructions that had to be given to Titus (1:5) in the Pastorals; from the failure to mention bishops in the Corinthian correspondence where it would have been logical to invoke their aid; from the failure to mention presbyters in any undisputed Pauline letter; from the need of Clement in I Corinthians 42-44 to strengthen the episcopate/presbyterate by giving it a pedigree; from the evidence of Didache 15 that only gradually did bishops and deacons take over the functions of prophets and teachers (mentioned in I Cor 12:28; Eph 4:11).

(Raymond Edward Brown, S.S., The Critical Meaning of the Bible, [New York: Paulist Press, 1981], p. 134, 134 fn. 17.)

Cf. Raymond E. Brown, S.S. (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

The presbyter-bishops described in the NT were not in any traceable way the successors of the Twelve apostles. …The affirmation that the episcopate was divinely established or established by Christ himself can be defended in the nuanced sense that the episcopate gradually emerged in a Church that stemmed from Christ and that this emergence was (in the eyes of faith) guided by the Holy Spirit.

(Raymond E. Brown, S.S., Priest and Bishop: Biblical Reflections, [Paramus: Paulist Press, 1970], pp. 72, 73.) Return to Article.

[18.] Cf. Allen Brent (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

But in addition we have the figure of Clement, who has an entrusted ministry or ‘commission’ to write to external churches. This seems clearly to describe the Clement of Corinthians, who wrote anonymously in the name of the church of Rome: he is a kind of ‘foreign secretary’ to the Roman community. His letter to the Corinthians in fact supports the presbyteral model of church government at Rome, Neven though he is sometimes credited with affirming the doctrine of episcopal succession in an Irenaean and Hegesippan sense. A group of presbyters, whom he sometimes calls ‘bishops’, have been deposed at Corinth and Clement’s letter opposes the right of the laity to depose them if they have exercised their office blamelessly.

(Allen Brent, Ignatius of Antioch: A Martyr Bishop and the Origin of Episcopacy, [London: Continuum, 2007], pp. 125-126.)

Cf. Allen Brent (Roman Catholic Theologian and Historian):

(Allen Brent, Ignatius of Antioch: A Martyr Bishop and the Origin of Episcopacy, [London: Continuum, 2007], p. 126.) Return to Article.

καὶ αὐτός ἐστιν πρὸ πάντων καὶ τὰ πάντα ἐν αὐτῷ συνέστηκεν ~ Soli Deo Gloria

Evangelical Answers

Thursday, February 16, 2023

No Single Bishop of Rome Until the Middle of the Second Century

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