David Kaiser
May 30th 2006, 05:51 PM
You bring up a point that I have been rattling around in my brain.
You are correct that the Bible is silent or ambiguous about a lot of things that pertain to church practice and rule. The Bible gives us everything we need for faith, Christian living and establishing of doctrine, but has left a lot unproscribed when it comes to how the church is to function and basically how to just “do church.” That indeed seems strange from the standpoint that one of the reasons that Jesus Christ came to this earth was to establish the church through the apostles. Would not part of that training that the disciples received be about just those questions of interchurch government, ordination, or liturgical worship that the churches battle about today? Maybe the reason it was not written down is that such questions of church practice and rule was lived out and modeled rather than a matter to be written down. We moderns are very exact when it comes to describing our institutions and procedures. We have lawyers surveying everything we do. But the early church was not like us moderns, although we try to put them into that mold. Much of Christianity was taught by practice and verbal repetition to much of a congregation that was illiterate. Paul makes a statement to the Corinthians that I think is important to understand here in 1 Corinthians 11:34, “When I come I will give further directions.” The context is the correct procedure to do the agape meal. Paul gives some information in his letter to keep the people in the correct practice until he returns, but then says he will come to give further directions on how to do the agape meal when he comes again to Corinth. These further directions are not given to us any place in Scripture. So they are either lost to us or are something we must look elsewhere other than Scripture for the answer. In this instance, we must look and see how the early church did the Eucharist to find those directions of Paul and the apostles on how church practiced this sacrament.
Now we can say that, well because the Holy Spirit did not write it down in Scripture, it was not important to God and He leaves that up to personal taste and cultural needs of that generation of the church. When I look at the seriousness of the omissions in Scripture about Church practice and how it has caused such division in the body of Christ through the centuries, I am left to really wonder if that was the plan of God. Was it not God’s intent that the church through the ages was supposed to be that source of practice and rule? I feel for the church to be fair in its hermeneutics of Christian practice that the church must take a holistic view of what was the Church of God that Jesus founded.
Now this controversy about tradition is a heated debate and the very word tradition and sola scriptura has been such rallying cries for many on both sides of reformed debate, so much so that an honest look at the facts has become impossible. I am not espousing a return to Roman Catholicism. Nor that pastors must wear special clothing, burn incense, celebrate the Eucharist weekly, be celibate, or worship images. What we need to do is look at the early church’s practices and read them as a living Scripture and ask ourselves what was the purpose of God in them, just as we read the written Scripture to interpret God’s message to for us today. We do not mimic the customs of written scripture, but look for its application for today. The same is true of our examination of the practices of the early church. Since the word “tradition” has such baggage, I will not use it, but rather use the phrase “early church practice.”
As I have looked at practice of the early church, we are driven to two points of caution on looking at early church practices.
In my reading of some Catholic works I come across the statement that tradition “develops.” At first I thought the phrase was an oxymoron. However, when we think about it, yes, traditions do develop. A family has many traditions that surround, say their Christmas holiday. These traditions have developed through the years. Each generation of the family adapts and drops parts of that tradition to better reflect the times, the culture venue and conveniences of the family. This is another reason why I stay away from the term “tradition.” What we are looking for are the early church practices that are as close as we can get to the practices of the apostles. The early church practices do not develop into something else. Tradition begins to acculturate with each succeeding generation with the traditions of the culture around it. What I am looking for is the hints of the faith once delivered in the writings and practices of the early church leaders.
Early church practice and teaching on a practice must be universal in the Mediterranean basin. One early teacher of the church must not make one statement and another make a contradictory statement. Various denominational apologetics are fond of picking and choosing from among the early church teachers, looking for the statements of the leaders that most agree with their position and neglecting the ones that contradict. If contradictory statements are found in the early church leaders, I can be certain a practice is not universal and I therefore can safely say that both cannot be the practice of the earliest church. Since I can’t determine which is correct, the early church documents cannot help me in my quest for understanding of the meaning of an ambiguous statement or practice in the written Scripture.
Now that we have laid this groundwork, let us look at as many of the statements of the early church leaders about women in head ministry positions that I can glean from my studies of the ante-Nicene documents. This is an on-going study of mine and I am in no way comprehensive in this list. But it does concern me that much of what I have found so far shows universality to the prohibition of women in positions of authority. The only reference that can be found of a dispute about women in the clergy is not between orthodox churches, but between heretical Gnostic groups and the orthodox faith.
“Paul instructs women to be silent in the church, not speaking for the mere sake of learning. In doing so, he goes to the Law for his authority that women should be under obedience. However, when he veils the woman who prophesies, he demonstrates that even they have the right of prophesying.” --Tertullian
It is not permitted to a woman to speak in church, nor to teach, baptize, offer, or to claim to herself a lot in any manly function, not to mention the priestly office. – Tertullian
“A woman should be silent in the church. In the first Epistle of Paul to the Corinthians: ‘Let women be silent in the church. But if any wish to learn anything, let them ask their husbands at home.’ Also to Timothy: ‘Let a woman learn with silence, in all subjection. But I do not permit a women to teach, nor to be set over the man, but to be in silence.’”
--Cyprian.
“…inspired by God’s grace, he [the leader of the church] bravely resisted and showed what was previously thought to be holy was indeed from a most wicked spirit… among other things by which she [a woman who preformed the duties of the clergy] had deceived many, that [she told]woman [that it was OK to ] … frequently dared these things: to pretend that with an invocation not to be scorned she sanctified bread and celebrated the Eucharist. And she offered sacrifice to the Lord, not without the sacrament of the accustomed utterance. She also baptized many, making use of the usual and lawful words of interrogation, so that nothing seem to be different from the ecclesiastical rule. What, then, will we say about the baptisms performed by this woman, by which a most wicked demon baptized through means of a woman?…Can it be believed that either remission of sins was given, or the regeneration of the saving bath was duly completed --- when all things were done by a demon, even though they were done in a manner resembling the image of the truth?” --Firmilian
“We do not permit woman ‘to teach in the church.’ Rather, they are only permitted to pray and hear those who teach. For Jesus himself, our Master and Lord, when He sent out the twelve to make disciples of the people and of the nations, nowhere sent out women to preach – even though there was no lack of women available. For there were with Him the mother of our Lord and His sisters; Mary Magdalene; Mary, the mother of James; Martha and Mary, the sisters of Lazarus; Salome and certain others…for the head of the wife is the man, and it is not reasonable that the rest of the body should govern the head.” -- Apostolic Constitutions, c. 390.
As to women baptizing, we let you know that there is no small peril to those who undertake it. Therefore, we do not advise you to do it. For it is dangerous, or rather wicked and impious…for if in the foregoing constitutions, women have not been permitted to teach, how will anyone allow them…to perform the office of the priest? For such is not one of the institutions of Christ, but is one of the ignorant practice of the Gentile atheism. For they ordain women priests for the female deities. After all, if baptism were to be administered by women, certainly our Lord would have been baptized by His own mother and not by John. Or when He sent [the apostles] to baptize, he would have also sent along women for this purpose. Apostolic Constitutions
Again, this is not being taught in my church. I allow women to preach and to administer the Lord’s Supper. But intellectually and spiritually I sometimes wonder if what I allow has the imprimatur of the kingdom of heaven. Your thoughts are deeply appreciated.
You are correct that the Bible is silent or ambiguous about a lot of things that pertain to church practice and rule. The Bible gives us everything we need for faith, Christian living and establishing of doctrine, but has left a lot unproscribed when it comes to how the church is to function and basically how to just “do church.” That indeed seems strange from the standpoint that one of the reasons that Jesus Christ came to this earth was to establish the church through the apostles. Would not part of that training that the disciples received be about just those questions of interchurch government, ordination, or liturgical worship that the churches battle about today? Maybe the reason it was not written down is that such questions of church practice and rule was lived out and modeled rather than a matter to be written down. We moderns are very exact when it comes to describing our institutions and procedures. We have lawyers surveying everything we do. But the early church was not like us moderns, although we try to put them into that mold. Much of Christianity was taught by practice and verbal repetition to much of a congregation that was illiterate. Paul makes a statement to the Corinthians that I think is important to understand here in 1 Corinthians 11:34, “When I come I will give further directions.” The context is the correct procedure to do the agape meal. Paul gives some information in his letter to keep the people in the correct practice until he returns, but then says he will come to give further directions on how to do the agape meal when he comes again to Corinth. These further directions are not given to us any place in Scripture. So they are either lost to us or are something we must look elsewhere other than Scripture for the answer. In this instance, we must look and see how the early church did the Eucharist to find those directions of Paul and the apostles on how church practiced this sacrament.
Now we can say that, well because the Holy Spirit did not write it down in Scripture, it was not important to God and He leaves that up to personal taste and cultural needs of that generation of the church. When I look at the seriousness of the omissions in Scripture about Church practice and how it has caused such division in the body of Christ through the centuries, I am left to really wonder if that was the plan of God. Was it not God’s intent that the church through the ages was supposed to be that source of practice and rule? I feel for the church to be fair in its hermeneutics of Christian practice that the church must take a holistic view of what was the Church of God that Jesus founded.
Now this controversy about tradition is a heated debate and the very word tradition and sola scriptura has been such rallying cries for many on both sides of reformed debate, so much so that an honest look at the facts has become impossible. I am not espousing a return to Roman Catholicism. Nor that pastors must wear special clothing, burn incense, celebrate the Eucharist weekly, be celibate, or worship images. What we need to do is look at the early church’s practices and read them as a living Scripture and ask ourselves what was the purpose of God in them, just as we read the written Scripture to interpret God’s message to for us today. We do not mimic the customs of written scripture, but look for its application for today. The same is true of our examination of the practices of the early church. Since the word “tradition” has such baggage, I will not use it, but rather use the phrase “early church practice.”
As I have looked at practice of the early church, we are driven to two points of caution on looking at early church practices.
In my reading of some Catholic works I come across the statement that tradition “develops.” At first I thought the phrase was an oxymoron. However, when we think about it, yes, traditions do develop. A family has many traditions that surround, say their Christmas holiday. These traditions have developed through the years. Each generation of the family adapts and drops parts of that tradition to better reflect the times, the culture venue and conveniences of the family. This is another reason why I stay away from the term “tradition.” What we are looking for are the early church practices that are as close as we can get to the practices of the apostles. The early church practices do not develop into something else. Tradition begins to acculturate with each succeeding generation with the traditions of the culture around it. What I am looking for is the hints of the faith once delivered in the writings and practices of the early church leaders.
Early church practice and teaching on a practice must be universal in the Mediterranean basin. One early teacher of the church must not make one statement and another make a contradictory statement. Various denominational apologetics are fond of picking and choosing from among the early church teachers, looking for the statements of the leaders that most agree with their position and neglecting the ones that contradict. If contradictory statements are found in the early church leaders, I can be certain a practice is not universal and I therefore can safely say that both cannot be the practice of the earliest church. Since I can’t determine which is correct, the early church documents cannot help me in my quest for understanding of the meaning of an ambiguous statement or practice in the written Scripture.
Now that we have laid this groundwork, let us look at as many of the statements of the early church leaders about women in head ministry positions that I can glean from my studies of the ante-Nicene documents. This is an on-going study of mine and I am in no way comprehensive in this list. But it does concern me that much of what I have found so far shows universality to the prohibition of women in positions of authority. The only reference that can be found of a dispute about women in the clergy is not between orthodox churches, but between heretical Gnostic groups and the orthodox faith.
“Paul instructs women to be silent in the church, not speaking for the mere sake of learning. In doing so, he goes to the Law for his authority that women should be under obedience. However, when he veils the woman who prophesies, he demonstrates that even they have the right of prophesying.” --Tertullian
It is not permitted to a woman to speak in church, nor to teach, baptize, offer, or to claim to herself a lot in any manly function, not to mention the priestly office. – Tertullian
“A woman should be silent in the church. In the first Epistle of Paul to the Corinthians: ‘Let women be silent in the church. But if any wish to learn anything, let them ask their husbands at home.’ Also to Timothy: ‘Let a woman learn with silence, in all subjection. But I do not permit a women to teach, nor to be set over the man, but to be in silence.’”
--Cyprian.
“…inspired by God’s grace, he [the leader of the church] bravely resisted and showed what was previously thought to be holy was indeed from a most wicked spirit… among other things by which she [a woman who preformed the duties of the clergy] had deceived many, that [she told]woman [that it was OK to ] … frequently dared these things: to pretend that with an invocation not to be scorned she sanctified bread and celebrated the Eucharist. And she offered sacrifice to the Lord, not without the sacrament of the accustomed utterance. She also baptized many, making use of the usual and lawful words of interrogation, so that nothing seem to be different from the ecclesiastical rule. What, then, will we say about the baptisms performed by this woman, by which a most wicked demon baptized through means of a woman?…Can it be believed that either remission of sins was given, or the regeneration of the saving bath was duly completed --- when all things were done by a demon, even though they were done in a manner resembling the image of the truth?” --Firmilian
“We do not permit woman ‘to teach in the church.’ Rather, they are only permitted to pray and hear those who teach. For Jesus himself, our Master and Lord, when He sent out the twelve to make disciples of the people and of the nations, nowhere sent out women to preach – even though there was no lack of women available. For there were with Him the mother of our Lord and His sisters; Mary Magdalene; Mary, the mother of James; Martha and Mary, the sisters of Lazarus; Salome and certain others…for the head of the wife is the man, and it is not reasonable that the rest of the body should govern the head.” -- Apostolic Constitutions, c. 390.
As to women baptizing, we let you know that there is no small peril to those who undertake it. Therefore, we do not advise you to do it. For it is dangerous, or rather wicked and impious…for if in the foregoing constitutions, women have not been permitted to teach, how will anyone allow them…to perform the office of the priest? For such is not one of the institutions of Christ, but is one of the ignorant practice of the Gentile atheism. For they ordain women priests for the female deities. After all, if baptism were to be administered by women, certainly our Lord would have been baptized by His own mother and not by John. Or when He sent [the apostles] to baptize, he would have also sent along women for this purpose. Apostolic Constitutions
Again, this is not being taught in my church. I allow women to preach and to administer the Lord’s Supper. But intellectually and spiritually I sometimes wonder if what I allow has the imprimatur of the kingdom of heaven. Your thoughts are deeply appreciated.