^ 
 
THE 
 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
THE MINISTRY 
 IN THE CHURCH 
 
 IN RELATION TO 
 PROPHECY AND SPIRITUAL GIFTS 
 
 (charismata) 
 
 BY 
 
 H. J. WOTHERSPOON, M.A., D.D. 
 '1 
 
 LONGMANS, GREEN AND GO, 
 
 39 PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON 
 
 FOURTH AVENUE & 80th STREET, NEW YORK 
 
 BOMBAY^ CALCUTTA, AND MADRAS 
 
 1916 
 

 Sit in memoria lectori 
 
 sicut scriptori fuit 
 lOANNES MACLEOD 
 
 ViR SIQUIS ALIUS HIS TEMPORIBUS PROPHETICUS. 
 
PREFACE 
 
 These lectures, delivered on the Alexander 
 Robertson Foundation in the University of Glasgow, 
 were written during August, September and October 
 of 1914, months of distraction and anxiety for 
 us all; and since their delivery the circumstances 
 of the time have allowed of little leisure for their 
 revisal : — I am extremely conscious that they are 
 even less adequate to the subject than otherwise 
 one might have hoped to make them. The subject 
 is, besides, one which calls for an expert knowledge 
 possible only to those whose main work lies along 
 special lines, a knowledge to which I cannot at all 
 pretend. So far however as experts are good 
 enough to supply us with their data and reasons, 
 there is opportunity for even the less well equipped 
 to form an opinion upon the conclusions which 
 experts reach, and to submit conclusions to which 
 on consideration of the data they themselves have 
 been led. 
 
 My interest was directed to this subject of the 
 relation of Ministry to Charismata in connection 
 with the inclination apparent in some recent apolo- 
 getic to relate the Episcopate as we find it in the 
 latter part of the Second Century with an earlier 
 charismatic ministry, to which there seems to be 
 
 339952 
 
vi PREFACE 
 
 a thought of serving the Episcopate heir. The 
 idea that such a relation may exist in no way 
 repelled me. I was rather attracted than other- 
 wise by the idea as, for example, it is somewhat 
 generally stated by the late Bishop of Salisbury in 
 his Ministry of Grace, and was willing to think 
 that it stood for something more or less actual. 
 One had been accustomed to assume that the hypo- 
 thesis of a primary charismatic ministry offered a 
 legitimate way of describing undoubted phenomena 
 of the first age of Christianity; since men like 
 Dr. Wordsworth, Dr. Gore or Mr. Turner, whose 
 authority one very much regards, for whose work 
 one is grateful, with whose general attitude to 
 Church questions one is sympathetic, treated it rather 
 as a critical result from which without further 
 discussion it is possible to argue. I had taken for 
 granted the genuineness of the Didache, while lean- 
 ing to a belief in the earlier of the dates which are 
 suggested for it, believing it to have issued from 
 some semi-Ebionite eddy lying out of the main 
 currents of Church life, and to preserve for us the 
 type, not of a primitive Christianity so much as 
 of a persisting Judaism — and therefore to be of 
 the less substantial importance in any question of 
 origins. One had taken for granted too the 
 Christian prophet, puzzled as one might be by the 
 place which St. Paul seems on any casual reading 
 to assign to him, but indolently accepting current 
 statements which include him with Apostles in a 
 spiritual hierarchy, as in some sense probably true. 
 T was, however, startled by certain of the in- 
 
PREFACE vii 
 
 ferences to which the effort to connect the Mono- 
 Episcopate with this hierarchy seemed likely to 
 lead, and yet more by concessions made in the 
 interest of that connection. I found it said, for 
 example, that " we can accept Dr. Lindsay's theory 
 of origins," which I confess that I am reluctant to do ; 
 and again that " all that must be decisively rejected 
 in the view propounded by Dr. Lindsay is the idea 
 of the local Church as being independent of the 
 main body " — whereas other statements occurring in 
 the work quoted, as for instance that the Church 
 has at one point changed its Ministry and can do 
 so at any point, seemed to call for as decisive 
 rejection. So again in the notable Dissertation on 
 the organisation of the Church which enriches the 
 first volume of the Cambridge Mediaeval History, I 
 found the distinction between the positions of the 
 charismatic and of the local Ministry carried so far, 
 and the charismatic so highly exalted at the expense 
 of the regular, that the latter in effect ceases to be a 
 ministry and becomes such a detail in the organisa- 
 tion of a laity as Sunday School teachers or District 
 Visitors may be with ourselves. True, the state- 
 ment is qualified with an " almost " — but there it 
 is, and I found it, as coming from such a quarter, 
 startling. One was the less surprised to find in 
 Foundations an apparent willingness to contemplate 
 without any great reluctance the surrender of 
 Apostolic succession " as commonly understood," 
 and a readiness to be, with Mr. Tyrrell, content if the 
 claim of " general ecclesiastical continuity " can be 
 maintained. Positions such as these seemed to me 
 
viii PREFACE 
 
 to involve the collapse of that doctrine of the Holy 
 Ministry which has hitherto been accounted the 
 Catholic doctrine. Out of the ruin the Episcopate 
 indeed purports to be preserved in esteem as in 
 some way attached to the primary charismatic 
 ministry, from which a function of rule and possibly 
 a certain Heavenliness of origin are thought to have 
 devolved upon it. But even as an apologetic for 
 Episcopacy this seemed to me a theory too expensive 
 in cost and extremely uncertain in ultimate result. 
 
 Three premisses might seem to be involved for 
 the theory in question : — 
 
 (1) It has to be shown that charismatic rulers 
 (other than the Apostles : everyone admits the 
 Twelve and claims from them) existed before 
 Bishops who ruled came to exist. The theory of 
 Twofold Ministry may either be assumed as true 
 or argued for true ; and is now generally assumed 
 rather than re -argued. 
 *' (2) It has to be shown that the Bishop not only 
 followed upon the prophet or other charismatic 
 ruler, but that the Bishop validly inherited authority 
 from the charismatic — inherited in a sense other 
 than rhetorical ; and probably also shown that 
 something charismatic devolved upon the Bishop 
 from the charismatic order. 
 
 (3) It has in a subsidiary way to be shown that 
 the Presbyter did not occupy the position tra- 
 ditionally assigned to him, but traces only to 
 some such place among a laity as that in which 
 Mr. Turner thinks he is originally to be discerned, 
 or to the place of such a " privileged senior " 
 
PREFACE ix 
 
 of the flock " occupying a semi-official status," as 
 Mr. Rawlinson describes. 
 
 Each of these premisses may be thought to contain 
 some element of difficulty. As to the second of 
 them, I am not able to see that, even if the first 
 premiss be granted, more has as yet been shown 
 than that once there were charismatics and that 
 later there were bishops. Sequence in possession, 
 even if the sequence were demonstrated, does 
 not infer inheritance. I find myself unable to 
 understand how the authority of a charismatic 
 can be inherited, or how charisma can be devolved. 
 Charisma, if we follow St. Paul's account of it, 
 comes as a direct allocation by the Holy Spirit : 
 any authority which a charismatic person exer- 
 cises, he holds in virtue simply of his charisma. 
 Official authority can be transmitted, and office 
 can be devolved — but I cannot conceive of official 
 prophets, or see how (though Elijah could indicate 
 the granting of Elisha's prayer) one prophet can 
 make another prophet. The doctrine of charisma 
 following office is another matter. As to the third 
 premiss noted above, that relating to presbyters, 
 it might perhaps be supported on Mr. Hatch's 
 method of " commencing where the New Testament 
 leaves off " ; but that method is less possible now 
 than when Mr. Hatch essayed to employ it. 
 
 In attempting to examine this question of Ministry 
 and Charismata I have found preconceived ideas, 
 with which I had approached it, to be changing. I 
 found myself becoming extremely uncertain of 
 the genuineness of the Didache in its present 
 
X PREFACE 
 
 form, and becoming convinced that, while prophets 
 indeed prophesied, they at no point are discovered 
 to have ruled — that in fact the Theory of Twofold 
 Ministry does not accurately interpret the history 
 of the first age of Christianity and that there has 
 not existed any hierarchy of charismatic officers from 
 whom it was practicable to inherit. In that case 
 it would be of course unnecessary to inquire further 
 as to the possible devolution of charisma or in- 
 heritance of charismatic authority. If the attempt 
 to express these convictions has occasionally led 
 one to disagree with persons who are immeasur- 
 ably more competent to judge of such matters, I 
 am aware that these will be the last to resent the 
 presumption. 
 
 I have to acknowledge most kind help from the 
 Rev. J. M. Kirkpatrick and the Rev. A. W. Wother- 
 spoon, who have read my proofs ; and from the 
 Rev. 0. S. Rankin for references with which he 
 has been good enough to supply me. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 LECTURE I 
 
 PAQB 
 
 Certain Theories of Church and Ministry ... 1 
 
 1. The Catholic theory of Ministry — long prevalent 
 
 and still widely maintained. 
 
 The Reformation doctrine of extraordinary Minis- 
 tries. 
 
 Brownism or Independency : embodied an idea. 
 
 Institution or Spirit : which first in the Creation of 
 the Church. 
 
 The difficulty of the latter conception is mainly 
 historical. 
 
 2. The discovery of the Didache supplied (or was 
 
 supposed to supply) a historical setting for the 
 conception of the Church as given in Spirit, and 
 for a prophetic account of Ministry. 
 
 3. The end of last century had been marked by a 
 
 revival of interest in Christian origins. Trao- 
 tarianism. Lightfoot. Hatch. 
 Influence of the discovery of the Didache. Pro- 
 fessor Hamack's use of it : the theory of " Two- 
 fold Ministry," charismatic and institutional. 
 
 4. Difficulties of this theory. Its dependence upon 
 
 the authenticity and genuineness of the Didache^ 
 round which all its evidential material is arranged. 
 Previous to the discovery of the Didache, the New 
 Testament writings had not suggested this theory. 
 Nor had the patristic. 
 6. It is possibly the Didache which itself requires to be 
 accounted for. 
 
 LECTURE II 
 
 The Didache : its Authority 26 
 
 I. Has been generally treated as important evidence. 
 Mr. C. H. Turner, however, deprecates place assigned 
 to it. 
 
xii CONTENTS 
 
 PAQB 
 
 Gore and Moberly allow it little weight. 
 
 Its date and genuineness are challenged by — 
 
 (a) Dr. Bigg. 
 
 (6) Dr. Armitage Robinson. 
 Dr. Swete asks, if not genuine, for its motive. 
 
 II. Further considerations — 
 
 1. The rules of the Didache suppose a considerable 
 
 area of operation ; which Montanism supplies. 
 
 2. Features of the Didache which would agree with 
 
 Montanistic Origin — 
 (a) The local colouring. 
 (6) The reference to persecution. 
 
 (c) The interest in Prophets. 
 
 (d) The degenerate conception of the Prophet. 
 
 3. The hypothesis of Montanistic origin supplies for 
 
 the Didache a background of reality. 
 
 III. 1. The favourable reception of the Didache to be 
 
 explained by the opportuneness of its appearance. 
 
 (a) Lightfoot had traced the lines followed by later 
 criticism. Distinguished temporary and per- 
 manent Ministry, etc. 
 
 (b) Hatch had assigned a mundane origin for the 
 " regular " Ministries. 
 
 (c) Hamack, inspired by the Didache, combined 
 Lightfoot and Hatch, and gave us his theory of 
 Twofold Ministry. 
 
 2. Hamack' s theory not deduced from the Didache — 
 
 but is suggested by it. 
 Cannot be based on sources previously accessible, 
 
 canonical or patristic. 
 Nor is what it requires to be found in the Didache. 
 The Didache has been overworked ; its own position 
 
 is uncertain and meantime it can be instanced 
 
 only with an "if.** 
 
 LECTURE III 
 
 The Charismata — What they are and in what Sense 
 -*^ Ceased'^ 76 
 
 I. 1. Things which one would avoid in any account given 
 of the Church — 
 (a) To ascribe to the Church initiation or control of 
 its constitution. 
 
CONTENTS xiii 
 
 (b) To begin our account with " Once upon a 
 time." 
 
 (c) To contemplate breach of continuity in its 
 development. 
 
 2. Yet at first the supernatural was manifest, as now 
 
 it is not : hence a difficulty as to continuity. 
 As to this — Lindsay, Sohm, Duchesne, Harnack, 
 
 Anglican Writers. 
 The difficulty remains, though declension be declared 
 
 inevitable. 
 
 3. However, Spirit and form are not necessarily 
 
 The essential idea of Christianity is Incarnation, 
 life demands organism : " Actuality is the end of 
 
 the ways of God.*' 
 The Gospels show the " preparation of a Body for 
 
 Christ." 
 4. The event of Pentecost came as a shock to our 
 
 undisciplined humanity. 
 ** Conversion " by comparison a minor experience. 
 A fresh consciousness, including — 
 
 (a) New perception. 
 
 (6) Communion with God. 
 
 (c) Sense of vocation. 
 
 (d) Sense of power. 
 
 A new energy seeking outlet, e. g. in Glossolalia. 
 6. There followed development of capacity for the 
 
 influx of Spirit — and therewith subsidence of 
 
 external manifestation. 
 6. Bollinger's simile of the cooling of a mass of molten 
 
 metal ; preferable comparison with the splendours 
 
 of a dawn or the plunge of a cataract. 
 
 II. " The Church is a body, whose soul is Christ ''- 
 rather the Spirit of Christ. 
 
 1. In the physical organism there is the cell-life and 
 
 the super-life of the whole, which specialises the 
 cell for function. So the Spirit specialises the 
 soul of man. 
 
 2. Grace differs in kind and in degree : yet the life 
 
 is one life, and all Christians have every grace. 
 
 3. The Church as an organism possesses (1) organisa- 
 
 tion; (2) life. 
 
xiT CONTENTS 
 
 PAOB 
 
 Organisation is attributed to Christ, life to the 
 
 presence of the Spirit. Christ and the Holy 
 
 Spirit are never confused. 
 Christ is immanent to the Church by the Spirit : 
 
 but personally is transcendent. 
 The Church is validly compared to a building, as 
 
 well as to a body. 
 
 4. Pentecost does not create — ^it vitalises. 
 Institution precedes the entrance of Spirit. 
 
 This is true of Ministry, as it is of, e. g. Sacrament. 
 Ministry does not depend on Pentecost, since it 
 existed as the Apostolate before Pentecost. 
 
 5. The difficulty of the theory of double Ministry is 
 
 theological as well as historical. 
 
 LECTURE IV 
 
 A. 
 
 Ministry and Charismata 109 
 
 I. " The Ministry *' — what ? 
 
 1. Ambiguity of the term. The New Testament word 
 
 so translated means service of any kind, and is not 
 technical. 
 
 2. Ministry in the technical sense cannot be delimited 
 
 by criterion of gift, or of exercise of gift, or by life- 
 long exercise of gift. 
 
 3. A better criterion would be that of the Church's 
 
 dependence for Ministration : or that of responsi- 
 bility. 
 Charismatics were not, as such, responsible persons. 
 
 II. An " Apostle "—what ? 
 
 1. The Apostle is claimed both by the Charismatic 
 
 and by the regular Ministry. 
 
 2. Etymologically the word Apostle represents the 
 
 idea of mission, which is distinctive of Christianity. 
 
 3. Yet its use is infrequent, and (except applied to 
 
 the Twelve) is only Pauline. Reasons for Paul's 
 extended application of it. 
 
 4. The Apostleship proper had a double function — 
 
 Evangelistic and Pastoral. The Evangelistic staff 
 had not the characteristics of a separate Charis- 
 matic Ministry. 
 
CONTENTS XV 
 
 VAGB 
 
 III. A " Prophet "—what ? 
 
 1. He is a man to whom God's thought is revealed. 
 
 Prediction is not an essential feature of prophecy. 
 Trance, vision, apocalypse, are lower forms of it. 
 
 2. Prophecy is a universal characteristic of the 
 
 Church. Belief in Christ is followed by illumina- 
 tion of Soul. 
 
 3. Illumination involves the impulse to expression. 
 
 Some, however, can express better than can 
 others. The " true prophet ** of Hermas. 
 
 B. 
 
 A perplexing feature of Christian prophecy — that 
 it should not be more prominent than it is. It 
 is known to us chiefly from Pauline sources. 
 
 1. Prophecy in the Book of Acts. 
 
 (a) The Jerusalem group of Prophets. 
 
 (b) Judas and Silas. 
 
 (c) The Prophets of Paul's journey to Jerusalem. 
 
 2. Prophecy as at Corinth. 
 
 3. Prophets as grouped with Apostles — 
 (a) As " foundations " of the Church. 
 (6) In St. Paul's lists. 
 
 4. In these lists St. Paul is dealing with spiritual 
 
 principles, not with hierarchies of Ministry. 
 
 LECTURE V 
 
 The Prophet in the Church 168 
 
 The New Testament Prophet — what ? 
 
 I. References to prophets and prophecy in non- 
 
 canonical writers : In Barnabas, Clement, 
 Ignatius, Hermas, Polycarp, Author quoted by 
 Eusebius, Justin, Irenaeus. 
 Except in Hermas, who is allegorical, it is of 
 prophecy rather than of prophets that we hear. 
 
 II. The Contents of New Testament Prophecy — 
 
 Incidentally it may include prediction, trance, 
 vision, subjective impressions, indication to 
 office, and apocalypse. 
 
 Essentially and constantly it is revelation of God 
 in Christ, as that occurs in the Soul. " ^Vlien 
 it pleased God to reveal His Son in me.'* 
 
xvi CONTENTS 
 
 Much that we should now describe otherwise was at 
 first properly recognised as prophetic. 
 
 The teratic element was not that in prophecy which 
 which is a foundation of the Church. 
 
 III. The record of New Testament prophecy is the New 
 
 Testament Scriptures, as incorporating the study 
 
 and exegesis of the Christian data. 
 The data do not themselves constitute a Gospel. 
 
 Gospel is inference from the data. The New 
 
 Testament is the work, not of Apostleship as such, 
 
 but of prophecy. 
 These Scriptures correspond to a difiused expis- 
 
 cation of the Christian inference throughout 
 
 Christian experience. 
 This expiscation, however, is a work in which some 
 
 must have been specially active. These would be 
 
 referred to as, par excellence, prophets. 
 This application of the term is possibly an Old 
 
 Testament survival. 
 
 IV. The false prophet. 
 
 The safeguard of prophecy was its impersonal 
 
 character. 
 The oracular prophet would be in Christianity a 
 
 spiritual anomaly. 
 False prophets, as they appear in patristic authors. 
 Prophecy always showed higher and lower forms : 
 
 hence two possible lines of development : a true 
 
 and a false. 
 The Church in practice followed the true line : 
 
 " the prophetic gift must continue in the whole 
 
 Church." 
 
 V. The theory of Twofold Ministry is impracticable — 
 
 It rests upon a false distinction. 
 
 It depresses the Christian flock, as Institutional 
 theories of Ministry do not. 
 
 A Twofoldness is perceptible in the first stage. It 
 is that of Foundation and Building : of the Apo- 
 stolic element in its aspect of uniqueness, along 
 with the Church in process of assuming a per- 
 manent form. 
 
 Accordingly, after the Apostolic age that Twofold- 
 ness ceases to be perceptible. 
 
 Nevertheless, " the prophetic gift must continue in 
 the whole Church until the coming of the Lord." 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 LECTURE I 
 
 CERTAIN THEORIES OF CHURCH AND MINISTRY 
 
 The history of Ministry in the Church of God 
 presents, it must be admitted, one problem hitherto 
 unsolved — that namely of the emergence and rapid 
 prevalence of the monarchical Episcopate. Other- 
 wise the account of its own Mnistry traditionally 
 given and received by the Church is in its main 
 features sufficiently simple, and is in general accord- 
 ance with the sources of information. The account 
 is that of a Ministry originating in our Lord's commis- 
 sion to His apostles, and proceeding from them by 
 acts of devolution — a Ministry imbedded indeed in 
 the atmosphere of an intense spiritual activity and 
 power which was confined to no official channel, 
 being as it was the vital activity of the body of 
 which the Ministry is part — nevertheless a Ministry 
 exercising its specific functions, not in virtue of 
 its sharing in that common current of life but 
 in virtue of office and commission and of grace 
 thereto congruous. Such a conception of Ministry 
 is suggested by the general treatment of the subject 
 by the canonical writers : it is traceable in the 
 
 B 
 
\ 
 
 2 :>TINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 sub-apostolic Fathers, as Clement of Rome, Ignatius, 
 Irenaeus : it has been prevalent throughout the 
 history of the Church; and it is maintained by 
 modern Anglicanism and by the Presbyterianism 
 which has followed the Westminster standards, as 
 well as by the unreformed Churches in East and 
 West. Continental Reformers, on the other hand, 
 showed an inclination to fall back on a theory of 
 extraordinary ministries and to regard themselves 
 as standing in a new mission as Evangelists raised 
 for the need of the time, and competent to establish 
 a pastorate with sufficient warrant for the handling 
 of the Word and Sacraments. Lutheranism has 
 never concerned itself with any doctrine of succes- 
 sion, though prepared in some cases to assert its 
 possession. Lutherans are not interested in the 
 history of ministry unless speculatively and criti- 
 cally. Calvin probably took the same view as 
 Luther ; but the second Helvetic confession, which 
 represents the consensus of the reformed Com- 
 munions in the middle of the sixteenth century, 
 clearly adheres to the traditional position, asserts 
 succession and prescribes ordination by the ordained. 
 Knox, although one of the signatories to this, seems 
 to have regarded his own claim to ministry as 
 prophetic, and would possibly have preferred to 
 assert the same of those whom he regarded as true 
 ministers of Christ. If so, he failed to impress his 
 view upon his coadjutors, and the doctrine of the 
 second Helvetic confession has always ruled the 
 doctrine and practice of the Church of Scotland; 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 3 
 
 and indeed no one is more severe than Knox himself 
 on such as run without being sent or who assume 
 without due commission to handle the seals of the 
 King of Heaven. 
 
 The Reformation, however, stirred the whole 
 question of orders, their nature and origin, and 
 revived interest in what were described as " extra- 
 ordinary Ministries " as a conceivable source of 
 fresh commission, and about the year 1580 a new 
 doctrine on the subject was formulated, known at 
 first as Brownism and later as Independency. This 
 regarded ministry as an evolution from the flock, 
 each self-associated group of Christians being con- 
 sidered as a microcosm — locally and temporally a 
 manifestation of the Church Universal — the primary 
 depositary of the gifts of the Spirit and the imme- 
 diate source of commission. This presentation at 
 once vindicated itself as intelligible and energetic ; 
 it embodied an idea. 
 
 For the Church can be conceived of in at least 
 two distinct ways. It may be conceived of as a 
 continuous corporation (the phrase, I think, is 
 Newman's), a substantive kingdom of grace, holding 
 its way through the ages and taking up into itself 
 such elements of humanity as accord with its nature 
 or submit to its claim. In that view the Church 
 is ideally antecedent to the individual. It is the 
 primary recipient of the Holy Spirit. Its institu- 
 tions are organically involved with its life as con- 
 stituted : as they are bestowed, so they abide — 
 modifiable, perhaps, in arrangement, adaptable in 
 
4 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 application, but unalterable in character. There is, 
 that is to say, a deposit of faith, which cannot 
 be increased or diminished : there are Sacraments 
 which are fixed in number and content : there are 
 ministries, given at the first to continue to the end. 
 The Church is in that view the Body of Christ, a 
 Divine Creation, an extension and continuation of 
 the method of Incarnation. Those who are added 
 to the Lord are added to the Church — that which 
 effects the one union effecting the other union. 
 The Divine thing in the world is this Kingdom 
 of Heaven, which appropriates and assimilates to 
 itself its material from our corrupt and perishing 
 humanity, and demonstrates itself as Divine through 
 its power by such a process to persist, and to main- 
 tain correspondence with a Heavenly origin, a 
 Heavenly calling, and a Heavenly destination. 
 This is the Catholic conception of the Church, 
 which has been common to the unreformed and to 
 certain at least of the reformed Communions. 
 
 On the other hand the Church may be conceived 
 of as adequately given in the giving of Spirit, and 
 as summed up in the fact of that gift,^ rather than 
 as a Divinely organised society inhabited by the 
 Spirit. In that case the believer is ideally ante- 
 cedent to the Church, and the Church is equivalent 
 to the sum total of believers, which as a unity exists 
 
 ^ " The Church depends upon essential reality, upon the 
 instant and constant proclamation of God's word, God's will, 
 in Spirit and in Truth." — Lowrie, The Church arid its Organisa- 
 tion, p. 4. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 6 
 
 only in the Spirit, but emerges into observation in 
 any such association as may result from the Christian 
 instinct and which is equally manifest in any and 
 every such association. In this conception the 
 Divine thing in the world is the regenerate soul 
 with its endowment of grace and truth, its affinities, 
 sympathies and sacred impulses. This believing 
 soul is then the immediate recipient of the Holy 
 Spirit. Those energies and those collective faculties 
 which are attributed, not to the individual but to 
 the Christian Society, emerge and become efficient 
 upon the association of believers with one another — 
 an association to which they are called and impelled, 
 which is the requirement of their nature as regene- 
 rate and is necessary for the full exercise of the 
 Mission of the Spirit by their means, but which 
 is dependent on nothing else than their obedience 
 to the impulse to associate and to the fact that 
 they are associated. Two or three are gathered 
 together ^ : there Christ is in the midst of them, 
 and there is the Church in plenitude of commission 
 and of capacity for its execution. 
 
 This conception of the Church is logical and 
 concatenated. It covers the ground. It has an 
 intellectual basis ; and it corresponds to a definite 
 and respectable type of Christian experience and is 
 
 1 St. Matt, xviii. 20 : The promise is to those who are 
 gathered " in My Name,*' and its scope will depend on what 
 may be understood as included under " The Name of Christ " 
 — whether, for example, it implies gathering in obedience to 
 Christ's Ordinances. 
 
6 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 likely always to appeal to one class of mind. It 
 has the merit of elasticity, and may be held more 
 or less thoroughly and carried out with more or 
 less consistence. One may combine with it Calvin's 
 insistence on certain offices as Scriptural and on a 
 certain form of organisation as of Divine right. It 
 may reconcile conscience to the acceptance of an 
 Erastian arrangement prescribed in the past and 
 proved tolerable in the present — which may seem to 
 be the position in Lutheranism. Or it will admit of 
 such a system as that of the Friends, in which 
 institutions are superfluous ; or of the Salvation 
 Army, in which they are improvised. Independ- 
 ency, however, shows it in its historical and typical 
 embodiment : there it is most systematic, spiritually 
 imagined, theoretically argued, scripturally sup- 
 ported, practically organised; and however widely 
 the conception may be elsewhere utilised, it is held 
 elsewhere with less consistence. It is the proper 
 antithesis of the Catholic conception, as a rival 
 interpretation of those facts which suggest for the 
 Christian Society a Divine plan. As such it has 
 been, if one may put it so, rediscovered and re- 
 stated on a philosophic basis by Professor Rudolph 
 Sohm (whom Mr. Lowrie so ably interprets to us) 
 and in that form has secured a wide appreciation.^ 
 The difficulty of this theory of the Church has 
 
 ^ " Sohm's theory, with the exception of the Catholic view, 
 is the most coherent and complete that has ever been put 
 forward." — Harnack, Constitution and Law of the Church, trans. 
 F. L. Pogson, p. 176. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 7 
 
 been mainly historical. Its difficulties begin within 
 sacred history — New Testament narrative and allu- 
 sion seem to lend themselves more readily to the 
 Catholic than to the individualistic reading. It 
 can hardly be doubted that patristic evidence 
 supports the Catholic theory, or that that has 
 prevailed in the Church from a very early date. 
 In order to hold any other theory it is necessary 
 to suppose that the Church departed from its proper 
 order within, if not before, the period known as 
 sub -apostolic. The Catholic view, on the other 
 hand, has not only the general support of history, 
 but finds the Scriptural evidence at least as patient 
 of its interpretation as of any other. So far, 
 therefore, the non-Catholic interpretation has had 
 a narrowly restricted basis in the facts as known, 
 and was compelled to argue largely a priori, appeal- 
 ing to the spiritual character of Christianity, and 
 implying an opposition between the Spiritual and 
 the Institutional, of which the existence is not to 
 all minds self-evident. 
 
 The discovery (in 1884) of the work known as 
 the Didache, or " Teaching of the Twelve Apostles," 
 with the research for illustrative material to which 
 that event gave occasion and with the re-arrange- 
 ment of evidence in light of its suggestions, has 
 certainly gone some way to remedy this weakness. 
 A historical setting was thereby supplied for the 
 presentation of ministry as prophetic and as inde- 
 pendent of institutional sanction, which previously 
 had been much to seek. The conception of the 
 
8 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 Church as primarily a Spiritual community of 
 Spiritual men, based on the individual quality and 
 experience of its component members, manifested in 
 their spontaneous aggregation, creating its own in- 
 stitutions and authorising its own ministries, has 
 been re-elaborated with greater resource and has 
 been restated with new cogency — by none with more 
 learning and force than by Principal Lindsay of 
 this city.^ His treatise ^ lacks, perhaps, something 
 of the philosophic unity and spiritual method of 
 apprehension which characterises Professor Sohm's 
 position, but has the advantage of leaving present 
 systems uncondemned, since it leaves them claiming 
 little that need occasion question. Whether the 
 evidence will sustain these positions it is one object 
 of the present lecture to consider. 
 
 The prophetic conception of Ministry has in its 
 favour certain correspondences with the temper of 
 our own period, to which possibly it owes some- 
 thing. It accords with the democratic idea which 
 sees the origin of authority in the mass of citizen- 
 ship. It accords with the tendency to spiritualise 
 the content of religion and to connect validity with 
 experience. And it accords with the tendency to 
 explain everything in terms of evolution. On the 
 other hand, there is room for question whether the 
 Christian system as a whole is characteristically 
 democratic — if it is thought of as including any 
 
 ^ This was written before the lamented death of that eminent 
 scholar. 
 
 2 The Church and Ministry in the Early Centuries. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 9 
 
 permanent and personal Christ, it is not demo- 
 cratic but monarchical, and its monarchy is abso- 
 lutist — ^it proclaims not the Republic, but the 
 Kingdom of Heaven. Nor in the Christian system 
 are the concrete and factual necessarily opposed 
 to the spiritual : in one view (which has not a 
 few supporters) Christianity is distinctively the 
 religion of Incarnation, according to which spirit 
 ever seeks for body and the Word becomes flesh — 
 an outward sign constantly accompanying and 
 serving the Spiritual, so that at every point a 
 Sacramental relation is discoverable between the 
 external in its apparatus and a Heavenly and 
 inward element, which thereby becomes accessible 
 to men who are themselves in the body : a relation 
 in virtue of which the Kingdom of Heaven finds 
 place in this world of sensible things, and without 
 ceasing to be Heavenly can work under conditions 
 of time and place, such as men inhabit. As for 
 its relation to the doctrine of evolution, everything 
 no doubt is the subject of evolution, in the sense 
 that everything has a history and is connected to 
 its own past; but many evolutions have sudden 
 and definite issues : long preparations lead to 
 critical moments, and history is full, not of processes 
 only, but also of events. The account which 
 Christianity has to give of itself is that its origin 
 is in an event, which was followed by a fresh depar- 
 ture and by new things. Even from the a priori 
 point of view there is something to be said for the 
 institutional conception of the Church. 
 
10 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 The latter part of last century was marked by a 
 revival of interest in the subject of the Christian 
 origins, including that of the Ministry. In this 
 country the Tractarian Movement had reasserted 
 the doctrine of Apostolic Succession through bishops, 
 in a form somewhat rigidly conceived and un- 
 critically derived from scriptural precedents (such 
 as those of James at Jerusalem or of Timothy 
 and Titus in their relation to St. Paul) and from 
 the patristic evidence as the Tractarians read it.^ 
 The interest thereby created led upon the one hand 
 to a renewed assertion by Divines of the Church 
 of Scotland of that doctrine of presbyteral succes- 
 sion which was habitual in the classical period of 
 Presbyterianism,2 and on the other hand led to a 
 deeper research into the sources. In 1868 Dr. 
 Lightfoot published his work on the Epistle to 
 the Philippians, with the dissertation on the Chris- 
 tian Ministry, in which he maintained the original 
 equivalence of presbyter and bishop, and the 
 emergence of the Episcopate by elevation out of 
 
 ^ The Theophilus Anglicanus (a.d. 1843) of Bishop Christopher 
 Wordsworth may be instanced as a typical example of the 
 method. 
 
 ^ See, e.g., a series of Articles which appeared, 1839, in the 
 Edinburgh Christian Instructor, a magazine printed and edited 
 by Dr. Andrew Thompson of St. George's ; and later Dr. Sprott, 
 Sermon before the Synod of Aberdeen, 1873, Worship and Offices, 
 1882; Dr. Leishman passim; Dr. Story {Memoir of B. H. Story, 
 pp. 138-9); and on the subject generally a paper by the present 
 writer in Scottish Church Society Conferences, 4th Series, Hitt, 
 1909. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 11 
 
 the Presbyterate. Nine years later, in 1877, he 
 began to issue his edition of the ApostoHc Fathers, 
 his Clement appearing in that year, and his Appendix 
 to it with the recently recovered portions of the 
 Epistle in 1879. In 1881 Mr. Hatch's Bampton 
 Lecture, The Organisation of the Early Christian 
 Churches, which submitted a new evolutionary 
 theory of the Ministry and of the distinction of 
 presbyter and bishop, had appeared and had 
 attracted attention. Finally, in 1884, while Light- 
 foot's Ignatius was actually passing through the 
 Press, a new document, the Didache, apparently of 
 the first age and presumably of capital importance, 
 was given to the world. Its earlier section showed 
 matter which recalled portions of the Epistle of 
 Barnabas, and its later section matter which could 
 at once be paralleled with portions of the Apostolic 
 Constitutions. Its discoverer identified it with a 
 work or works referred to by Eusebius and Athana- 
 sius, and assigned it to about the date a.d. 100. 
 The main interest of the document lay in the latter 
 section which has the character of a Church Manual 
 and gives directions as to Baptism, Fasting, Prayer, 
 the Eucharist, and for relations to Apostles and 
 Prophets, Bishops and Deacons. 
 
 This discovery has exercised a profound influence 
 on subsequent discussion of Christian origins. The 
 discussion of the nature and history of ministry 
 would have doubtless in any case proceeded — the 
 work of Lightfoot and Hatch had already secured 
 re -examination of sources ; Bishop Charles Words- 
 
12 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 worth's appeal for reunion between the National 
 Churches of England and Scotland, a.d. 1853 onwards, 
 to which we may refer the beginning of the present 
 interest in Christian unity, had sent Presbyterianism 
 to consider its title deeds, which since the Revolution 
 Settlement it had been content to take for granted. 
 The critical method applied everywhere would have 
 been applied in this field as well. But the publica- 
 tion of the Didache came to give an urgent and 
 immediate impulse to the application. The writing 
 was generally accepted as exceedingly early — Har- 
 nack stood almost alone in bringing its possible 
 date as low as the second half of the second century ; 
 and it was accepted as representative of the Church 
 life of its period or of the period immediately ante- 
 cedent. It introduced a point of view. It was 
 spoken of as lifting a veil, casting a light, supplying 
 a link. It seemed to lie behind all the manuals of 
 Church order known to exist : Harnack at once 
 (1886) edited the earliest of these, the Apostolic 
 Canons, and showed the common matter, in light 
 of which the Didache seemed a still earlier source. 
 Its disclosure of apostles and prophets as living 
 and active agents in the life of its time was thus 
 connected with a whole mass of reference in the 
 New Testament writings and in early extra-canonical 
 literature, and especially with the fact that apostles 
 and prophets, along with teachers (who are also, 
 but less emphatically, mentioned in the Didache) 
 head St. Paul's lists of persons and gifts in his 
 Epistles to Corinth and Ephesus. In St. Paul's 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 13 
 
 view these, apostles and prophets, are " founda- 
 tions " 1 of the Church ; in the Didache, however, 
 their operations appear, not at any founding, but 
 as familiar and expected where some degree of 
 settled order has been reached. These directions 
 of the Didache are rules, and rule supposes custom. 
 The writer is able to describe his work — we must 
 suppose with some degree of speciousness — as the 
 Teaching of the Twelve Apostles, who stood at the 
 beginning of all Church order; and the fact that 
 he can so entitle it implies that he is not prescribing 
 the entirely new, but assumes himself to be formu- 
 lating practice which already existed. His title 
 may be more or less fictional ; but even the fiction 
 would be possible only in a community which has 
 reached the stage at which the usual exists, and 
 is sufficiently established to admit of regulation 
 and of explanation ; and if this is fiction, it is 
 fiction which would be possible only where usage 
 is so far developed that its beginnings are forgotten. 
 And within this order of the usual appear apostles 
 and prophets. In St. Paul's conception, as pre- 
 sented in 1 Corinthians and Ephesians, pre-eminence 
 of some sort is assigned to Apostle, Prophet and 
 Teacher; and in the Didache it is easy to find 
 prescriptions which may be read as assigning a 
 pre-eminence to persons who are at least described 
 
 ^ " Foundations," not " Founders.'* The difference of the 
 ideas implied respectively in these two words is really radical to 
 this discussion, although Dr. Gore {Orders and Unity, p. 95) 
 seems to use them as interchangeable. 
 
14 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 by the same titles. If, then, St. Paul's lists which 
 occur in these Epistles are to be conceived of 
 as lists of ministries in any technical sense, the 
 ministries which he names are obviously not those 
 which have since become stereotyped in the Church's 
 system. St. Paul identifies them with the incidence 
 of charismata, that is, of specific endowments con- 
 ferred by the Pentecostal Spirit — it is doubtful 
 whether the ministries of which we are accustomed 
 to think as permanent and regular have any place 
 at all in those lists. They may be covered by the 
 phrase " pastors and teachers " in the Ephesian 
 list ; but the " teacher " also appears in the Didache 
 in association with the apostle and prophet, and 
 there are indications elsewhere that the teacher 
 was a recognised charismatic, occupying a position 
 which was not that of bishop or of presbyter but 
 was constituted by " gift." If regular and perma- 
 nent ministry is to be found in St. Paul's lists, it 
 may be only under the head of " helps and govern- 
 ments," which in the Corinthians passage follows, 
 but in a group which is obviously subordinate. 
 The ministries in that case upon which St. Paul 
 lays stress would be not those which as institu- 
 tional and official lie behind the succession of 
 bishops and presbyters, but would be those others — 
 apostle, prophet, evangelist, "teacher — of which the 
 common characteristic might seem to be that they 
 are not " of man or by man," but are of the nature 
 of an immediate creation by the influx of the Holy 
 Spirit upon the human spirit. We would then 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 15 
 
 have a deep and far-reaching distinction between 
 two types of ministry, the charismatic and the 
 official. The charismatic ministry would appear 
 as the primary and authoritative — the official 
 ministry as the secondary and dependent; the 
 charismatic as the divine creation, the regular as 
 at most its creature — possibly not as even so much, 
 but as only the natural provision of the Christian 
 Society for its own greater convenience. 
 
 Such was the suggestion deduced from the newly 
 discovered document. The common practice pre- 
 viously had been to treat the charismatic element 
 generally either as non-historical or as the feature of 
 an age of miracle which is past. The Church had 
 originated in an atmosphere of the supernatural 
 which must be allowed to clear away before history 
 in the accepted sense could be taken in hand. So 
 far as Scripture carries us, it had been found suffi- 
 cient to condense Scriptural narrative with its 
 account of signs and wonders accompanying the 
 propagation of the Gospel, as to which Scripture 
 must speak for itself. Dollinger, for example, in 
 his First Age of the Church,^ dismisses the subject 
 in a few pages. He speaks of extraordinary gifts 
 conferred by the laying on of the apostles' hands 
 as " widely communicated," and goes on : " This was 
 a condition singular in history which has never 
 since repeated itself, and which in the absence of 
 any experience we can only approximately conceive 
 of." " This condition [he says] gradually passed 
 1 Translated, H. R. Oxenham, 4th ed., p. 286. 
 
16 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 away"i; from the time of St. Paul's Epistle to 
 the Galatians " it was more and more passing 
 away." 2 The persons of whom St. Paul in his 
 lists speaks had been regarded as discharging ex- 
 ceptional functions required at an exceptional 
 juncture. The Westminster Form of Church Govern- 
 ment briefly says of them that they " are ceased," 
 while pastors, teachers and deacons are perpetual ; 
 and its view is substantially the view prevalent 
 until last generation. Reformed divines, indeed, 
 kept in reserve the possibility of the re-emergence 
 of extraordinary ministry on adequate occasion. 
 Calvin probably thought that such an occasion had 
 arisen in his own time,^ and Gore is perhaps right 
 in believing that Calvin derived the authority of 
 the Reformed Pastorate from such a " new mission." * 
 Our Scottish Divines admitted the conceivability 
 of the emergence ^ and the feasibility of this plea 
 for their own status, had the occasion for it existed ; 
 but denied that it had arisen, and preferred to trace 
 their " ordinary vocation " to regular succession 
 from the ministry of the unreformed Church. In 
 " settled Churches " the extraordinary ministries 
 had no place ; and, for the contingency of the failure 
 of regular ministry, it was their commonplace that 
 
 1 Translated H. R. Oxenham, 4th ed., p. 323. 
 
 2 Ibid., p. 288. 
 
 3 Inst., IV. 2. 12. Quoted Gore. 
 * Orders and Unity, p. 179 n. 
 
 ^ See Smeton, Patrick Forbes, Gillespie, etc. ; and see especially 
 Patrick Forbes, Defence of the Lawful Calling, etc., passim. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 17 
 
 to imagine it was to reflect on the faithfulness of 
 God. 
 
 In the Didache, however, tho^e " extraordinary " 
 persons the apostle and prophet appear as normally 
 active in Churches which are sufficiently " settled " 
 to be provided with bishops and deacons, to use 
 the Sacraments, and to require something like a 
 code of canons for which their practice provides 
 material. The period to which these canons are 
 supposed to refer is at least later than the death 
 of the last of the Twelve. If, then, the Didache 
 be taken as representative of any state of matters 
 generally prevalent, the inference would be that 
 charismatic persons down to that time which it 
 represents constituted something like a definite 
 ministry; that this ministry was by no means a 
 phenomenon solely of the immediately post-pente- 
 costal period; that such ministry did not begin to 
 " pass away " at the very early date given, for 
 example, by DoUinger for the beginning of its 
 disappearance ; that, on the contrary, some half 
 century later it was in something like full vigour,^ 
 and was then still the main factor in Church life 
 
 ^ I do not myself find in the Didache any plain indication of 
 such decadence or obsolescence of charismatic influence as are 
 sometimes discovered; see, e.g., Lindsay, op. cit., p. 176 n.; 
 Allen, Christian Institutions, p. 59; Sanday, Expositor, Third 
 Series, Vol. VI. p. 109 ; Swete, Holy Spirit in the Ancient Church, 
 p. 22, etc. Warnings against false prophets do not amount to 
 such indication ; they are found, for that matter, in Deuteronomy 
 and in the New Testament. The Didache seems to assume the 
 prophet as flourishing happily. 
 
18 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 to be recognised in codifying practice. Farther 
 and important inferences are in that case suggested 
 \ and have been drawn : — the original ministry of 
 i the Church was then charismatic, not institutional ; 
 I and it consisted of those persons who are named in 
 St. Paul's lists. Such a theory was at once formu- 
 lated by Harnack and has been widely followed — 
 a theory based partly on the suggestion of the 
 Didache, but resting rather upon that suggestion 
 correlated with other material which was at once 
 re-interpreted in the light of the Didache. Sohm^ 
 conveniently summarises the theory as " distin- 
 guishing a double organisation, one spiritual, 
 universal, unitary, applying to the Church as a 
 whole : and the other legal, belonging to the local 
 community — charisma in the former, election and 
 office in the latter; the gradual dying out of the 
 charismata, of the apostles, prophets and teachers; 
 the transference of the function of teaching to 
 the elected bishops." The charismatic ministry, the 
 theory in its complete form infers or postulates, 
 was not dependent on ecclesiastical sanction ; 
 it required no ordination; it was general, not 
 local; it stood for the authority of the Church 
 as a whole; it was peripatetic or itinerant; it 
 exercised the oversight of the overseers ; when it 
 came, it took command and superseded local and 
 appointed functionaries . These local functionaries — 
 bishops, presbyters, deacons — grew up under its 
 
 ^ See Harnack, Constitution and Law of the Churchy trans. 
 Williams & Norgate, p. 190. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 19 
 
 direction and constituted a ministry of an inferior 
 and more earthly type ; a ministry without re- 
 sponsibility wider than might exist toward the 
 particular Church appointing them, depending on 
 lower sanction and not necessarily equipped with 
 special gift or grace ; a ministry rather of manage- 
 ment, a ministry of affairs, of discipline and the 
 like ; and one which, whatever its usefulness, left 
 the Church which it served dependent on the 
 itinerating charismatic for the higher ministrations 
 of religion. 1 
 
 Such in outline is the theory of Twofold Ministry, 
 which to many minds was suggested by study of 
 the Didache. It is, one may see, a theory which 
 involves farther that the charismatic ministry 
 which it holds forth should be supposed to have 
 carried within itself the seeds of a decay which 
 might not have been expected to exist in an institu- 
 tion directly derived from Heaven and pregnant 
 with the inexhaustible resources of Divine Spirit. 
 It assumes this Heaven-derived ministry to be 
 inherently unfit to co -exist with the development 
 of the Christian Society : to the result that in or 
 about the first half of the second century it suffered 
 rapid collapse and by the end of that century was 
 effectively a thing of the past. It has also to recog- 
 nise that a ministry which it regards as local and 
 inferior displayed, notwithstanding its mundane 
 and merely legal origin, a startling correspondence 
 with the real requirement of the position, an 
 ^ Turner, Camb. Med. Hist., pp. 144, 145. 
 
20 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 elasticity and adaptibility, a capacity and an energy 
 of correspondence with fact, in virtue of which it 
 found itself automatically substituted for the older 
 and higher system, which disappeared before it, as 
 we are better accustomed to see the more earthly 
 vanish before the more divine. Farther, this vast 
 and radical change in the character of the Church 
 as an institution must be supposed to have taken 
 place within little more than a single generation 
 and entirely within the activity and under the 
 observation of the same persons. At the same time 
 it must have happened unconsciously, silently, 
 without ambition of the inferior ministry to dis- 
 place the superior, and without resistance on the 
 part of those inspired persons or attempt of theirs 
 to maintain the charge directly committed to 
 them from Heaven : if any protest was raised, it 
 was not until the revolution was complete, and 
 then from none of the Churches which were recog- 
 nised as guardians of tradition and custom, but 
 from a village in the highlands of Phrygia, and by 
 an individual of whom little is known but that he 
 was a recent convert to Christianity, who perhaps 
 had been a priest of the wild cult of Cybele. 
 
 These are hard sayings. A very thorough ex- 
 amination of the sources on which they depend 
 and a very convincing result from the examination 
 would seem to be required to establish such con- 
 clusions; for on the face of the matter they do 
 not impress themselves as probable. In particular 
 the document which has mainly suggested them 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 21 
 
 would seem to call for careful consideration. Not 
 that the theory of twofold ministry is supported 
 from the Didache by itself — an ample research has 
 been brought to its service, and the available 
 material so far as relevant has been thoroughly 
 utilised for its illustration; but that unless the 
 discovery of the Didache had taken place, no such 
 theory would have originated or would now have 
 much chance of maintaining itself. The evidences 
 supporting the theory are arranged round sugges- 
 tions derived from the Didache and draw coherence 
 from the assumption that a state of matters such 
 as that which the Didache seems to imply was at 
 some point of time prevalent, and that the Didache 
 is representative of Church life at that period. 
 
 The theory of twofold ministry does not rest 
 upon the Didache only; it looks for support also 
 to St. Paul's enumerations of charismatic persons! 
 and gifts in 1 Cor. xii., and in Ephes. iv. : to his 
 discussion of charismata, their relative values and 
 their uses, in 1 Cor. xii.-xiv. : to parts of St. Luke's 
 narrative in the Book of Acts, such as the account 
 of the " setting apart " of Barnabas and Saul 
 (chap, xiii.), and to other passages of the New Testa- 
 ment. It refers to the Pastor of Hermas and its 
 descriptions of the founding in successive courses 
 of the Mystical Tower which is the Church; and 
 it calls to its service much else, not all perhaps 
 equally germane to its thesis. It has appealed to the 
 Montanistic outburst of the middle of the second 
 century as an evident reaction against the sub- 
 
22 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 stitution of a regular for a charismatic ministry, a 
 last despairing effort to reassert the validity of the 
 purely spiritual and to revive its force. All this 
 material, however, requires an interpretative illumi- 
 nation which only the Didache affords. It is neces- 
 sary to assume the Didache as authentic and veridical 
 in order from that to derive the framework into 
 which other material can be woven. Withdraw 
 the skeleton which the Didache supplies, and there 
 does not remain anything sufficiently substantial 
 to range against evidence which suggests conclusions 
 of a quite different kind. The New Testament 
 literature, for example, does not apparently of 
 itself lead to the inference of a separate and pre- 
 ponderant charismatic ministry : that literature 
 had been sufficiently considered previous to Bryen- 
 nios' discovery without leading to any such infer- 
 ence, and very great difficulty remains in reconciling 
 it with the historicity of the Didache as an account 
 of conditions existing at any assignable date. The 
 Book of Acts and no less the Pastoral Epistles present 
 a view of Church organisation which seems to be 
 radically different. If the argument from silence 
 is to be allowed place, the difficulty of recon- 
 ciling the evidence of the Didache with that of the 
 New Testament becomes still greater, for apart 
 from passages in two of St. Paul's Epistles and 
 from allusions to the activity of prophets which 
 are found in the Book of Acts, there is little in the 
 New Testament on which the theory of an oecu- 
 menical charismatic ministry can rely. But the 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 23 
 
 New Testament documents, however regarded, are, 
 at all events in this matter, evidence of the first 
 importance. They are the contemporary docu- 
 ments of the period most crucially involved. They 
 are of earlier date than can be feasibly suggested 
 for the Didache, and they are of much more certain 
 origin. So far as critical questions of date or author- 
 ship affect any of them, these questions are for 
 the purpose of the inquiry of less account, since 
 in any case the documents remain evidence for 
 the period within which inquiry must necessarily 
 lie. And if the type of ministry which is judged 
 to be discoverable in the Didache — i. e., an itinerant 
 ministry warranted by gift, in comparison with 
 which fixed and constituted ministry was of negli- 
 gible authority — is not discoverable in the earlier 
 period represented by the New Testament writings, 
 its discovery in a solitary document, isolated in its 
 testimony, peculiar in its presentation of Church 
 life in other respects, of uncertain provenance and 
 unquestionably of date later than that of even the 
 later New Testament writings, will not necessarily 
 transform the problem of Church origins. It may, 
 then, be only this document which itself needs to 
 be accounted for; and there may be an account 
 of it more probable than one which involves so 
 many difficulties, historical and critical. On the 
 face of the position there seems no conclusive reason 
 for assigning to the Didache greater weight than to 
 the Book of Acts or to the Pastoral Epistles, upon 
 a question which is after all a question of the state 
 
24 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 of matters during the first rather than during the 
 second century. For if the charismatic ministry 
 did not exist as a separate and superior ministry 
 within the Apostolic period, it cannot have had 
 much right to rule in the sub -Apostolic. 
 
 The result reached from consideration of other 
 capital sources is similar. St. Clement's Epistle to 
 the Corinthian Church is if anything earlier than 
 the date most generally assigned to the Didache, 
 and the Epistles of St. Ignatius are only slightly 
 junior. Neither of them show any consciousness 
 of a charismatic ministry. Both are occupied with 
 questions of ministry, but they are questions of 
 regular and institutional ministry. The authen- 
 ticity of these documents is not seriously questioned : 
 we know what and whence they are. They are 
 evidence for the conditions of Church life for Rome, 
 Achaia, Asia Minor and Syria, regions where Christi- 
 anity was oldest and the Church best consolidated. 
 If the Didache be taken as representing a system 
 at any time general, it is extremely difficult to 
 reconcile its evidence with theirs. On the other 
 hand, they accord with that of the New Testament 
 documents. Once more it is the Didache for which 
 it seems necessary to account, as being the excep- 
 tional, the inconsistent, almost the fantastic. Nor 
 is the Didache explained if it is regarded as archaic, 
 a fossil testifying to an order of life once abundant. 
 The Epistles of St. Paul are older; the Epistles of 
 St. Peter and of St. John are older; the Book of 
 the Acts is older ; the Epistle of Clement is at least 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 25 
 
 as old. If the Didache discloses to us a stage of 
 Church life which, though at its own period deca- 
 dent, had been formerly general (and if it does 
 not do this, it can be of no particular significance), 
 its indications ought to correspond with those of 
 sources which belong to that more primitive time; 
 it should recall to us the atmosphere in which the 
 great apostles moved, and should reproduce the 
 organisation which the literature of that period 
 leads us to imagine. But it does not; it recalls 
 little unless perhaps a section from one of St. Paul's 
 earlier Epistles (1 Cor. xii.-xiv.), which section is 
 by no means typical. 
 
 The Didache, in fact, intrudes into Church his- 
 tory only to confuse what, apart from it, though 
 at points unexplained, might seem fairly consecu- 
 tive and comprehensible. The Didache does not 
 explain — it introduces a new problem. 
 
LECTURE II 
 
 THE DIDACHE : ITS AUTHORITY 
 
 For the consideration of Ministry in relation 
 to Charismata much, as has been said, will depend 
 upon the value assigned to the tract known as the 
 Didache, or " Teaching of the Twelve Apostles." A 
 large literature has gathered round the subject and a 
 remarkable research has been brought to its illustra- 
 tion : one may believe that pending the discovery of 
 new sources, which is always possible and in these 
 days hardly improbable, the available material for 
 discussion has been brought within reach. I pretend 
 only to offer the impression made upon my own 
 mind by its consideration. If these impressions 
 are in the direction of a doubt whether the document 
 adds much to our knowledge of primitive conditions, 
 or need be allowed to sway our judgment far from 
 the conclusions which apart from it we might have 
 reached, I am encouraged by the farther impression 
 that the trend of more recent criticism is towards 
 such doubt. 
 
 The Didache is known to us only from a single 
 manuscript, and that of the eleventh century. We 
 are entirely ignorant of the history of the earlier 
 manuscript from which the copyist Leo, " notary 
 and Sinner," worked. The contents of the document 
 seem to be highly complex. Even such a critic as 
 
 26 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 27 
 
 Professor Bartlet, who ascribes to it " real organic 
 unity " ^ and claims that we should assent to 
 Harnack, when he bids us " acquiesce in the assump- 
 tion of the integrity of the writing," himself subjects 
 it to a searching analysis, and probably means that 
 in its final shape as it has reached us there is nothing 
 inconsistent with the probability that a single mind 
 has revised it and has aimed to guard against 
 obvious discrepancy. It is more difficult to agree 
 with Harnack in discovering " unity of style and 
 language as well as of feeling " as marking it as a 
 whole, or in limiting suspicion of later additions to 
 some passages in the first chapter. The document 
 seems to be rather the result of repeated accretions 
 and modifications. 2 
 
 The Didache is best considered as consisting of 
 two distinct parts : (1) cc. I.-V. and (2) cc. VI.-XVI.^ 
 The first of these is a version (interpolated) of an 
 undoubtedly primitive tract. This announces itself 
 as the didache (that is to say, the practical inference) 
 derived in the first place from the Sum of the Law, 
 stated as follows : Firstly, thou shalt love God who 
 made thee ; secondly, thou shalt love thy neighbour as 
 thyself ; and, farther, from the Golden Rule stated 
 negatively : Whatsoever thou wouldst not have done 
 
 ^ Hastings'^ Dictionary of the Bible, extra vol., p. 439 a. 
 
 ^ " Of composite character." — Lindsay, Church and Ministry, 
 p. 172. 
 
 3 On this, see P. Drew's " Apostellehre ' ' in Von Hennecke's 
 Neutest. Apocr., Tiibingen, 1904. He sums up, p. 187: "The 
 hypothesis of the independence of the first part is practically 
 no hypothesis, but a certainty." 
 
28 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 to thyself, do not thou either to another. It contains, 
 however, no didache of the first precept of the Sum 
 of the Law, which enjoins love to God, but confines 
 itself to a rule of ethics between man and man, 
 presented under the ancient form of the Two Ways 
 of life and of death, familiar to us from both Old 
 and New Testaments. ^ This tract of the Two 
 Ways, older by far than the document which has 
 incorporated it, seems to have existed at first as 
 " a manual of instruction for the initiation of 
 proselytes into the Synagogue " ; it was Jewish 
 before it was Christian. ^ We cannot expect direct 
 evidence of its existence in a written form at this 
 stage, but that it did so exist is hardly doubtful. 
 In its Christian form it presents the appearance of 
 a revisal ; a revisal not of verbal tradition, but of a 
 text. For if the matter of it had passed from Jewish 
 into Christian use by an oral process of transmission 
 by Hebrew converts to Christianity, it would neces- 
 sarily have received in the process a general and 
 continuous Christian colouring. Its Jewish charac- 
 ter would have been currently modified as it passed 
 
 1 Deut. xi. 26 f!. and xxx. 1, 15, 19; Prov. ii. ; Isa. Iv. 8, 9; 
 St. Matt. vii. 13, 14 ; 2 St. Peter, ii. 15, etc. 
 
 * Immediately on the appearance of the Didache, Massebieau 
 {Revue de THistoire des Religions, Sept.-Oct., 1884 : quoted 
 Hitchcock and Brown, p. Ixxviii.) had suggested that " traces of 
 teaching intended for Jewish proselytes '^ were discernible in 
 it, Mr. Taylor (1886) followed up the suggestion and extended 
 its scope. It was accepted by Harnack (1895) and has been 
 worked out to something like demonstration by Dr. Kohler 
 {Jewish Encychpcedia, vol. iv. sub voce). 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 29 
 
 fluid through Christian minds and was delivered 
 by Christian lips ; the adaptation to Christian use 
 would not have shown itself by mere interpolation 
 or by an occasional verbal phrase ; no large section 
 could have remained in unaltered Jewish shape. 
 As it is, much of the Two Ways seems to have been 
 adopted from the Jewish source without alteration. 
 The original reviser had before him a Jewish original 
 in documentary form and worked over it.^ 
 
 In its Christian form the tract of the Two Ways 
 had early and extensive currency. It was in the 
 hands of Barnabas (a.d. 71-130), who embodies 
 much of it in his Epistle. ^ It was known to Hermas 
 (a.d. 140-150). It is quoted by Clement of Alex- 
 andria apparently as " Scripture." The Apostolic 
 Canons (a.d. c. 300) contain its earlier portion. Its 
 existence as a distinct and separate writing has been 
 made practically certain by the discovery (Schlecht, 
 1900) of a Latin version, of which only a fragment 
 (cc. I. -II. 6 a) had previously been known. This 
 version covers Didache cc. I. -VI., which thus ap- 
 pears as an independent document, to which later 
 matter (cc. VII.-XVI.) has been appended to form 
 our Didache. It is scarcely necessary to discuss 
 the alternative theory ^ that the Two Ways is an 
 abbreviation of the Didache, formed by dropping 
 
 ^ An interesting attempt in parts to reconstruct this appears 
 in Mr. Turner's Studies in Early Church History. 
 
 2 Mr. Turner thinks that Barnabas dealt with the Jewish 
 original unmodified. 
 
 3 See Bartlet, Hastings' Diet, of the Bible, pp. 449-^50. 
 
30 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 later sections when these became obsolete, while 
 the earlier ethical matter was retained for the 
 instruction of catechumens. The only support for 
 this is that Athanasius speaks of a Sidaxr] TcaXov/uivrj 
 rcbv anooToXcov as used with some other non-canonical 
 books, received by custom from the fathers, for that 
 purpose, and that the latter part of the Didache 
 could not have been so used. The passage is suffi- 
 ciently explained if we suppose that (as the Latin 
 version, if Bartlet's date for it, fourth century, is 
 near the truth, suggests) the original Two Ways 
 unextended was in some form still in circulation, 
 and that this is the Aidax'^ to which Athanasius 
 refers. The theory of abbreviation is negatived by 
 the fact that separate recensions of the Two Ways 
 seem to have existed long before Athanasius wrote. 
 Of these at least two are discernible, represented 
 respectively by the Latin and hy Didache I.-VI., the 
 Latin being probably the nearer to the Jewish 
 original, and having more in common with the text 
 underlying the Apostolic Canons. 
 
 The section Didache I. 3 b-11. I appears in neither 
 the Latin nor in the Canons, and is unknown to 
 Barnabas ; it is an entirely Christian interpolation, 
 based on the Gospels of Matthew and Luke, from 
 which it unconsciously adopts the plural form of 
 address, instead of the singular which characterises 
 the Two Ways proper, and to which after one or 
 two sentences there is a return. There is nothing 
 to mark as late its date of insertion — it may be 
 based on oral tradition of the sayings which it 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 31 
 
 embodies rather than upon the text of existing 
 Gospels, or upon sources lying behind these Gospels 
 as well. It was certainly known to Hernias, as 
 appears from a comparison of Didache I. 5 with 
 Mand. II. 4-6.^ The section corrects the excessive 
 Judaic emphasis on the negative side of morals; 
 any Christian adapter must have felt the need — and 
 it seems probable that a recension containing this 
 interpolation was from the early part of the second 
 century in circulation side by side with texts, such 
 as that of the Latin version, which did not contain it. 
 It is important to have in view that the antiquity 
 of the tract of the Two Ways is undoubted, and 
 that its inclusion in the Didache supplies no evidence 
 of the date of the farther matter which the Didache 
 also contains. The second main part of the Didache, 
 cc. VI. -XVI., is closely followed throughout by 
 Book VII. of the Apostolic Constitutions, a work 
 probably of the latter part of the fourth century, 
 and there is no earlier evidence for this section. 
 Barnabas has been said to show consciousness of 
 it, the ground for this being that while the Didache 
 says (XVI. 2 6): " For the whole time of your faith 
 shall not profit you, except ye be perfected in the 
 last time," Barnabas says (IV. 9) : " For nothing 
 will the whole time of our life and faith profit us, if 
 now in the lawless time and impending offences we 
 do not resist as become th sons of God." But 
 
 ^ Mr. Bartlet points out that there is less evidence for 
 Didache II. 3-4 ; but the phrases are almost entirely Dominical, 
 and afford the less means of identification. 
 
32 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 (1) the coincidence is far from close; (2) the 
 phraseology which is common to both passages is 
 ordinary and might be foimd anywhere ; (3) the idea 
 common to the two passages is current in Christian 
 literature : "In whatsoever things I may find 
 you, in this will I also judge you " ^ (compare 
 St. Matt. xxiv. 48 ; Heb. x. 35-9) ; (4) the passage 
 as in the Didache occurs in a section which is probably 
 an independent apocalyptic document which might 
 be quoted by more than one writer ^ — in any case 
 the reflection which it contains is one which is likely 
 to have been a Christian commonplace ; (5) if these 
 be quotations, the Didache may quote from Barnabas, 
 not Barnabas from the Didache — Harnack considers 
 that the Didache does here borrow from Barnabas. 
 
 The matter of these chapters appears to be a 
 compilation of which the parts are loosely articulated 
 and the sequence is sometimes confused. It deals 
 with Ascetic Practice, Baptism, Ritual Fasting, 
 Prayer, " the Eucharist,"" Persons who " come,'^ 
 First Fruits, the Lord's Day (and again in this con- 
 nection the Eucharist), the Appointment of Bishops 
 and Deacons, concluding with an exhortation to 
 Amity. This matter is framed between (1) a short 
 section designed to link it on to the tract of the 
 Two Ways and (2) a short apocalyptic section, with 
 which the Didache ends. 
 
 It is possible that the first addition made to the 
 Two Ways tract was based upon a document dealing 
 with Sacrament and Ministry, which may lie behind 
 
 ^ Justin, Dial, with Trypho, c. 47. ^ See note, p. 36. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 33 
 
 cc. VII., XIV. and XV. of the Didache. Read con- 
 secutively, these chapters may be thought to show 
 a similarity in treatment of subject and to balance 
 each other with appropriate emphasis on each 
 ordinance ; the subject of Baptism then leads 
 naturally to that of the Eucharist, which in turn 
 brings in the topic of the Lord's Day in proper 
 connection ; and c. XV., dealing with the appoint- 
 ment of bishops and deacons, then follows in logical 
 sequence, XV. 1 h-2 being in that case interpolation 
 by a final reviser. 
 
 Into this again there may seem to have been made 
 successive interpolations, or one extensive interpola- 
 tion of a number of fragments. Chap. VIII., dealing 
 as it does with fasting and the use of the Lord's 
 Prayer, has no proper place where it stands between 
 directions for the two sacraments : whoever placed 
 it there had somewhat to say about fasting, and saw 
 his opportunity to say it where fasting is mentioned 
 in connection with Baptism. The inclusion of the 
 Lord's Prayer almost compels the inference that 
 this insertion is late. The cc. IX. and X. are peculiar 
 even in the Didache, and stand by themselves. They 
 declaredly introduce matter from an independent 
 source ; the prayers of which they mainly consist 
 are supposed to be standard and current. They 
 have been worked over in a Christian sense, but 
 are probably Jewish in origin, and one of them is 
 found in another connection.^ The adapter of 
 
 ^ With modification ; as a benediction before breaking bread : 
 Pseud. Athan., De Virginitate, c. 13. 
 
 D 
 
34 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 these prayers does not seem to be the same with 
 the general editor of the Didache, as the latter does 
 not use the Fourth Gospel, to which the prayers 
 are much indebted. ^ As they are introduced their 
 sequence and reference are extremely obscure, so 
 much so as to be almost unintelligible. It is im- 
 possible to say to what it is that they are intended 
 to be applicable, to an Agape or to the Eucharist. ^ 
 While they are announced as nsgl rfjg evxaQioxiaq, 
 they contain no reference to things eucharistic — to 
 our Lord's Death or Sacrifice, to Atonement, or to 
 the Bread and Wine as related, symbolically or 
 otherwise, to our Lord's Body and Blood. It is 
 incredible that these prayers should have been 
 composed, and almost equally incredible that they 
 should have been used, for celebration of the Sacra- 
 ment. The order of consecration is " First the 
 Cup," an order unknown to Christian practice, ^ 
 and this is curiously and unnecessarily emphasised. 
 The direction suggests, as Dr. Bigg has indicated, a 
 
 ^ For a list of Johannine phrases occurring in them, see 
 Harnack, Prolegomena, p. 79, abbreviated Hitchcock and Brown, 
 p. Ixxvii. 
 
 ^ Allen says that it is the Agape which is described : Christian 
 Institutions, p. 518. 
 
 ^ The statement to the contrary based on St. Luke xxii. 17 
 and on 1 Cor. x. 11 cannot be supported. St. Luke mentions 
 two cups, one of them in the Passover, the other in its normal 
 place in the institution. St. Paul, though for some subjective 
 reason he mentions in 1 Cor. x. the Cup before the Bread, follows 
 the usual order, Bread and Cup, when he recounts the Institu- 
 tion and prescribes practice (chap. xi. 23-8, where he repeats 
 the enumeration of the elements in this order four times). 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 35 
 
 purposeful effort to be archaic, based on a mistaken 
 recollection of St. Luke's narrative ; it is not natural 
 to the reviser, for at the end of the chapter he slips 
 back into the order which is really habitual to his 
 mind : " Eat and drink of your Eucharist." A 
 third prayer is given as Thanksgiving after recep- 
 tion, but concludes with what seems rather a call 
 to receive, recalling as it does the ay La dyioig, 
 which in the Liturgies precedes communion. I 
 find myself unable to believe that we have here a 
 genuine account of the sacramental service at any 
 stage of its history. That history, however obscure 
 along tracts of its course, is at certain points clear : in 
 the Gospels ; in St. Paul's account in 1 Corinthians ; 
 in the references of the Ignatian Epistles ^ ; in 
 Justin Martyr ^ ; and in the Liturgies. These 
 points, separated as they are, lie in one line ; they 
 witness to a single conception of the ordinance 
 common to them, which is not that of the Didache 
 IX .-X., and to an order of its celebration which is 
 common to them, but is not that of the Didache. 
 On the other hand, c. XIV., which also deals with 
 the Eucharist, is not necessarily discordant with 
 St. Paul, Ignatius, Irenaeus or the Liturgies ; there 
 the Eucharist is " our sacrifice," and the common- 
 place quotation, Mai. i. II, is applied to it. The 
 inference, as already suggested, may be that the 
 final editor had before him a document in which 
 c. XIV. was consecutive to c. VII., or perhaps to 
 
 1 Ad Ephes. v., Ad Rmn. vii., Ad Philad. iv., Ad Smym. vii. 
 ^ First Afol. Ixv.-lxvii. ; Dial. Tryph. Ixx., cxvii. 
 
36 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 c. X., if a previous hand, as is possible, had already 
 inserted c. VIII. and cc. IX. -X. ; that he had matter 
 on prophets to be introduced somewhere, and saw 
 his opportunity where the fixity of liturgical thanks- 
 giving suggested the prophetic liberty of prayer, 
 " Permit the prophets to give thanks, 6oa Oelovoiv " : 
 which he states, in contrast to the prescribed form 
 of c. X. ; and having thus brought in the mention 
 of prophets, he proceeds to hang upon it the passage 
 for which he required a connection; finally, having 
 found a place for this material, he goes on at 
 c. XIV. with his original source, and finishes with an 
 apocalyptic fragment. ^ 
 
 Here, however, we are in the region of mere 
 conjecture. There may have been one editor or 
 more than one. The process of accretion may have 
 been gradual. The ordinances document may have 
 been early appended to the Two Ways, and inter- 
 polations upon it may have come as a later develop- 
 ment in other hands. It is possible that, as sug- 
 gested by Mr. Taylor and approved by Dr. Salmon, 
 and tentatively approved by Rabbi Kohler {Jewish 
 Encyclopedia), some Jewish source of the same 
 nature as that which underlies the original Two 
 Ways — intended for the instruction of proselytes, 
 but now in matters of ceremonial law — is somewhere 
 
 ^ Drews thinks that this c. XVI. of the Didache was prob- 
 ably the original conclusion of the Jewish Tract of the Two Ways. 
 This chapter, if appended to cc. I.-VI., would agree with the 
 size of 200 Stichoi, which Nicephorus ascribes to the Didache — 
 a size too small for the Didache of Bryennios and too large for 
 its cc. I.-VI. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 37 
 
 behind this later part of the Didache also, deter- 
 mines its arrangement and to some extent has 
 supplied its matter; or perhaps is rather behind 
 the sources which may have been used to complete 
 the Didache. It is difficult on any other supposition 
 to understand, for example, such treatment as Bap- 
 tism receives in c. VII., where the only preparation 
 of the Catechumen is the delivery to him of the 
 ethical rule of the Two Ways (" Having first de- 
 clared aU these things, baptise ye," etc.); there is 
 no suggestion of any requirement of belief, and no 
 consciousness of any spiritual condition to be sought 
 in the person to be baptised ; the interest is wholly 
 in the ritual rule to be applied — the source of the 
 water used, its temperature and the mode of its 
 application. One can conceive a reviser who had 
 before him a Jewish rule for the Baptism of prose- 
 lytes producing this chapter by some simple process 
 of correction from Jewish terms ; but it is difficult 
 to imagine any Christian teacher, however Judaistic 
 in temper, as producing it at first hand and spon- 
 taneously. But the fact that the whole is a result 
 of compilation is much clearer than the method 
 or order in which it has been compiled. 
 
 Since its discovery and publication the tendency 
 has generally been to treat the Didache with respect, 
 to assume it as "a genuine fragment of the earliest 
 tradition of the Church," ^ and to consent to its 
 
 ^ Taylor, Teaching of the Twelve Apostles, app., p. 118. 
 Rawlinson, Foundations, p. 369 n., is content to say of it that 
 " most critics assign it to about a.d. 100.'^ 
 
38 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 being dated somewhere about the end of the first 
 or beginning of the second century ; with the infer- 
 ences that Church history for the earlier period must 
 be rewritten, and that our ideas of the Church 
 life of that time must be recast, and in particular 
 that theories of ministry must be henceforth based 
 on a distinction between a charismatic ministry, 
 originally supreme, and an appointed ministry, at 
 first of negligeable importance, but developing to 
 supplant the charismatic. Persons who have 
 ventured to hint a doubt of these conclusions or 
 to obstruct the assumptions which underlie them 
 have been exposed to a certain severity of construc- 
 tion, and their difficulties have been traced to 
 dogmatic prepossession and even to incapacity.^ 
 Dogmatic prepossession unfortunately is not con- 
 fined to any one school of criticism, and incapacity 
 to estimate evidence has various causes. It is 
 better to assume the bona "fides of those from whom 
 we differ, else the work of scholarship is at an end. 
 " For some reason the Didache has been the spoilt 
 child of criticism. Here and here only suspicion 
 has slept, and instead of the facts proving the youth 
 of the book, the book has been held to show the 
 age of the facts." ^ Where Dr. Bigg says this he 
 is commenting on the number of points '' which 
 
 ^ E.g., P. Drews, ut supra, p. 187 : " That it is a composition 
 later than a.d. 160 is not entertained to-day by any one capable 
 of judgment." Thus by establishing terror the Teuton still 
 secures his communications in other fields than the military. 
 
 2 Bigg, Doctrine of the Twelve Apostles, Introd. p. 21. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 39 
 
 [he says] in the case of any other document would 
 certainly have been thought to indicate a late 
 origin." 
 
 There have, however, always been the sceptical. 
 So soon as 1887 Mr. C. H. Turner had deprecated 
 " the disposition to see in it (the Didache) the only 
 clue to the solution of all problems," and had also 
 deprecated Hamack's apparent belief that it " pre- 
 serves the only trustworthy picture of the early 
 Christian Ministry outside of the First Epistle to the 
 Corinthians and the Shepherd of Hermas," notwith- 
 standing the existence of much else (the Epistle to 
 the Ephesians, the Pastoral Epistles, the Acts of the 
 Apostles, the Epistle of St. Clement, the Epistles 
 of Ignatius and Polycarp) which was passed over 
 in comparative silence in the interests of a writing 
 maintained by Harnack himself to be later than 
 any of them.^ For Harnack has never agreed with 
 those who throw back the date of the Didache to 
 the neighbourhood of a.d. 100, and at the time 
 when Mr. Turner wrote assigned it to a.d. 135-165. 
 Mr. Turner desired to throw back the date, but 
 also required that the deference paid to the Didache 
 should be much less unconditional, and especially 
 contended that being as he thought " a rechauffe 
 of a purely Jewish Manual " not much stress could 
 be laid on its negative evidence. 
 
 In his Church and Ministry, 1888, Dr. Gore also 
 
 ^ Church Quarterly Review. As Mr. Turner has lately re- 
 published this article, he probably adheres to the views there 
 expressed. 
 
40 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 discussed the Didache. He accepted for it a very 
 early date and has not since on that point modified 
 his opinion. He considered it to be Jewish-Chris- 
 tian and to lie within the first century, surmising 
 for its place of origin " an out-of-the-way district," 
 for which he latterly substitutes Egypt. He 
 parallels the community from which it may be 
 supposed to issue with that to which the Epistle 
 to the Hebrews is addressed, and thinks it may 
 best be characterised as representing the beliefs 
 of a Jewish Christianity as yet unleavened by the 
 deeper " teaching of the Apostles," which was to 
 follow the early preaching of the Messiahship of 
 Jesus. Dr. Gore's attitude in 1909 (Orders and 
 Unity) seems less favourable. He there speaks of 
 the Didache as " generally attributed to sub -apostolic 
 times " ; the references to wandering missionaries 
 he finds " redolent of fraud " : " One experiences 
 [he says] a profound unwillingness to believe — 
 what we have no evidence of elsewhere — that the 
 apostles and prophets and teachers of the New 
 Testament were represented in the next generation, 
 in the age of Clement and Ignatius, by men of this 
 ambiguous reputation," and he declines to believe 
 it. " It seems more probable that we have here 
 to do with the wandering missionaries of some 
 Judaic Christian sect of uncertain epoch. But 
 in any case we ought not to allow the authority 
 of this ambiguous and anonymous document to 
 countervail the testimony of St. Luke and St. Paul 
 in his later letters and St. Clement." Dr. Gore, 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 41 
 
 then, it may be understood, accepts the Didache as 
 of early, though of uncertain, epoch and as genuine, 
 but considers it to be of small value as evidence. 
 
 Dr. Moberly's treatment {Ministerial Priesthood, 
 1897) is of much the same nature. While he accepts 
 for the Didache an early date, he points out that 
 '' as a Jewish Manual and concerned with Chris- 
 tianity " it is not and could not have been of high 
 authority in the Church, and speaks of immense 
 deductions to be made from its value as being local, 
 anonymous, and in some respects ignorant : "in 
 no case a particularly intelligent or authoritative 
 interpreter of the ecclesiastical phenomena which 
 it reflects." 
 
 Of recent years more sweeping attacks upon the 
 authority of the Didache have appeared, calling 
 in question its genuineness. In 1910 the late Dr. 
 Bigg (Christ Church, Oxford) issued a short but 
 brilliant Introduction ^ to a translation of the text, 
 in which he points out that it cannot be identified 
 with the works mentioned by Eusebius or Athana- 
 sius or Rufinus or Nicephorus. He agrees with 
 Harnack ^ that the Didache quotes from Hermas 
 (a.d. 140-165) and therefore is of course later than 
 Barnabas. He argues that Clement of Alexandria 
 quotes, not as has been thought from the Didache, 
 
 ^ Early Church Classics series, S.P.C.K. 
 
 2 Harnack has come to think that Hermas and the Didache 
 borrow from a common source (see Resch, Agrapha, p. 99). 
 Dr. Bigg in a postscript deals with this change of view and 
 seems to make a good case for the previous view. In either 
 case Hermas does not quote from the Didache, 
 
42 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 but from the Apostolic Church Order. He gives 
 reason for thinking that the compiler of the Didache 
 had this last-named document before him and used 
 its text, the A.C.O. being (Harnack says) in its 
 relevant section " not later than a.d. 230." From 
 the precept " Fast for your enemies " he believes 
 that the Didache presupposes the Didascalia and 
 a late stage of the Quarto -Deciman controversy, 
 which would carry the Didache well down into the 
 third century. He enumerates a number of indica- 
 tions of late date, of which the stress laid upon 
 persecution of Christians by Christians, the absence 
 of reference to persecution of Christians by Pagans, 
 and the fact that Baptism by aspersion is regarded 
 not only as valid but as entirely satisfactory, whereas 
 in Cyprian's time it was still an irregularity and 
 a bar to ordination, may seem the strongest. The 
 word xQtord/LiTtoQog {Didache XII. 5) Dr. Bigg finds to 
 be " a current fourth-century bye-word," in itself 
 enough to date the book. (The lateness of this 
 word is indeed admitted ^ and can only be explained 
 by supporters of the early date of the text by postu- 
 lating interpolation of the section in which it occurs 
 — a suggestion for which there is no apparent ground 
 except the inconvenience of the occurrence). Dr. 
 Bigg concludes that the belief is justified that the 
 Didache " did not exist as a book before the fourth 
 century." He regards Dr. Harnack's theory of 
 double ministry as "in its extreme form quite 
 untenable," comments upon the vagueness of the 
 1 Bartlet, in Hastings' Diet, of Bible, p. 448 a. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 43 
 
 Didache's supposed Hierarchy, contrasts the pro- 
 phets of the New Testament with those of the 
 Didache and finds that it does not seem possible to 
 regard the one as even a successor in title of the 
 other — there is "a resuscitation rather than an 
 imitation." He thinks that if the Didache ever 
 had a local habitation, that might be looked for 
 in Montanistic Phrygia, possibly as a protest against 
 the Julian persecution. Dr. Bigg's evidences of 
 late date may not be all of equal cogency, but 
 cumulatively they go far to show that the place 
 of the Didache in the series of Christian documents 
 should be looked for at least ajter the Apostolic 
 Church Order — that is to say in the third, if not 
 in the fourth century. 
 
 Two years ago Dr. Armitage Robinson published ^ 
 an investigation of the problem of the Didache 
 from the point of view of the writer's relation to 
 St. Paul, St. John and St. Luke : an investigation 
 which leads him to the conclusion that the work 
 is a deliberate construction, in which the writings 
 of these authors have been used, while the author 
 has been at pains to conceal his obligation to them. 
 He has designed, Dr. Robinson thinks, to present 
 his views in such a way that apostolic authority 
 may be alleged for each detail, and so his title 
 (" Teaching of the Twelve Apostles ") be justified ; 
 but at the same time has veiled his indebtedness to 
 them by a process of combination of passages and 
 of verbal modification in such a manner that an 
 ^ Journal of Theological Studies, April, 1912. 
 
44 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 appearance of independent tradition may be pre- 
 sented. " In attempting to interpret it [he says] 
 we must constantly remember that two elements 
 are everywhere present : the writer's desire to say 
 nothing that might not be supposed to have been 
 said by the apostles, and his desire to issue instruc- 
 tions which should have some bearing on the Church 
 life of his day. It is just because he has combined 
 these elements so skilfully that we cannot either 
 date or locate him." To the apostles, prophets 
 and teachers of the Didache Dr. Robinson can find 
 no parallel in any part of the Church : the more he 
 considers them he finds them increasingly unreal. 
 They are derived from St. Paul's lists — a shadowy 
 figure of the " apostle " being introduced because 
 St. Paul mentions apostles, and something therefore 
 must be said of them; while the "teacher" is 
 perfunctorily mentioned for the same reason. The 
 " prophet " alone bears some character of reality, 
 and of him the author exhibits a certain awe. The 
 directions as to bishops and deacons are a careful 
 construction from references found in St. Paul 
 and St. Luke. With the apocalyptic section Dr. 
 Robinson does not deal ; he does not attempt to 
 be exhaustive, but indicates a method ^ which, in 
 
 ^ The starting-point of the author has, in Dr. Robinson's 
 view, been a version of the Two Ways, into which he has inter- 
 polated the section peculiar to the Didache (I. 3 6-II. 1 a) mainly 
 from the Sermon on the Mount, but modified from St. Luke's 
 parallel matter. Having reached Baptism, his task demands 
 " more originality,'* but the basis of clause after clause is still 
 identifiable. His method of introducing his sequence of topics 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 45 
 
 his opinion, the author of the Didache has certainly 
 used and which he thinks has been strangely over- 
 looked. As for what is not traceable to apostolic 
 writings, such as the kinds of water used in Baptism, 
 the bi-weekly fast, the prayers thrice a day and 
 the professional prophet, — these " may be regarded 
 as positive features characteristic of the writer's 
 situation." Dr. Robinson notes that his investiga- 
 tion is independent of Dr. Bigg's, whose work he 
 had not seen before writing, and that it follows a 
 different reasoning. He does not go with Dr. Bigg 
 in looking for the date of the Didache in the fourth 
 century, as he would find it hard to conceive that 
 it was written after Montanism had attained any 
 considerable vogue : from the Catholic standpoint 
 too much is said in it about prophets, and from the 
 Montanistic too little. It will be seen, however, 
 that while Dr. Armitage Robinson differs from 
 Dr. Bigg as to date, he agrees with him in regarding 
 the Didache as a purposeful and conscious construc- 
 tion. It is possible that in one or two points he is 
 
 {irepl 5e . . .) is traced to St. Paul's use of the same in 1 Cor. 
 Modifications such as " fast (instead of ' pray ') for them which 
 persecute you," and the variations from the recorded forms of 
 the Lord's Prayer are treated as literary devices to suggest 
 independence, and the abnormal order of the Eucharistic acts 
 as " literary perversity " — one presumes for the same motive. 
 K\d(Tjj.a is considered to be an invented term derived from the 
 KKda/xaTa of St. John vi. 12-13, just as the Johannine vSccp (uv 
 is utilised for the description of Baptism. The Eucharistic 
 prayers Dr. Robinson finds to be full of echoes of St. Paul and 
 St. John. 
 
46 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 inclined to push his method to the verge of inge- 
 nuity.i Nevertheless he employs a method of true 
 critical efficiency, and his results seem to demand 
 consideration and refutation before they can be 
 set aside. When he thinks that the position ac- 
 corded in the Didache to the " prophet " is insuffi- 
 cient to fit except into an early stage of Montanism, 
 it may seem that he so far forgets his own thesis 
 and allows too little for the literary imagination 
 which he has ascribed to the writer of the Didache. 
 So skilful a person as Dr. Robinson would show 
 him to be might well be skilful enough to avoid the 
 too much, and though himself an advanced Mon- 
 tanist might be content to assume less if thereby 
 he might maintain a certain air of detached in- 
 genuousness and show " the Twelve Apostles " in 
 fundamental agreement with the position which he 
 sought to reinforce. He may have appreciated the 
 value of suggestiveness. On such a theory of his 
 motive the reception accorded to his work on its 
 rediscovery would certainly show that he had 
 gauged with accuracy the point to which suggestion 
 might advantageously be carried. Dr. Armitage 
 Robinson's essential conclusion is that the writer 
 *' disguises the actual conditions of his own time," 
 with the result that " he contributes almost 
 nothing except doubtful exegesis to advance our 
 knowledge of the early Christian ministry " ; and 
 
 ^ For example, in thinking that the description of " prophets " 
 as " your high priests," is a reminiscence of the prophesying of 
 Caiaphas (St. John xi. 51) in virtue of his high-priesthood. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 47 
 
 that, if even half of his (Dr. A. Robinson's) argument 
 be admitted, " the pen must be drawn through 
 many a sentence and indeed through whole pages 
 of some recent descriptions of early Christian life 
 and organisation." 
 
 This investigation elicited from Professor Swete 
 an additional note appended to his Holy Spirit in 
 the Ancient Church (1912), in which he refers to it 
 as '' claiming the serious attention of all students 
 of early Christian literature." He does not think 
 that on the evidence adduced Dr. Robinson's 
 charges are proved. He admits that the writer 
 of the Didache is more or less the author of the 
 forms which are provided and of some of the rules — 
 that " in fact the constantly recurring imperatives 
 imply that the writer desires to impress upon the 
 Church ... a certain order of ritual and discipline 
 such as he himself approves " ; but declines to 
 agree that the general conditions of Church life 
 presupposed " had no real existence anywhere, 
 that the whole picture has been artfully constructed 
 out of scattered hints in the New Testament." 
 Absence of apparent motive specially influences 
 Dr. Swete to this judgment; he asks what motive 
 could lead to the resuscitation of the title of 
 " apostles " and what purpose the " apparently futile 
 ingenuity " of the writer could have been intended 
 to serve ; and until such a motive has been sug- 
 gested Dr. Swete will continue to regard the Didache 
 as "an honest attempt to legislate for an unknown 
 and probably obscure Church which still received 
 
48 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 visits from itinerant missionaries and prophets and 
 where from time to time a prophet settled down, 
 and ministered side by side with the local presbyter- 
 bishops and deacons." 
 
 If this, however, is all that on a favourable con- 
 struction remains to be said for the value of the 
 Didache, it is not much. The attempt to legislate 
 which it embodies, is in Dr. Swete's own view 
 merely that of an individual, and therefore is not 
 legislation, but is only an attempt to lead — it is 
 the expression of a personal view. It attempts 
 to persuade, not by frank counsel, but by the pre- 
 sentation as of apostolic prescription or tradition 
 of forms and rules which are the writer's own com- 
 position — some of them at least. Dr. Swete would 
 freely grant, are no more than that. This presenta- 
 tion is not carried off as sincere by any conviction 
 habitual to Christian societies that current practices 
 were necessarily apostolic ^ — in a document sub- 
 sequent to the Apostolic Church Order we are hardly 
 in so primitive an atmosphere as that; and in 
 any case it is granted that other than current 
 practice is sought to be introduced, and that for 
 these novel practices sanction and authority is 
 sought by the title under which they are offered 
 and by appending the writing which prescribes 
 them to a received Manual of wide acceptance 
 (the Two Ways) which Clement of Alexandria quotes 
 as " Scripture." Dr. Swete would seem to leave 
 
 ^ Bartlet, Hastings* Diet, of Bible, p. 445 a. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 49 
 
 the Didache in a position not much better than 
 that assigned to it by Dr. Bigg or by Dr. Robinson. 
 I venture to suggest some further considerations 
 which make generally in the same direction of 
 doubt. Itinerants, prophets or apostles or teachers, 
 cannot come even to the obscurest or least known 
 of Churches without coming from somewhere. 
 This question of the provenance of itinerants seems 
 to have been somewhat overlooked. To supply 
 them and to keep them occupied in itineration, 
 one must suppose other Churches of the same type 
 of organisation; and these must be supposed to 
 exist in some considerable number — for the " apo- 
 stle " at least, as contemplated in the Didache, 
 might remain at most only two nights in any one 
 of them. This unfortunate man had to overtake 
 at least three Churches in every week, twelve to 
 fifteen per month; unless the communities in 
 question were fairly plentiful and well spread the 
 visits of the same person must have recurred with 
 such frequency that he might as well have imitated 
 the example of his fellow the prophet and have 
 '* settled " at once. If there were many apostles on 
 the road at the same time it is not wonderful that 
 there should have been regulation to limit demands 
 on their part. Now one such Church as the Didache 
 contemplates might easily remain unknown to us; 
 but if such Churches were numerous and widespread, 
 and so federated that a field for legislation as to 
 their interaction existed, it is practically certain 
 that we should have heard otherwise of their 
 
50 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 existence. The case is not met by supposing, as in 
 various phrase is frequently supposed, Dr. Swete's 
 " unknown and obscure Church," Drew's " Dorf- 
 gemeinde," as the source of the Didache ; for the 
 Didache itself implies a far-flung system of similar 
 Churches. When or where is such a system to be 
 found ? 
 
 Conceivably it may be found within the range of 
 Montanism; scarcely elsewhere or at any earlier 
 time. Montanism — and Montanism alone — would 
 supply what it is essential to discover, a field wide 
 enough for such a circulation of ministers as the 
 Didache at least imagines. " There are many 
 Montanist features in the Doctrine'' ^ Those which 
 seem to the present writer to stand out most clearly 
 are (1) the indications of locality; (2) the nature 
 of the references to persecution; (3) the peculiar 
 interest shown in the " prophet." 
 
 (1) The local colouring of the Didache is agricul- 
 tural, and Phrygia, the home of Montanism, was 
 
 ^ Bigg, op. cit., p. 41. There existed latterly more types of 
 Montanism than one ; it came to include considerable variety (see 
 Swete, Holy Spir. in the Anc. Church, p. 81). A document may 
 be Montanistic, though it does not show all the characteristic 
 features of the Montanism of Montanus, or though it shows other 
 features. It is objected, for example, that the prophet of the 
 Didache was always a man — that prophetesses are not so much as 
 considered; whereas in Montanism prophetesses had a place. 
 But TertuUian was a Montanist when he wrote {DeVirg. Vel. 9) : 
 " It is not permitted to a woman to speak in Church nor yet to 
 teach ^' ; and after all we hear in the accounts of Montanism of 
 " only two women who were moved by the Spirit '* (Hamack, 
 Encyc. Brit., p. 758 a). 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 51 
 
 essentially an agricultural region.^ To the thought 
 of its author the bread which is broken in the 
 Eucharist has been sown and reaped on " moun- 
 tains " 2 {Didache IX. 4), and Phrygia is a land of 
 mountains. The life which he has in mind is village 
 life — he has no thought of commerce — his gain is 
 from his field ; nor of industry or manufacture ; even 
 his loaf is home-baked ; his increase is of winepress 
 and threshing-floor and oil-vat and loom. So 
 Montanism was primarily a village cult ; it origi- 
 nated in a land of villages to which Pepuza and 
 Vicinium (let us say for comparison Inverness and 
 Dingwall) could seem eligible as world centres. 
 Montanism had bishops even in villages.^ Phrygia 
 at least suits well as a home for the Didache. 
 
 (2) Where else is it possible to look for persecu- 
 tion of Christians by Christians, " the sheep turned 
 into wolves and love into hatred," brethren hating 
 and persecuting and delivering up one another 
 {Didache XVI. 3-4) ? The particular language here 
 depends upon well-known Scriptures * and is such 
 
 ^ Duchesne, Early History of the Church, pp. 190-1. 
 
 ^ This phrase may be one of the writer's improvements on the 
 Jemsh Benediction underlying his prayer ; it does not occur in 
 the version of the prayer which appears in De Virginitate. On 
 the other hand it is found in the eucharistic prayers of Serapion, 
 who ministered in the Delta of the Nile. See Arm. Robinson, 
 ut supra, p. 347. ^ Sozomen, vii. 19 : koI iu Kdo/xais. 
 
 * Acts XX. 29 : " Grievous wolves shall enter in among you, 
 not sparing the flock"' (comp. St. Matt. vii. 15); St. Matt. xxiv. 
 10 : " Many shall be offended . . . and shall hate one another " ; 
 ibid., X. 21: " Brother shall deliver up brother to death . . . and 
 ye shall be hated of all . . . and when they persecute you. . . .'* 
 
52 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 as might be expected in any similar apocalyptic 
 passage ; but it is less clear at what period earlier 
 than the latter part of the second century, or then 
 where else than in Phrygia, the idea of such things, 
 as within the Christian Society, would have suggested 
 itself.^ Possibly, as Dr. Bigg thinks, the later 
 stages of Montanist history (Constantine's perse- 
 cution) may best fit the situation described; but 
 we are not driven down so far to find a setting for 
 it — hostility to Montanism did not begin with 
 Constantine ; there is persecution which stops short 
 of fire and sword and yet is persecution, and there 
 is hatred which has not proceeded to the last ex- 
 tremity; language almost as strong as that of 
 Didache XVI. has been known to be used where 
 the aggrieved parties had less to complain of than 
 had Montanists of the time before the Great Peace 
 of the Catholic Church. Any time after the Asia- 
 tic bishops' condemnation (c. a.d. 172) might be 
 possible : certainly where intercourse with Mon- 
 tanists, even while Catholic and Montanist were 
 alike sufferers from the Pagans, was refused, or 
 when Montanist Baptism went unrecognised. There 
 remains, so far as that goes, large room for the 
 Didache within the ambit of Montanism. 
 
 (3) The interest of the Didache is not in charis- 
 
 1 Maximilla, the Montanist prophetess, complained of being 
 hunted like a wolf from the sheep, and protested that she was 
 no wolf. The Catholic opponents of Montanism were called 
 slayers of prophets; Euseb., H. E., v. 16. There seems to be 
 something common to the vocabulary here and to that of 
 Didache XVI. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 53 
 
 mata generally ; there is on the contrary a marked 
 absence of " charismatic enthusiasm " ^ in its tone, 
 which rather is legalistic to the point of flat Judaism: 
 it is a book of the letter, not of the Spirit. The 
 section relating to ministries (cc. XI. -XV.) is not 
 really concerned with the supposed hierarchy of 
 St. Paul's lists (apostle, prophet, teacher), but with 
 only one of these, namely the prophet. To the 
 apostles are allotted only four brief sentences ; the 
 first of them is a somewhat perfunctory paraphrase 
 of Christ's words (St. Matt. x. 40): "He that 
 receiveth you receive th Me " ; the second forgets 
 that the apostle is the subject and alludes to him 
 as a prophet ; while the third and fourth take pre- 
 caution against the too probable case that he is 
 a pseudo-apostle. As for the teacher he is no 
 more than mentioned. It is the prophet who 
 occupies nearly the whole of the section which deals 
 with the treatment of charismatic persons. Of the 
 apostle it is only prescribed that he is to be received 
 reverently, must go within two days and may carry 
 away no more than bread sufficient for his next 
 stage : and of the teacher nothing but that he 
 must follow the Didache already recounted and may 
 receive, if he settle, his maintenance. When the 
 prophet enters we have something like a genuine 
 interest ; the subject is elaborated — as to the judg- 
 ing of the prophet, so far as allowed — as to the 
 tests which may legitimately be applied to him — 
 as to his relation to the Agape or Eucharist, which- 
 ^ Batiffol, Primitive Catholicism, p. 106. 
 
64 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 ever is meant — as to his inconsistency, his use of 
 " signs," the objects for which he may collect ; as to 
 his possible settlement, and minutely as to his right 
 to firstfruits ; and (at a previous point, c. X. 7) 
 his liturgic privilege, whatever that may have been. 
 
 It is difficult to conceive that we are here in a 
 primitive atmosphere. The Evangelistic note, the 
 missionary unction and the earnestness of a mis- 
 sionary Church are conspicuously, almost ludi- 
 crously, absent. The missionary proper (" apostle ") 
 is there in his office only to be shuffled on to some- 
 one else's hands as quickly as a very bare decency 
 allows. He is not even thought of as a missionary — 
 the Pagan world to which he might be supposed to 
 have mission is entirely out of mind. " The Gospel " 
 suggested in connection with him is not a message 
 of good which he carries to the perishing — it is a 
 code for his own proper treatment. He comes in 
 sight, not as an evangelist but as a " teacher " 
 (c. XI. 1-5), and he carries, not salvation for those 
 who are without, but " increase of righteousness 
 and knowledge of the Lord " for the community 
 which receives him (c. XI. 36). The writer has lost 
 sight of the idea of apostleship even in the secondary 
 sense. 
 
 The theory of a stage of Church life in which the 
 ministry of charismatic persons should have been 
 pre-eminent, whether supported by historical sources 
 or not, is in itself a consistent theory, and a priori it 
 is arguable — that is to say, that it harmonises with 
 a well-marked and respectable type of spiritual 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 55 
 
 tendency and spiritual experience, and that there 
 is likely to be always a school of Christian thought 
 to which it will seem fundamentally probable. But 
 however that may be, such a theory is not really 
 supported by the Didache ; the Didache does not 
 show a charismatic system — it shows an official and 
 professional prophetism, which is another matter. 
 Are there more quarters than one known to us 
 from which such an interest is likely to have been 
 advocated ? The indifference of the Didache to 
 apostle evangelist and teacher seems even more 
 significant than its zeal for the prophet; or rather 
 the indifference fills the zeal with significance. 
 
 Farther, the conception of the prophet to which 
 the Didache witnesses is a degenerate conception, 
 and we must find time for the process of degenera- 
 tion. At an earlier point not the prophet was 
 regarded, but the prophecy; now the question is 
 of the man — if (to use a Scotticism) he has " the 
 gift," that is enough : to challenge utterance or 
 action of an acknowledged prophet is the gravest 
 form of blasphemy. He is known, not by his 
 message, but by his ways — if he have " the manners 
 (xovQ rgoTcovg) of the Lord." What the standard 
 intended by this phrase may be is not apparent. 
 One thinks of the Dominical directions to the Twelve 
 (St. Matt. X. 9 Jff.) ; or there may be some esoteric 
 reference which cannot be identified — it can hardly 
 be meant that a commonly Christian conversation 
 is sufficient to warrant prophetic claims, which 
 once admitted are to carry authority unquestionable. 
 
56 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 Whatever they are, these " ways," they seem to 
 admit of proceedings which in the case of one who 
 is not a prophet and therefore above criticism might 
 occasion scandal (c. XI. 11: cf. Bigg and Harnack 
 in loco). The acceptance of gifts, which Apollonius ^ 
 considered to be a blot upon any prophet, is treated 
 by the Didache as a regular incident, and it is even 
 an obligation upon the faithful to render them. We 
 seem to have travelled far here from the days when 
 Hermas drew his distinction between " the prophet 
 of God " and the " empty prophet." ^ Hermas' 
 true prophet is the Christian man who has the 
 Spirit of God, who in common course comes into 
 the congregation as a worshipper with the rest and 
 who, as prayer goes on, receives his inspiration and 
 speaks "as he is moved of God." The true pro- 
 phet's note is in fact spontaneity and the absence 
 of professionalism. The note of the pseudo -prophet, 
 on the other hand, is his isolation in virtue of pro- 
 phetic office, his self-exaltation, and his receiving 
 of rewards. It seems probable that Hermas in 
 this expresses not merely a private opinion, but 
 gives voice to the prevailing and current judgment 
 of the Church — for his criticism of the " empty 
 prophet " is in effect that which we find directed 
 against the " new prophet " of a century later. 
 The Didache, however, speaks from an environment 
 in which it seemed normal and proper that a prophet 
 should be official, should be isolated from other 
 Christians by possession of " the gift," should be 
 1 Euseb., H. E., v. 18. * Mand. xi. 3. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 57 
 
 exalted to the chief seat, should receive rewards 
 on a prescribed scale. We have no great choice 
 of quarters or periods in which to look for such an 
 environment. It is impossible to prove a negative — 
 within the Christian world of any of the first cen- 
 turies there may have existed such a community 
 as the Didache supposes, a community more or less 
 Christian — since within even the first period there 
 could exist such a community as that to which the 
 Epistle to the Hebrews is addressed, and there is no- 
 thing to show that it must have been unique. But, 
 as has been said, the Didache is not to be satisfied 
 with one such community nor with several, but 
 implies a sect of considerable ramification. It is 
 the need to discover this setting for it which makes 
 it difficult to place the Didache. We cannot find 
 room for such a sect within the period covered by 
 the Canonical writings. It does not appear within 
 the world as known to Clement of Rome. It is 
 certainly not within that of Ignatius, and Ignatius 
 is witness for Syria as well as for Asia, and in especial 
 covers with some relevant reference ^ that very 
 tract in which Principal Lindsay thinks it natural 
 that a prophetic reaction should have arisen, since 
 there or in the neighbourhood Christian prophecy 
 had flourished, and there prophetic and local min- 
 istries confronted each other as nowhere else ^ ; 
 nothing answerable to the apostle or prophet of 
 the Didache is to be discovered in Ignatius, unless 
 
 1 Ad Philad. vii. 
 
 2 Church and Ministry in the Early Centuries, p. 236. 
 
58 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 we are to see them in those itinerants against whom 
 he warns,^ who " carry about the name of Christ 
 in deceitfulness and do things unworthy of God." 
 Nor does Hermas know of any such system of 
 Churches; and with Hermas we are in the eve of 
 the emergence of Montanus. 
 
 The surmise of a Montanistic origin for the Didache 
 can be so far only surmise ; but it has the advan- 
 tage of allowing for it a certain background of 
 reality which otherwise it is hard to assign. And 
 one may admit that to discover for it such a back- 
 ground is, if possible, desirable. When all is said 
 that makes its bona fides uncertain, the Didache 
 remains an extremely perplexing document. It has 
 a certain naweti and air of conviction. For a great 
 part of it that is, of course, easily explained — if it be 
 in main a compilation of earlier matter, or is at all a 
 gradual accretion upon a genuine and earlier nucleus, 
 the earlier matter and in measure the accretions 
 would sincerely reflect the temper of their respective 
 periods. But even those sections which on such a 
 view of the matter would still have to be regarded 
 as the work of a final redactor and as expressing the 
 object of his redaction and interpolation (viz. cc. XI.- 
 XIV.), are not without these same characteristics 
 of earnestness and intensity. There may be in the 
 document such marks of artificiality as Dr. Armitage 
 Robinson discovers — I think that there are : it may 
 be as late as Dr. Bigg suggests — which I am not con- 
 cerned to show; but withal there is an impression 
 ^ Ad Ephes. vii. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 59 
 
 conveyed by it that the writer had a system and a 
 cause for which he cared. He may be imaginative 
 — he may use a certain skill to clothe his work with 
 commendatory archaisms ; but there is something 
 behind his imagination — he is writing up to certain 
 facts, whatever they be. His reiterations point that 
 way ; and it is not easy to account otherwise for the 
 occurrence in a document designed to sustain prophets 
 of so emphatic warning against pseudo-prophets. 
 A certain measure of such precaution would no 
 doubt be in any case appropriate — every one, from 
 Deuteronomy onward, who alludes to prophets has 
 something of the sort to say. But the warnings of 
 the Didache are more than conventional ; they are 
 earnest. The writer while he exalts prophets knows 
 how little some prophets are to be trusted. He has 
 facts in mind. 
 
 Professor Swete desiderates an adequate motive for 
 the construction of such a work as the Didache, before 
 he can assent to Dr. Armitage Robinson's results. 
 The supposition of a Montanistic origin, if otherwise 
 consistent with the facts, supplies ample motive ; to 
 buttress an opinion men w ill undertake greater tasks 
 than its composition need have been. It is easy to 
 imagine one of these many village bishops of Phrygia 
 who should be competent for the task — a devout 
 man and earnest, as Montanists often were, in his 
 measure learned, scholarly and adroit in his village 
 way, a man versed in Scripture and a collector of 
 ancient fragments, so far as anything at once ancient 
 and Christian can at that date be spoken of — 
 
60 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 familiar with Jewish manuals, liturgic attempts, 
 documents such as the Two Ways; a simple man and 
 sincere, without experience of cities, but knowing 
 well the life of his own valleys, its primitive indus- 
 tries, its pious and generous households, its intense 
 religious activity, its circulation of preachers better 
 and worse — one can picture such a man, easily 
 capable of the literary feat and unlikely to be 
 troubled by scruples in executing it; pseudepi- 
 graphic writing was not so rare, nor was the literary 
 morality of the time so strained that he should hesi- 
 tate. It is not wonderful should the Didache have 
 been written to fortify a basis for the claims of 
 Montanistic prophecy. But if, having failed in its 
 own time to effect its purpose,^ it should in the 
 nineteenth century have attained its object, and 
 should then have succeeded in producing very much 
 the impression which on the theory hazarded it was 
 originally intended to produce — that is no doubt 
 remarkable. Possibly, however, it is this which 
 has taken place. 
 
 That the Didache on its re-discovery should have 
 created this impression and that the impression 
 should have been so generally received was, in part 
 at least, due to circumstances ; the discovery was 
 felix opportunitate. In his Dissertation on the Chris- 
 tian Ministry,^ Dr. Lightfoot had gone over, if he 
 
 ^ The Didache is followed in the Apostolic Constitutions, but that 
 is done with suppression and modification of the matter which 
 bears upon the prophetic interest. 
 
 2 Epistles of St. Paul : Philippians, 1868. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 61 
 
 had not occupied, most of the ground covered by- 
 more recent discussions, and had indicated, though 
 he had not adopted, the positions which have since 
 been elaborated.^ Starting from St. Paul's " lists " 
 he had pointed out a distinction of " permanent " 
 and " temporary " ministries, and that " in both 
 passages . . . great stress is laid upon the work of 
 the Spirit." ^ He had remarked upon that missionary 
 character of the lists which Dr. Lindsay has worked 
 out in so illuminative a manner. He had affirmed 
 the inclusion in the lists of the " permanent " minis- 
 tries, and that this involves (as is now, in modifica- 
 tion of the theory of twofold ministry, amply 
 admitted ^) their charismatic participation. And 
 he had remarked upon the " subordinate place " 
 which what he calls permanent ministries at that 
 stage occupied, and their gradual emergence from 
 such subordination, and that this emergence cor- 
 responded to the " falling away " of higher but 
 temporary offices. He had thus traced the lines 
 which a later criticism has followed, and in a manner 
 had anticipated what is valid in its conclusions. 
 
 Owing to the remarkable canon by which Dr. 
 Hatch in his Bampton Lecture of 1880 limited his 
 use of available information, " commencing where 
 the New Testament ends," and so depriving himself 
 
 ^ " Lightfoot for instance had already anticipated much of 
 the truth '' ; Bartlet, H. D. B., sub voce Didache, p. 450 a. 
 
 2 Fourth Edition, p. 185. 
 
 * Lindsay, Church and Ministry, p. 70 n.; Lowrie, Church 
 and its Organisation, pp. 189, 256-7 n. ; Sohm, quoted Harnack, 
 Const, and Law of the Church, trans, p. 194. 
 
62 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 of the information afforded by the contemporary 
 literature of the actual origins, that writer had sup- 
 plied the Church with a ministry tracing to financial 
 and administrative necessities, a ministry of tables, 
 which in his view came by degrees to appropriate to 
 itself a right to execute spiritual functions which 
 had been originally common to believers ; Montanism 
 appearing in its now familiar r61e of a reaction 
 against such appropriation.^ It is only at this point 
 that Dr. Hatch, working under his limitation, meets 
 the idea of charismatic gifts, among which he classes 
 alike " every form of the manifestation of the reli- 
 gious life " ; and the ministries of St. Paul's lists do 
 not receive from him mention. ^ In such a treat- 
 ment of the subject there was an obvious element of 
 impossibility, and it created more interest than 
 conviction. The work was, however, translated 
 into German with excursus by Professor Harnack 
 in 1883. 
 
 In the same year Bryennios gave to the world his 
 discovery of the Didache. It is not wonderful that 
 it should have been welcomed as suggesting redress 
 of the balance which Dr. Hatch's theory had some- 
 what excessively disturbed. The energy and resource 
 of Professor Harnack were at once turned to its 
 appreciation. He in effect combined the theory of 
 twofold ministry, which Lightfoot, in terms whose 
 
 1 Mr. Hatch points out that Ritschl, Rothe and Bonwetsch 
 had already indicated this view of Montanism : 2nd ed., p. 123 n. 
 
 2 Apostles are alluded to, pp. 96, 106, 108, but not prophets, 
 etc. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 63 
 
 familiarity gave it the appearance of commonplace, 
 had already stated, with Dr. Hatch's theory of the 
 mundane origin of those ministries which we may 
 call regular ; but he distinguished, not as Lightfoot, 
 a temporary and a permanent ministry, but — deriv- 
 ing from the Didache — a Charismatic and an Elec- 
 tive ; of which the former depended only upon gift, 
 and was oecumenical in scope and in habit ambula- 
 tory, while the latter depended upon appointment 
 and was local and subordinate to the charismatic. 
 This reading of the situation was very generally 
 accepted, and until Sohm in 1892 completed the cycle 
 by balancing Hatch's purely mundane theory of the 
 ministry with a theory as purely charismatic may 
 be said in one modification or another to have held 
 the field. 
 
 This theory, however, it may be perceived, is not 
 so much deduced from the Didache as suggested by it. 
 It certainly cannot rest upon the sources which 
 otherwise have reached us — these did not lead to 
 it and cannot sustain it. The appeal which it can 
 make to the Canonical writings is slight, being really 
 confined to the well-known section of First Corin- 
 thians and (with significance read into it from that) 
 to the Epistle to the Ephesians. This theory requires 
 us to accept the Corinthian Church as the norm of 
 Churches, and its interior life as typical of the life 
 of Christian ecclesiae generally. For a generation 
 past, when that primitive life has been visualised 
 and described, it has been in effect a Sunday at 
 Corinth somewhere about the sixth decade of the 
 
64 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 first century, which we have been called to imagine.^ 
 But it is improbable that Corinth was a typical con- 
 gregation, or that its life was normal; on the con- 
 trary, we happen to know much of Corinthian affairs 
 precisely because it was not normal, but was, as in 
 Clement's day a generation later, a difficult, excit- 
 able and factious community which exacted from 
 St. Paul a voluminous and detailed correspondence. 
 And apart from Corinth we hear remarkably little 
 of charismata or of charismatic persons as such : 
 nowhere else do we meet such a state of matters as 
 St. Paul had to deal with there. It is at least as 
 probable that Thessalonica, which needed to be 
 warned against despising prophecy, was typical; 
 and indeed it is hard to understand that if Thessa- 
 lonica was consciously dependent upon a prophetic 
 ministry the warning should have been required. 
 Charismata and charismatic persons occupy a certain 
 place in the earlier part of the Book of Acts, but it 
 is not the place assigned to them by Professor 
 Harnack's theory. That book shows apostles as 
 supreme — which no one has doubted ; and it shows 
 them and their companions and delegates as itiner- 
 ant — which is natural : to itinerate is the metier 
 of apostles. But it does not show us prophets who 
 do more than prophesy, nor does it show us prophets 
 who as such itinerate — the solitary instance of 
 Agabus, his passage with a group of other prophets 
 
 ^ E.g., Mr. Owen in his Introduction to Harnack's Sources of 
 the Apostolic Canon, trans. 1895 ; or Lindsay, Church and Ministry ^ 
 pp. 43 ff. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 65 
 
 from Jerusalem to Antioch and his later appear- 
 ance at Caesarea (on that occasion he only came from 
 Judaea, and one would gather resided at Jerusalem 
 or near it) is slight support; while the mission of 
 Judas and Silas to Antioch with the decrees of the 
 first council is not an instance. The narrative of 
 Acts is so far from placing prophets in the fore- 
 ground of its picture, that when St. Paul is found 
 grouping them with apostles as '' foundations," we 
 are unprepared for the collocation ^ ; his meaning 
 has been sought for elsewhere than in the New 
 Testament. St. Luke's narrative nowhere suggests 
 a charismatic organisation independent of eccle- 
 siastical mission, and nowhere suggests a local 
 ministry independent of charismatic qualification. 
 Even the Seven, selected for a purely secular 
 service, are selected as men " full of the Holy 
 Ghost and of wisdom " (wisdom being the first in 
 St. Paul's enumeration of spiritual gifts, 1 Cor. xii. 
 8) ; while on the other hand, their charismatic quali- 
 fication has no effect to dispense with their formal 
 ordination to ministry. The Church system presented 
 in the Pastoral Epistles contains no indication of 
 the presence within its purview of a charismatic 
 organisation traversing the regular organisation 
 which these writings assume. Timothy is him- 
 self a charismatic — there is " grace in him " ; but he 
 has, on the one hand, been selected on qualification 
 (the word of prophecy indicating him for charge), and 
 
 ^ Alf ord takes the reference to be to Old Testament prophets ; 
 see his note to Ephes. ii. 20. This is in 1849. 
 
66 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 on the other hand, he has been regularly instituted 
 to office, and his possession of charisma is associated 
 with the act of his ordination. There is perceptible 
 no division of spiritual and of administrative func- 
 tion — no ministry confined to the merely judicial or 
 governmental. The conception of double ministry, 
 in Harnack's sense, is equally to seek in the extra- 
 canonical writers of the earlier time ; their ignorance 
 of such a system is, in fact, the chief difficulty which 
 such a theory has to conciliate. Had it been other- 
 wise, it is improbable that the theory should have 
 waited for the discovery of the Didache. 
 
 On the other hand, the theory of twofold ministry 
 can hardly be said to rest on the contents of the 
 Didache. Though everything that can be claimed 
 for that document were conceded, it would still be 
 evidence for much less than the theory postulates. 
 It would not, for example, be evidence for any state 
 of matters generally prevalent in the Church; it 
 has been pointed out to us that even St. Clement's 
 Epistle to Corinth can speak only for the Church 
 of its origin ^ and in measure for that of its destina- 
 tion ; and the Didache could certainly speak for no 
 more, even if, in its case, we were equally assured 
 of what the origin and destination were. It does 
 not really show that prophets are in its scheme essen- 
 tially or characteristically itinerant, but only that 
 some prophets itinerated. Its apostle certainly 
 itinerates, and it leaves him no room for hesitation 
 
 ^ Rawlinson, Foundations, p. 419. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 67 
 
 on the subject. But if its references to prophets are 
 examined, it will be found that the only definite 
 allusion to mobility on their part is that prescriptions 
 are given for the case of a stranger who proposes to 
 "settle" — any stranger^; though the instance of 
 his happening to be a prophet is considered in a 
 sentence at a later point. Such a case is evidently 
 the exceptional,^ and the rule given (XIII. 1) is not 
 a rule for his settling, but a rule for his recognition 
 as one of a class already resident and possessing 
 certain rights. Residence and not peregrination 
 appears to be a prophet's normal condition .^ 
 
 ^ The section deals with " every one who comes in the name 
 of the Lord '' — claiming, that is, hospitality as a Christian from 
 Christians; "if he came with a profession of the Christian 
 faith ^' (Lindsay, Church and Ministry, p. 172) : the rules are 
 rules for hospitality in general, and not for hospitality to charis- 
 matics only. It is, of course, usual to assume that the whole 
 drift of it is to deal with charismatics as such; but c. XII. 
 will not bear that construction. It deals with people who, if 
 they are to eat, must work. A prophet, on the other hand 
 (c. XIII. 1), is worthy of maintenance by the community. 
 
 2 Mr. Lowrie says {Church and its Organisation, p. 243 n.) 
 that " the prophet is supposed to settle,^'' but plainly it is only 
 supposed that he may do so. 
 
 3 Obviously the " whosoever ^* of c. XL 1 covers both the 
 ordinary traveller and the itinerating charismatic. But the 
 charismatic in view is the apostle. At c. XL 7 we reach 
 the case of the prophet; but of him it is not "every prophet 
 who comes ^^ (as it had been of the apostle), but " every prophet 
 who speaks."' At c. XIII. we at last are at the case of the 
 prophet who arrives, desiring recognition as a true prophet and 
 a share with the local prophets who are in possession. These 
 are taken for granted (c. XIII. 3) ; they are spoken of in the 
 plural, and are sufficiently plural to consume the firstfruits of 
 
68 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 Nor is it really to be found in the Didache that the 
 local communities depend for spiritual ministrations 
 or for higher ministrations on the arrival of itinerants.^ 
 I point this out with diffidence, but the text is acces- 
 sible, and what I say is easily verified. If the 
 Didache tells us anything on that subject, it is that 
 local communities are not upon its scheme thus de- 
 pendent, since bishops and deacons also minister the 
 ministry of prophets and teachers, whatever that is 
 understood to have been (c. XV. 1). The state- 
 ment in this matter is so explicit that one wonders 
 how it should have been so generally ignored and the 
 contrary assumed. Nor is it really provided that as 
 soon as a charismatic wanderer should appear, he is 
 to supersede local ministry .^ He is indeed to be 
 
 the community. It is not said, "If no prophet happen to 
 come," but, " If ye have no prophet." The common case is 
 assumed to be that of " having prophets.''' The parallel might 
 be with the "Men" of some Highland districts; the idea is 
 that of persons who " have gifts," are highly regarded, may be 
 acknowledged with presents, and are allowed a certain liberty 
 of speech in the congregation, very much as the " Men " were 
 allowed on days preliminary to sacramental occasions. 
 
 ^ C. H. Turner, Camb. Med. Hist., I., pp. 144, 145; Rawlinson, 
 Foundations, p. 415. 
 
 2 Lindsay, Church and Ministry, p. 99 n.; Lowrie, Church 
 and Organisation, p. 274 n.; Gwatkin, H. D. B., sub voce 
 "prophet"; Swete, H. 0. in Anc. Ch., p. 22; Rawlinson, 
 Foundations, p. 383 n.; Ibid. p. 388; Gore, Church and 
 Ministry, p. 362; Lowrie, Church and its Organisation, p. 337. 
 A directly opposite inference seems to suggest itself to Batiffol : 
 " The Didache could not have affirmed more strongly the 
 supremacy of the local Church and of those who preside over 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 69 
 
 "received as the Lord " ; but so, according to St. Matt. 
 XXV. 35, is every stranger to be received. The ex- 
 pression is stronger than that of Heb. xiii. 2 as to 
 entertaining angels unawares, since the case contem- 
 plated is more than that of a casual visitor ; but it is 
 not so much stronger that it must be construed with 
 laborious literalness. There is no reason whatever 
 to suppose that the phrase is intended to institute 
 any comparison between the treatment to be accorded 
 to itinerants and that habitually accorded to bishops 
 and deacons who " ministered the same ministry " ; 
 according to c. IV. 1 he that '* spoke to them the 
 word of the Lord," as the bishops unquestionably 
 did, they were also to " honour as the Lord." Far 
 too much has been made of this sentence. Too 
 much also has been made of " for they are your 
 high-priests " (c. XIII. 3). It seems often to be 
 read as if its connotation were " other ministers are 
 your priests, but prophets are your high-priests." 
 On the supposition of the early date for the Didache 
 the phrase can hardly be more than a rhetorical 
 justification of payment of firstfruits to prophets 
 exclusively. Principal Lindsay would, in that case, 
 correctly paraphrase it, " in this respect they are 
 like the high-priests of the Old Testament." ^ To in- 
 terpret it as a dogmatic parallel of systems of minis- 
 try is impossible without involving the ascription 
 
 it " — in assigning, i. e., to the local Church the right to judge 
 of the credit to be given to itinerants; Prim. Cath.y pp. 109, 
 110. 
 ^ Church and Ministry, p. 174. 
 
70 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 of Sacerdotium to the office of presbyter — for the 
 implicit question is " Shall you pay your first- 
 fruits to your presbyters, or only to your prophets ?" 
 and if the answer be, " To prophets only, for they are 
 high-priests," the contrast must be with presbyters as 
 merely priests. At the date supposed this form of 
 thought is improbable. As Dr. Bigg points out : " The 
 Christian High-Priest in the Epistle to the Hebrews 
 is Christ Himself." Clement certainly argues from 
 the assignment of different services to high-priest, 
 priest and Levite,^ but there is no indication that he 
 intends an analogy with corresponding Christian 
 ministries ; his argument is more general and is an 
 argument for order — that all things be done, as 
 St. Paul would have said, ;>iaTd xdiiv. 
 
 As it stands the sentence seems one of the most 
 suspicious in the book. What then has become of 
 the apostle who on any reckoning had precedence of 
 prophets ? How have prophets slipped into first 
 rank ? If the statement had been made of apostles 
 we might have remembered Poly crates' story of 
 St. John and the Petalon, we might have allowed 
 something for Clement's reference to the high-priest 
 and to the fact that, if by that he suggested any 
 
 ^ Ad Corinth, c. XL. The matter of c. XLII. is not 
 sufficiently consecutive with that of c. XL to justify Bishop 
 John Wordsworth in the assertion which he bases on their 
 sequence that " St. Clement, Cor. 40-42, compares the apostles, 
 the ' bishops ^ and the deacons to the high-priest, the priest- 
 hood and levites.'* When the analogy comes to be pressed 
 (as it is by Tertullian, by Cyprian, and in the Apostolic Canons) 
 it is the bishop who is regarded as high-priest. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 71 
 
 ministry, it is the apostolate. But this writer has 
 forgotten his apostle ; his interest is in prophets, not 
 in apostles. 
 
 Again, a prophet may apparently (if oqcCo^v be 
 read) appoint an Agape (c. XI. 9), provided always 
 that he is not himself to benefit by it ; it is not really 
 said anywhere that he is to preside at it,i or that he 
 may celebrate the Eucharist, which presumably 
 would follow. The statement that bishops and 
 deacons also minister the ministry of prophets and 
 teachers (c. XV. 1), does not really convey that 
 normally prophets and teachers celebrated the 
 Divine Liturgy, although bishops and deacons were 
 now beginning to do the same ; it is improbable that 
 XeiTovQyla had acquired the technical sense within 
 the period assigned to the Didache ^ — ^if it is here used 
 technically, so much the worse for the early date of 
 the document ; the actual meaning seems to be that 
 bishops and deacons also discharged the ministry of 
 the word, notwithstanding that that ministry might 
 seem to be peculiarly the sphere of prophets and 
 teachers. Nor again is the right to celebrate the 
 Sacrament really implied for prophets in the proviso 
 of c. X. 7, *' Suffer the prophets to give thanks as 
 much as they will." ^ Evxagtorslv does not mean " to 
 celebrate the Eucharist," and the thanksgiving in 
 which prophets are allowed to depart from set forms 
 
 1 Rawlinson, ut supra, pp. 383 n., 415; Allen, Christian 
 Institutions, p. 59; Lindsay, Church and Ministry, pp. 99, 174. 
 
 2 Cf, Batiffol, Prim. Cath., p. 107 n. 
 
 ^ Swete, Holy Spirit in the Anc. Church, p. 21. 
 
72 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 is expressly a concluding thanksgiving after celebra- 
 tion. Nor is it in any way implied that the prophet 
 who is at this point permitted to expand has " pre- 
 sided " at the previous celebration; it is rather 
 implied that his outpouring was not part of the 
 requisite and usual order. There is nothing at all 
 which imports that under any circumstances lay- 
 men, charismatic or otherwise, celebrated ^ ; on the 
 contrary, if anything relevant is to be inferred from 
 the "therefore" of c. XV. 1, it is that bishops and 
 deacons were required with a view to celebration. 
 Nor, once more, does the exhortation in that sentence 
 as to electing bishops and deacons imply anything 
 as to transition from a charismatic to an appointed 
 ministry.2 They are not exhorted to elect, as if such 
 election were a new departure ; they are exhorted in 
 electing to elect men of a particular type and qualifi- 
 cation. The election is a matter of ordinary course, 
 but it is not on that account to be perfunctory. The 
 predicate is " worthy of the Lord, meek and not 
 covetous, and true and approved " ; the reason given 
 being that the functions of the bishops and deacons 
 are equally sacred and honourable with those of 
 prophets and teachers. No one who is famiUar with 
 the tone of thought in some circles of our own religi- 
 ous environment will fail to recognise how such an 
 apology for the " regular ministry " might be made 
 to-day. It is possible, of course, to read all these 
 
 1 Bartlet, Proceedings of Oxford Soc. of Hist. Theol, 1892-3. 
 
 2 Allen, ut supra; Lindsay, Church and Ministry, p. 176 n. 
 and p. 215. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 73 
 
 things into the Didache, but unless they are read into 
 it I do not find them in the document. ^ 
 
 If then the theory of twofold ministry, Charismatic 
 and Appointed, is not derivable from the information 
 accessible to us apart from the Didache, and is not 
 derivable from the Didache itself, can it be deriv- 
 able from a combination of these two sources ? In 
 chemistry the addition of a few drops from one solu- 
 tion to another may bring about the precipitation 
 of a new substance different from that held in solution 
 by either ; such possibly has been the result of the 
 addition of the Didache to our previous stock of 
 knowledge. " The gain," Mr. Bartlet says,^ " lies 
 
 ^ As an instance of finding in the Didache more than it con- 
 tains, Principal Lindsay, Church and Ministry, p. 213, speaks of 
 the prophet of the Didache as "not to be judged, but to be 
 obeyed," disobedience to his command being an unpardonable 
 sin. But I can find nothing in the Didache about obedience 
 to the prophet — the only command of his to which there is 
 allusion being his "ordering of a table"; and the sin being, 
 not to disobey him, but to judge him. A prophet's business 
 is to prophesy, not to give commands. Dr. Lindsay finds that 
 the prohibition to judge the prophet comes from a time when 
 prophecy was the great controlling power; but the earlier re- 
 quirement was, on the contrary, to " prove all things " (1 Thess. 
 V. 20-1) and to judge prophesyings (1 Cor. xiv. 29). Dr. 
 Lindsay seems to have in mind the contents of a theory, not 
 the content of the Didache. So again, Weizsacker {Apostolic 
 Age, ii. 302) : " The Didache . . . enforces the authority of the 
 bishops and deacons by urging that they can now discharge 
 the same ministry as the prophets and teachers had done in 
 earlier times " ; whereas the text contains nothing about " now " 
 or about " earlier times " — it merely says that bishops and 
 deacons minister the same ministry as prophets and teachers. 
 
 2 H. D. B„ L, p. 450 a. 
 
74 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 not so much in the way of new facts as in the way of 
 new light cast upon things akeady witnessed to by 
 our existing documents, though in a manner too 
 implicit to attract attention or win general assent 
 as to their meaning." But if we do not gain new 
 facts from the Didache, and if the evidence of the 
 old facts is too implicit to attract attention or to 
 win assent, the efficiency of the Didache seems to 
 be reduced to this, that to certain minds it has sug- 
 gested a theory. The Didache is capable of more or 
 less accommodation to the theory, and so no doubt 
 may be a certain number of the other data. But 
 the theory does not arise out of the data — the theory 
 must be assumed, and that again more or less upon 
 an a priori presumption of opposition between the 
 spiritual and the institutional, which cannot justly 
 be assumed as axiomatic, before the data take on 
 the aspect which the theory requires of them. And 
 if certain of the data are patient of that aspect, 
 others are not ; and those which refuse to accommo- 
 date themselves to it are by much the more numer- 
 ous and the more authentic. The theory of Twofold 
 Ministry is far less an explanation than a new per- 
 plexity. For, with the exception of certain allu- 
 sions, which may be otherwise interpreted, it leaves 
 us with substantially the whole literature of the first 
 age involved in a conspiracy of silence. 
 
 One may venture to hazard the suggestion that 
 on the most favourable estimate of its position the 
 Didache has been overworked. It has been read in 
 the light of a theory, and has then been required to 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 75 
 
 show proof of the theory. It has been taken to con- 
 tain what, even on that theory, it only suggests. A 
 picture of the sub -apostolic age has been presented 
 as derived from its pages ; we are then called to 
 recognise its authenticity from its faithfulness to that 
 picture. Above all, it has been required to account 
 for everything, while itself still unaccounted for. One 
 meets such phrases as that the Didache shows or that 
 it proves this or that, or that we now know from the 
 Didache that this or that was the case ^ — and one 
 finds oneself asking, " But what is the Didache? " 
 "What is its origin?" "What is its date?" 
 " What is the truth about its composition ? " "Is 
 it of the first century, or of the third, or of the 
 fourth ? " " Is it genuine or is it a literary tour de 
 force?'' The answers to these questions are, at 
 least, uncertain; and till they are clearer than at 
 present, it is difficult to see how the Didache can be 
 said to show or to prove anything. 
 
 1 E.g., Turner, Cambridge Med. Hist., p. 144; Lake, Earlier 
 Epistles of St. Paul, p. 228, etc. 
 
LECTURE III 
 
 THE CESSATION OF SUPRANATTJRAL MANIFESTA- 
 TIONS IN THE CHURCH 
 
 In my last lecture I discussed the more recent criti- 
 cisms of the Didache, and ventured the conclusion 
 that its position is uncertain, and that it can be 
 instanced as evidence only with qualifications; 
 that in fact we are on surer ground if our sources 
 are the New Testament documents and the writings 
 of the Apostolic Fathers. I go on to consider the 
 more general basis for a theory of Ministry in re- 
 lation to the Pentecostal Endowment, under two 
 main heads : (1) The cessation in the Church of 
 those manifestations of the supranatural which 
 characterise the post-pentecostal moment, and the 
 significance of their disappearance ; (2) the re- 
 spective offices or functions of our Lord and of the 
 Holy Spirit in relation to Christian institutions. 
 
 I. — 1. In any account of the Church from its emer- 
 gence from the Upper Chamber towards its present 
 as we know it, there are certain things which one 
 would prefer to avoid. 
 
 (a) One would prefer to avoid if possible any 
 76 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 77 
 
 way of understanding the past which ascribes to 
 the Church initiative or authority in matters of its 
 essential equipment. For the Christian instinct 
 is to locate initiative and authority in Christ and 
 to regard the apparatus of grace as deposit in regard 
 to which the Church is dependent on Christ's will 
 and act. A Church, for example, conceived of as 
 competent to create or to change ministry may 
 seem far on the way to independence of Heaven 
 itself, except in so far as Heaven may be conceived 
 to have supplied its primum mobile. 
 
 Doctrine of the Church is conditioned by doctrine 
 of the Incarnation. An Incarnation which has 
 produced in Jesus a new personality, linking Deity 
 to manhood from the side of Deity, or perhaps 
 drawing up manhood to the point of being " in 
 every sense of the word. Divine," leads consistently 
 enough to the conception of an evolutionary Church. 
 The Christ who in one form has disappeared has 
 then probably reappeared in another : He has "re- 
 turned as Spirit " ; the Church is the locus of the 
 manifestation of this Spirit, and so is practically in 
 itself an Incarnation. Such a Church would without 
 doubt be of large competence, and the making or 
 unmaking of ministries might be the common in- 
 cident of its activity. Spirit-filled, Spirit-guided, 
 it goes its way, in virtue of Pentecost occupying the 
 role which Christ has vacated, mistress of itself and 
 of the spiritual sphere in which it administers, 
 having nothing to consult except that impulse of 
 its own which on the supposition it would be justified 
 
78 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 in regarding as Divine.^ On the other hand an 
 Incarnation which presents the manifestation of a 
 pre-existent Person of Eternal Deity, which was 
 effected by the taking of humanity into union 
 with the Godhead and persists for all purposes of 
 Mediation between God and man, leads naturally 
 to a conception of the Church as permanently and 
 entirely attached to the Incarnation as a Kingdom 
 over and in which the Eternal Christ reigns. In 
 such a view the Spirit does not supersede Christ : 
 on the contrary the coming of the Spirit estab- 
 lishes Christ's presence and authority. For on this 
 supposition the Spirit does not speak or act e^ 
 eavrov ; ^ as He hears, so He speaks ; the ordinances 
 which He honours are Christ's ordinances and the 
 institutions which He uses are Christ's institutions. 
 The Church in that case is not an Incarnation of 
 the Spirit, but through the Spirit is an extension 
 of the Incarnation of Christ. There is no Kingdom 
 of the Spirit; there is a Kingdom of Christ by the 
 Spirit. 
 
 On this conception it is natural to think of the 
 Church as a society definitely constituted by the 
 will of its Lord, and as having from Him such en- 
 dowment of grace and of means of grace as it pleased 
 
 ^ Not that a view of the Church as self -developing by a self- 
 contained spiritual life necessarily implies a view of the Christ 
 as also evolutionary — in many cases it implies nothing of the 
 sort — but that the two views are logically congruous and 
 sympathetic to each other. 
 
 2 St. John xvi. 13. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 79 
 
 Him to bestow; of which things the Church is 
 merely steward. The general mind of Christianity 
 tends to this manner of thought and inclines to deny 
 excessive claims for the Church ; to set it lowly at 
 Christ's feet in a place of dependence and attention ; 
 and even to see the sanctity and glory of the Church 
 in her incapacity to be other than Christ has Himself 
 constituted her. 
 
 (h) Again one would willingly avoid any account 
 of the Church which should begin with " Once upon 
 a time" : — once God was near — in those days the 
 Church's common day gave effective proof of 
 Heavenly Presence ; but not now — that which began 
 in the supernatural has subsided into the natural. 
 Such an account is unsatisfactory — it is too easy, and 
 reminds us too much of tales which, whatever their 
 symbolic value, do not ask to be believed. We may 
 attempt to rationalise it by the plea that at its first 
 introduction the Gospel required the supernatural to 
 warrant it ; but to that plea the answer is only too 
 obvious that the supernatural is much required 
 to warrant it still, and, since Christianity claims to 
 be supernatural, that only the supernatural can 
 at any time be its warrant.^ Our natural desire 
 is to be able to think of the Church and to describe 
 the Church throughout its course in the same terms ; 
 we have an obstinate persuasion that whatever it 
 is now the Church has in essential character been 
 from the first, and that whatever it was at the first 
 
 ^ I quote from recollection of an old pamphlet, Modern 
 Christianity a Civilised Heathenism. 
 
80 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 that it continues to be. The supernatural in which 
 it originated ought still to be discoverable in its 
 present, and our account of the Church ought at 
 least to have room for that discovery. We need 
 not at all overlook the evidential value of the 
 emergent supernatural as we find it at the Church's 
 origin. Evidential value, however, is not the same 
 as evidential purpose. Our instinct opposes the 
 idea of the supernatural imported " for a sign," 
 used teratically ^ on an occasion and then dropped. 
 Our Lord did not encourage such a view of the 
 miraculous. One would prefer to think of the 
 supernatural as then manifest because under the 
 circumstances natural, the proper and inevitable 
 symptom of the Spirit's descent into humanity. 
 The evidential value seems even in some sort to 
 depend upon the absence of evidential purpose. 
 St. Paul was by no means certain that all charismata 
 tended to convince the world.^ Their effect might 
 be repellent rather than convincing.^ 
 
 (c) Again one is reluctant to contemplate, if it 
 can be helped, the idea of dislocations as incidents 
 of the Church's unfolding. The story of the Church 
 is a story of life, the processes involved are vital 
 processes; and except in its lower forms life pro- 
 ceeds by growth, and shows in the elements of the 
 
 1 St. Paul's "sign to believers'^ (1 Cor. xiv. 22) is another 
 matter. 
 
 2 1 Cor. xiv. 23. 
 
 3 Hamack, Expans. of Christianity, trans, p. 254 n., points 
 out that this was the case with men like Celsus. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 81 
 
 organism with which it is at birth provided develop- 
 ment rather than substitution. Normally life pro- 
 ceeds from weakness to strength and from lower 
 conditions to higher. In the case of the Church 
 regarded as the embodiment of life in its highest 
 form, one shrinks from attributing to it crises of 
 collapse or of declension from a higher to a lower, and 
 one would be specially unwilling to be forced to see 
 it as in any feature suffering loss of its distinctively 
 spiritual character or of its Heavenly provision. 
 
 It may, however, prove difficult to avoid one or 
 other of these ways of thinking as to the Church's 
 history, since as matter of fact that history does show 
 a stage at which the supernatural was apparent as 
 now it is not. That is the circumstance for which 
 an account has to be found ; but if possible an ac- 
 count which wUl allow us to ascribe to the Church 
 that continuity of history which the mind of our 
 time desiderates, and which will make it practicable 
 to view the Church as still containing whatever 
 spiritual energy was resident in it at the beginning 
 of its course. That the difficulty exists is certain. 
 Principal Lindsay, for example, finds it necessary to 
 admit an overthrow ^ of the prophetic ministry 
 which, he thinks, was at first supreme and even 
 held the great controlling power; and is led to 
 conclude that the Church has always power to 
 change its ministry — a conclusion which in the case 
 
 ^ Church and Ministry in the Earlier Christian Centuries^ 
 pp. 213, 235. 
 G 
 
82 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 of an ordinance by hypothesis the direct creation 
 and specific organ of the Holy Spirit is sufficiently 
 startling. Mr. Lowrie,^ following Sohm, is com- 
 pelled to posit that from an extremely early moment 
 the whole Church has erred in adopting an institu- 
 tional (" legally constituted ") view of its own 
 nature ; whereas it was really given as a purely 
 charismatic society. "The rise of ecclesiastical 
 law and the constitution of the Church is an apostacy 
 from the conditions intended by Jesus Himself and 
 originally realised." ^ Sohm himself comes nearest 
 the sort of solution of which we are in search by 
 indicating the essentially charismatic character of 
 all ministry, but unfortunately interprets this very 
 sound principle so as to condemn the form which, 
 historically, ministry has assumed.^ Duchesne * has 
 little to say on the subject except that prophecy 
 " held a prominent place in the life of the early 
 Churches " and, as to charismata, that such pheno- 
 mena were well calculated to arrest the minds and 
 to sustain the enthusiasm of the first Christians. 
 Harnack's theory of twofold ministry, however, is 
 that which of all theories creates the most serious 
 
 1 The Church and Us Organisation, p. 9. 
 
 2 Quoted Harnack, Const, and Law of the Church, trans, p. 5. 
 But Harnack tells us that the formation of a legal code " began 
 at once.'* 
 
 ^ "Is it not a contradiction that according to him [Sohm] 
 an empirical entity is treated as though it were an ideal one, 
 and consequently an absolute value is ascribed to earthly em- 
 bodiments of the ideal ? " — Harnack, ut supra, p. 195. 
 
 * Early History of the Church, John Murray, 1909, p. 197. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 83 
 
 dichotomy between the earlier and later phases of 
 Church life — the earlier, as we have seen, being 
 according to this characterised by a God-given 
 ministry which had direct mission and inspiration, 
 the later by one which had no better credentials than 
 those of legal appointment and of a certain mundane 
 efficiency.^ Anglican writers of the conservative 
 school have tended to accept and utilise this 
 conception of twofold ministry, seeing in it at least 
 a partial explanation of the emergence of mono- 
 episcopate. Gore, for example, finds in the gradual 
 localisation of apostolic men the best supported 
 view of that development; and by apostolic men 
 he seems to intend the charismatic or ambulatory 
 ministry of Harnack's theory.^ Bishop John 
 Wordsworth accepts this position frankly and 
 thoroughly — the charismatic ministry, he says, 
 certainly existed side by side with the settled 
 
 1 In Harnack's view every direct external bond between Jesus 
 and the Church and its developing order is severed by criticism, 
 the only remaining bond being inner and spiritual. Neverthe- 
 less, since he admits the Twelve as recognised rulers of the 
 Christian community and this by virtue of their appointment 
 to that end by the Lord Himself, something direct and external, 
 of the nature, that is, of institution and commission, would seem 
 even so to persist ; and in conjunction with the fact of spiritual 
 endowment, also admitted, there might seem to be room thereby 
 left for the validation of that which can trace to the exercise of 
 this function of rule on the part of the Twelve. 
 
 ^ Church and Ministry, p. 304. Apostolic men he explains 
 as " either of prophetic inspiration or of apostolic authority 
 and known character — ' prophets ^ or ' teachers * or ' evange- 
 lists * or ' rulers.' '-* 
 
84 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 ministry: and like Gore he indicates a connection 
 between the episcopate as developed and " the 
 old broad apostolic ministry." ^ Moberly is more 
 cautious, but seems to utilise the idea of charismatic 
 ministry to supply for the sub-apostolic period that 
 " background " of authority behind the presbyterate 
 which he desires everywhere to estabhsh.^ 
 
 The common feature of all such treatments of 
 the history is that they contemplate a serious 
 discrepancy between the first age of the Church and 
 all later ages. The Church then, it seems, began on 
 one plane and has shifted to another. It began 
 on the spiritual and has declined to the legal. It 
 possessed an organ of direct communication with 
 Heaven, which has disappeared by atrophy, or has 
 perished for lack of appreciation, or has been with- 
 drawn as unsuited to a practical world. But this 
 is precisely the type of conclusion which, if we 
 entertain any conviction of the Heavenly mission 
 of Christianity or of a Divine superintendence of 
 its embodiment in the Church, is necessarily un- 
 welcome. The fact that a disruption of continuity 
 and a declension from higher to lower levels has 
 taken place is not removed, nor is the painfulness 
 of admitting it softened, if we are told that it was 
 inevitable, closer organisation leaving alwaj^s less 
 room for free exercise of charismatic function,^ or 
 that the passing away of the charismatic ministry 
 
 ^ Ministry of Grace, p. 147-149. 
 
 2 Ministerial Priesthood, pp. 215-18. 
 
 ^ Lindsay, ut supra, p. 214. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 85 
 
 is part of the Divine order which tends generally 
 to the substitution of the ordinary and continuous 
 for the miraculous and extraordinary ^ : we still ask 
 ourselves why the inevitably decadent should have 
 been at all called into service, or we ask ourselves 
 whether it is orderly to initiate that for which a 
 substitute must at once be found. St. Paul certainly 
 seems to have contemplated a sweeping change 
 " when that which is perfect is come " ; but the 
 change which he expects is from lower to higher; 
 and in any case perfection was not reached at the 
 end of the first century. 
 
 2. In endeavouring to arrange the facts which 
 the early history of the Church discloses — and that, 
 after all, is the most that we can attempt — we are 
 perhaps too ready to import into our considera- 
 tion of them the pre-supposition of an opposition 
 between the spiritual and the corporeal. If such 
 an opposition tends in human affairs to emerge, 
 Christianity certainly does not propose to emphasise 
 but to solve it. Spirit and form are not necessarily 
 opposed. The distinctive conception in Christianity 
 is that of Incarnation — the Word becoming Flesh 
 in order to manifest the spiritual, and also in order 
 to redeem the actual. Christianity in fact sets 
 itself to counteract the common and perhaps natural 
 idea of the grossness of the actual — an idea which 
 most other systems have accepted and have sym- 
 bolised by characterising matter as evil and by 
 
 ^ Wordsworth, ut supra, p. 149. Cf. Cotterill, Genesis of the 
 Church, pp. 421, 422. 
 
86 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 holding that the Divine suffers loss by contact with 
 matter. In the Christian scheme the material and 
 actual appears as the medium which God has chosen 
 for the purpose of self-expression. Hence in one 
 aspect the Incarnation. In its other aspect of 
 Redemption, we see God refusing to assent to the 
 degradation of the material and actual. He will 
 reclaim it to the service of the spiritual. The 
 spiritual requires the material for its self-assertion 
 and realisation. It embodies itself in lives as they 
 are lived and in actions as they are done and in 
 societies as they cohere. Spirit in fact has not 
 reached its goal until such embodiments are achieved. 
 Actuality, as Goethe somewhere says, is the end of 
 the ways of God. In St. John's view Christianity 
 is true to itself wherever it represents Christ as 
 come in the flesh ; when its teaching, that is, 
 develops in harmony with and in dependence upon 
 its fundamental conception of a factual Incarnation. 
 As regards our doctrine of the Church, that result 
 is so far attained when we think of the Church as, 
 in Newman's phrase, a substantive corporation, 
 spiritual in the proper sense, not of tenuity or of 
 imperceptibility, but of adequacy to express Spirit 
 and of correspondence to the activity of Spirit. 
 Ovxoy xat 6 Xqloxoq — Christ is not carnalised if we 
 ascribe to Him a body, the Church, having the same 
 quality of realness which St. John or St. Ignatius 
 asserts for His personal Body. Life demands 
 organism : Spirit desires to be clothed upon. It 
 is permissible to think of Christ as in His Divine 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 87 
 
 humanity the actual Lord and Head of an actual 
 kingdom — which is not indeed eh tov hogjuov xovxov, 
 forth from this world, but is certainly in this world, 
 composed from such elements as the world offers, 
 and so far ordered after human methods as a practical 
 kingdom of men must be ; all that is ;iaTd Xqioxov. 
 We are not in reality any nearer a spiritual idea of 
 the Church if we discover at its initiation a ministry 
 warranted not by institution but only by values ; 
 and we are not any further from ascribing to it a 
 spiritual character if we regard it as a society whose 
 form is Divinely determined and as the organism 
 of a life which demands certain modes of form for 
 its full realisation. Life is not less vital when its 
 organs assume predetermined shape ; spirit is not 
 less spiritual if a body be prepared for it — on the 
 contrary, it is then spirit reaching expression and 
 accomplishing mission. 
 
 The account which we possess of events leading 
 up to Pentecost is an account of the preparation of 
 a Body in which the ascended Christ might come 
 to do the will of the Father ^ : the company of be- 
 lieving men was already gathered ; the apostles 
 were already chosen and had received commission ; 
 the Sacraments had been appointed; the Gospel 
 had been enacted. As an externally constituted 
 society the Church was even then complete ; it 
 lacked only life — it waited for that influx of spirit, 
 of which Christ had spoken as the promise of the 
 Father. The history of the Church as such begins 
 1 Heb. X. 5. 
 
88 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 where Christ chose Twelve and ordained them to 
 be with him, whom also He called apostles — it is 
 reasonable to expect that its development should be 
 from that germ of action, and that its history should 
 continue upon the method then initiated. A charis- 
 matic ministry, dependent upon impulse, occupying 
 no office, guaranteed by no delegation, is not more 
 accordant with our Lord's apparent method as indi- 
 cated in the call of the Twelve, but is less accor- 
 dant with it and with the principles which seem 
 to underlie it, than a regular and appointed ministry 
 is. Regular ministry is ideally truer to type — 
 Christ is come " in flesh " — He accepts the con- 
 ditions of human actuality for His Church as for 
 Himself; He constitutes it as a society composed 
 of human elements may naturally be constituted. 
 If definiteness of selection and explicitness of ap- 
 pointment and of commission and delegation amount 
 to legalism and mundanity, the Church seems to have 
 already incurred these detriments at a point long 
 antecedent to Pentecost. The importation of a 
 purely charismatic at Pentecost would give us only 
 another dislocation and another breach of con- 
 tinuity, even more severe than that of the super- 
 session of the charismatic by reversion to the method 
 of regularity, which Harnack and others suppose 
 to have taken place in the course of the second 
 century. If this is spirituality, it is spirituality 
 dearly purchased. There are minds to which the 
 older conception of an apostolic and continuous 
 ministry would be, if the facts at all permit, more 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 89 
 
 intelligible. 1 Should that conception seem to have 
 a certain tinge of the commonplace, there is none 
 the less this for it, that Christianity delights in the 
 commonplace ; for the Word has become Flesh and 
 dwells with us. The spiritual has become the 
 commonplace of Christian experience. 
 
 3. There is, however, no difficulty in admitting 
 that there has been in the Church's experience a 
 moment at which this normality of the spiritual 
 was far from being yet established. In this fact 
 lies the element of truth in those views which dis- 
 tinguish sharply between a first period of the 
 Church's history and its whole subsequent develop- 
 ment. The influx of the Holy Spirit to the Christian 
 soul and to the Christian Society was exalting and 
 exciting, and therefore was disturbing and per- 
 plexing. We who have existed in no other atmo- 
 sphere than that which the presence of the Divine 
 Spirit creates must always have difficulty in imagin- 
 ing what life on that lower plane on which the 
 Spirit found men may have resembled, and no less 
 in imagining the novelty of the consciousness of 
 which the first recipients of the Spirit were suddenly 
 aware. The experience of personal conversion as 
 it is known among ourselves is often sufficiently 
 overwhelming : in its " movement of the whole man," 
 its illumination, its liberation of unsuspected faculty ; 
 yet it is probably a much less marked change of self 
 than that undergone by those. For in our case 
 
 1 Cf. BatifEol, Prim. Cath., p. 151 (trans. Brianceau, 1911). 
 
90 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 conversion, however critical, has had a previous 
 history ; the soul knows what to expect ; it has to 
 realise rather than to discover, and is already docile 
 to Spiritual contacts. It has already been the 
 subject of many influences of the Paraclete; the 
 Christian graces and the Christian capacities may 
 be and in many cases are already largely developed 
 in it. The subjects of the Pentecostal experience 
 had no such preparation. As the Spirit found them 
 they were, in St. Paul's phrase, " psychic men," to 
 whom, as St. Paul states it, things of the Spirit were 
 foolishness ; we can find no better illustration of 
 St. Paul's meaning in the phrase quoted than the 
 incapacity of the Twelve during their discipleship 
 to understand Christ. Discernment of the Spiritual 
 implies Spiritual faculty which they had not; the 
 things of God knoweth no man save the Spirit of 
 God — the Spirit was with them, but He was not in 
 them.i Their dullness of apprehension at that 
 stage astonishes us — it is a helplessness to under- 
 stand — Christ wrestled in vain with it; He had 
 many things to say to them, but they could not 
 bear them; He stakes everything on the coming 
 of the Spirit — in that day they should know.^ The 
 transformation of their consciousness which followed 
 is associated, not with their persuasion of the 
 Resurrection and not directly with the Ascension — 
 in his narrative of that St. Luke with evident 
 purpose emphasises the fact that they were up to 
 
 1 St. John xiv. 17. 
 
 2 Ibid. xiv. 20 : conf. w. 25, 26; xv. 26; xvi. 4-7, 13, 25. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 91 
 
 that point still dreaming the old dream of a Jewish 
 risorgimento} and that even after the Ascension 
 they continued for a time in the former impotence, 
 voiceless and inactive. None of the phenomena of 
 regeneration are so far apparent in them ; they are 
 still, as they had been, " natural men" to whom the 
 past through which they had lived with Christ 
 remained a puzzle, and the future to which they 
 were called in Him a blank perplexity. 
 
 Into this perplexity blazed the illumination of 
 the Divine Spirit; upon this impotence came the 
 energy of a Divine life. History supplies no parallel 
 moment for illustration. Our own experience, as 
 has been said, has been too gradual and habitual 
 to enable us to present to ourselves any clear image 
 of theirs, (a) It must have included the conscious- 
 ness of perception. The spiritual atmosphere was 
 no longer opaque to them ; it had become trans- 
 parent. The past became luminous, intelligible, 
 containing a Gospel which they could interpret. 
 (6) It must have included a new consciousness of 
 communion with Jesus in one Spirit ; through Him 
 with the Father; and in God with all that is re- 
 demptive and Heavenly, (c) It must have included 
 the sense of destiny and of vocation; the same 
 change which affected their apprehension of the 
 past must have affected also their apprehension of 
 the purpose of the future. Their eyes were opened 
 and they saw both the way by which they had come 
 and the path before them, {d) It must have included 
 1 Acts i. 6. 
 
92 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 the sense of power ; from that aspect especially the 
 promise had been presented to them, " Ye shall 
 receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come 
 upon you " ; and it is the note of power — power to 
 witness, to reconcile to God, to judge, to endure, 
 to save — Christ's power in Earth as in Heaven 
 now thrilling in them to make them able ministers 
 of the Gospel, which rings through and dominates 
 the earlier narratives. With great power gave the 
 Apostles witness. 
 
 It is not easy, then, for us to represent to ourselves 
 such a consciousness as that of this group of men. 
 Yet it is necessary for us to do so, because within 
 that consciousness lies the secret of the difference 
 between those days of the Church and all days which 
 have followed. The life of God has touched them ; 
 they can know God ; they can enter the mind of 
 God; they can do the will of God. That which 
 has reached them is life of a new sort. Heavenly 
 life, abounding, rejoicing; life that vibrates with 
 force and that strains the limitations of humanity 
 to contain and to express it. The unearthly voices 
 which burst from their lips are a symptom of it as 
 more than nature can endure, something excessive 
 and uncontrollable. Life must out — it must ex- 
 pend its energies. This fulness of life which floods 
 into the Church does not at once flow into those 
 expenditures in which by and by it will learn to 
 exhaust itself — the weariness, namely, of contest 
 with a world's evils and the toil of a great service ; 
 and till it is turned exhaustively to such uses it must 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 93 
 
 effervesce and overflow. This stage of ebullition 
 will not immediately pass ; it will necessarily con- 
 tinue until the human spirit is disciplined to endure 
 and to respond to the impact of the Divine Spirit. 
 The human accommodates itself but slowly to the 
 Heavenly, the natural to the Spiritual. From this 
 time on there begins a new evolution; it is the 
 evolution of the new Christian nature, xqIxov yevoQ, 
 adapting itself to such high communion. The 
 position as seen after Pentecost is therefore for the 
 moment abnormal to the condition upon which 
 the Church had now entered ; but the abnormality 
 is not, as commonly assumed, upon the side of the 
 Spirit who comes, but of the humanity to which 
 He comes : a humanity which has not yet assumed 
 and is not as yet capable of that relation to Divine 
 Spirit which is to prove itself the normal relation. 
 The necessary evolution will, however, accomplish 
 itself under those processes of response to stimula- 
 tion which are distinctive of a living body. If we 
 pass through a wire an excessive current of electricity 
 the wire will heat and fuse ; but the nerve channels 
 of a living organism under the stimulus of increased 
 nervous flow behave otherwise — they adapt them- 
 selves, their capacity expands to meet requirement 
 — they become adequate to its transmission and 
 deft to elicit the proportionate muscular response, 
 the nerve tract developing under increased and 
 repeated demand. In this manner the will which 
 originates the stimulus so to speak recreates the 
 organ as is needful for its own exercise. 
 
94 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 This illustration is inadequate ; it is meant to 
 suggest that the later subsidence of " supernatural " 
 demonstrations in the Church is due, not to the 
 " passing away " of Spiritual power or to the with- 
 drawal of any endowment, but on the contrary to the 
 greater Spiritualisation of the Church and to its in- 
 creasing capacity for correspondence with the Divine 
 presence which is always seeking expression by its 
 means. This presence does not become less ener- 
 getic, but its energy comes to be otherwise absorbed 
 and utilised. It is true that the activity of Spirit 
 is now less apparent upon the surface, but that is 
 because it is now finding its way through the depths. 
 The Divine Life appears less as a life operating 
 independently within the Church, because it is now 
 more thoroughly blent into the life of the Church 
 itself ; its force has passed into the ordinary channels 
 of our activity and finds outlet through these. 
 Every force works the more smoothly and silently 
 as the mechanism which it actuates is perfected to 
 receive and obey its impetus. As we watch this 
 subsidence of supranatural manifestation in the 
 Christian Society we need not postulate change on 
 the Divine side — the onrush of the Spirit continues 
 as before ; what occurs is perhaps rather an adapta- 
 tion of the Body of Christ to that newly given Soul 
 which is His Spirit, a gradual opening of its nerve 
 paths to the stream of Christ's will, a gradual ex- 
 pansion of capacity in the organism to meet new 
 demands ; with a consequent direction of the new 
 energy into its proper work of redeeming our 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 95 
 
 humanity and of engaging it in the redemption of 
 the world. There comes no stinting of the tide of 
 grace let loose by the Ascension ; there is now, not 
 a greater remoteness from the Divine, but a more 
 intimate union with it. The Heavenly life con- 
 tinues in the Church with every fulness of its original 
 entrance ; but the Church has now so developed 
 the spiritual habit that it can meet and absorb the 
 entering Spirit without perturbation. The energy 
 communicated from Christ no longer requires such 
 outlet as the Glossolalia may have supplied; it 
 may not as common incident sparkle in miracle or 
 overwhelm startled souls to the point of ecstasy or 
 trance. You must look now for its usual evidence 
 in other forms, not less supernatural and more 
 Divine, in the work of faith and labour of love 
 and patience of hope which appear in the lives 
 of sinful men, or in the age-long vigilance and 
 perennial vigour of the Church itself. 
 
 DoUinger compares the Church in the post- 
 pentecostal period to a mass of metal in fusion, 
 " still glowing, unformed," a mass holding one may 
 suppose in solution the elements of an order which 
 was to emerge, though as yet not crystallised into 
 shape — much as cosmic theory suggests the worlds 
 as at first nebulae of a flaming vapour, which was 
 the undifferentiated matrix for future evolution. 
 DoUinger's simile would in fact suit better with an 
 evolutionary theory of the Church than with that 
 system of Divinely authoritative institution to which 
 he proceeds. He speaks of its later condition as 
 
96 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 one of coldness and fixity.^ But it is exactly this 
 conception of cooling down and of passage from 
 state to state, as a fluid becomes a solid, which one 
 does not desire to affix to the Church. When one 
 considers the Pentecostal glories, one would prefer 
 to think of the splendours of a dawn. These splen- 
 dours appear because at first the sun shines through 
 those heavier vapours of our world which lie low 
 and thick along its horizon. They are splendid 
 and are the fitting accompaniment of the sunrise 
 which brings light and life. Presently they fade 
 and disappear, not because the light wanes, but 
 because it has increased to the perfect day, the 
 common light in which man goes forth to his work. 
 Nothing has been withdrawn; only now the sun 
 has risen above the mists and is shining in his 
 strength. 
 
 Or perhaps, better, we may recall St. John's 
 figure of the Living River ^ : when the sluice-gates 
 of Heaven are opened and it flows to earth, there 
 must needs be the plunge and tumult of its first 
 impact, and its earlier course may well be that of a 
 cataract with foam and spray and loud rushing; 
 for the course into which it descends is rough and 
 narrow — at first the River must make its own path, 
 
 ^ " Presented a very different appearance from that of its 
 later conditions when it had become cold and fixed," First Age 
 of the Church, p. 286, trans. Oxenham. Mr. Turner {Foundations, 
 App., p. 408) speaks of " a pre -institutional phase or moment,'* 
 and of a subsequent " crystallisation.'* 
 
 2 "This spake He of the Spirit which they that believe in 
 Him should receive'' (St. John vii. 39). 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 97 
 
 clearing it through obstruction. As the river-bed 
 grows deep and smooth under its sweep, the River 
 will flow always more quietly. The full stream is 
 perhaps less picturesque than the rapids ; yet it has 
 lost nothing of its volume or strength. And now 
 it parts into the humbler channels prepared for its 
 flow, and the waters spread and sink from sight into 
 thirsty ground ; yet nothing of it is lost — every- 
 thing shall live whithersoever the River cometh. 
 One may believe that thus the full tide of Pentecost 
 still floods into the Church of God undiminished. 
 Because at a point in its history the projection of 
 the supra-natural upon the surface of the Church's 
 life began to subside, it is not necessary to infer 
 from that a general subsidence of the Church itself 
 from an earlier spiritual to a merely natural plane, 
 or to infer such a withdrawal of spiritual energy 
 that we must expect an inferior type of ministry, 
 tracing to human appointment, to be substituted 
 for a higher ministry of direct inspiration. 
 
 II. — ^But farther — the Pentecostal gift does not 
 by itself account for the Church. Assuming that 
 the Church is best understood by that comparison 
 to a living organism which first occurs in our Lord's 
 simile of the Vine, and is followed up in St. Paul's 
 favourite simile of the Body — such a comparison 
 implies two characteristics, organisation as well as 
 life. The Church's possession of life is attributed 
 to the presence in it of the Holy Spirit ; the fact of 
 its organisation is attributed — not to the Spirit — 
 
98 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 but to Christ as the Church's Creator. The theology 
 of the Holy Spirit in His relations to the First and 
 Second Persons of the Trinity may in the earlier 
 age have been vague ; it was certainly unformulated : 
 to the present moment, indeed, this province of 
 Theology remains less determinate than any other of 
 comparable importance, and possibly from its difi&- 
 culty will continue more or less unexplored. But, at 
 least so far as the ground is covered by Scripture, 
 there was no confusion of the Holy Spirit with Christ. 
 Disproportionate stress has been laid upon an 
 expression used by St. Paul, " Now the Lord is the 
 Spirit," 1 as if it implied in the writer's mind 
 an identification — a " return of Christ in the form 
 of Spirit." ^ It is, however, impossible to set an 
 isolated phrase of this sort against the whole drift 
 of a writer's habitual system of thought. It is no 
 longer our custom to argue from " proof texts " 
 unless they are really representative statements. 
 St. Paul's manner is to state his point with an 
 epigrammatic vigour which, in another, might be 
 taken for over-statement. His point here is the 
 entire coincidence of the mind of Christ with the 
 mind of the Spirit who in the Church speaks for 
 Him, so that to yield to the Spirit is to receive 
 Christ, and to recognise Christ is to become partaker 
 
 ^ 6 5e Kvpios rh irvevfid iffriv, 2 Coi. iii. 17. 
 
 * This identification seems to be assumed, for example, by 
 Professor Kirsopp Lake, op. cit., p. 213: "When we remember 
 that to St. Paul, ' the Lord is the Spirit,' and that His body was 
 spiritual " ; p. 384 : " One Spirit who for Paul and his hearers is 
 scarcely, if at all, distinguishable from the risen Christ,** 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 99 
 
 of that liberty which the Spirit effects; but he 
 does not identify the Spirit with Christ. We can 
 attribute no more to this saying than to that of the 
 earlier Epistle, " The second Adam became a quick- 
 ening Spirit," 1 which occurs where the whole argu- 
 ment depends upon the factual nature of Christ's 
 resurrection. St. Paul operates in fact with the 
 doctrine which is set forth in St. John's record,^ 
 where the sending of the Paraclete through Christ's 
 mediation is regarded as effectively Christ's own 
 return, and the Spirit's indwelling as Christ's in- 
 dwelling, though in St. John there is certainly no 
 confusion or identification of Christ with the Spirit, 
 the Spirit being explicitly " another Paraclete." 
 This doctrine is the commonplace of St. Paul's 
 thinking, and he is not careful of being misunder- 
 stood by his readers ; elsewhere he can pass without 
 pause to identify the " Spirit of God " dwelling in 
 us with the " Spirit of Christ," and, finally, with 
 " Christ in us," ^ the three phrases being for him 
 equally descriptive of the same fact. The thought 
 is consistent and clear : primarily the Spirit is the 
 Spirit of God — in virtue of Christ's mediation He 
 reaches us and is known in us as the Spirit of Christ 
 — and His interpretation of Christ's mind and con- 
 veyance of Christ's will is so absolutely faithful that 
 the result of His indwelling is effectively Christ in 
 us * — he that is joined to the Lord, St. Paul says 
 
 ^ 'Ey4vero . . . 6 ecxftros 'ASk/x els irvevp.a Cwoiroiovv, 1 Cor. XV. 46. 
 
 « St. John xiv. 3, 18, 23, etc. 
 
 3 Rom. viii. 9-11. * Cf. Ephes. iii. 16-17. 
 
100 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 elsewhere, is with Him one Spirit,^ but is not on that 
 account supposed to be merged in the Spirit or to 
 lose his own identity. The Holy Spirit in St. Paul's 
 thought is not Christ ; He is the Spirit of Life in 
 Christ, the Spirit of Him that raised up Jesus, the 
 Spirit of God. St. Paul's mind was constantly 
 dominated by his own conversion experience; the 
 Christ of his thoughts was not, and could not 
 be, subjectively apprehended Spirit, but was the 
 glorious One whom he saw and heard on the 
 Damascus road. Whoever might doubt of Christ's 
 persistence as personality localised and cognoscible, 
 Paul did not ; he was incapable of conceiving of 
 Christ otherwise than as clothed upon in that 
 ocbfjLa TivevjuaTLKov, which, from the precedent of 
 the risen Christ, he so confidently anticipates for 
 us. 2 For Paul, not only are the Christ and the 
 Spirit distinct, but they are severally received — 
 first Christ, and then through Christ the Spirit. 
 It is because we are sons, reconciled by faith in 
 Christ, that God sends forth the Spirit of His Son 
 into our hearts ^ ; God establishes us into Christ and 
 anoints us, giving us also the earnest of the Spirit- 
 such had been the order of Paul's own experience, 
 and for him it is the normal order. 
 
 St. Paul's theology in this matter is not in any 
 sense peculiar to him ; it is part of that groundwork 
 of accepted doctrine which is common to him with 
 such of his contemporaries as have left record. For 
 them all Christ is the enthroned Authority, the 
 
 1 1 Cor. vi. 17. 2 1 Cor. xv. 42-9. ^ ^^1. iv. 6. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHUHOM lOi 
 
 Source, the Dispenser of Gifts, He to whom the act 
 of regulation is proper, who orders and institutes; 
 while the Holy Spirit is the Living Medium by whom 
 Christ acts in the Church, and the immediate Agent 
 of Christ's will. St. Peter (in the narrative of the 
 Acts — which makes St. Luke also a witness with 
 him, and indirectly St. Paul as well) preaches Christ 
 exalted at the right hand of God, receiving from the 
 Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, and so shed- 
 ding forth That which on Pentecost was seen and 
 heard. To Peter as to Paul the order of grace is 
 man's turning to God in penitence through Christ, 
 and, in sequence to that, his reception of the Spirit. ^ 
 The Christ of St. Peter's Epistle is One who through 
 suffering has attained to glory, and is now our Pastor 
 and Overseer,^ exercising from Heaven a perpetual 
 dominion ^ ; the Spirit on the other hand is the 
 Power sent forth from Heaven through whom the 
 Gospel has been preached.* It seems almost un- 
 necessary to illustrate from the Fourth Gospel or 
 from the Apocalypse, that the same conception of 
 the relation of Christ to the Spirit and to the Church 
 as receiving the Spirit prevails in them. The theme 
 of that part of the Fourth Gospel which is occupied 
 with the subject is the mission of the Spirit in obe- 
 dience to the requirements of Christ's Lordship in 
 the Church. The Spirit does not speak from Him- 
 self — He is a listening Spirit, repeating in the Church 
 what He hears in the Heart of the Ascended Saviour. 
 
 1 Acts ii. 32^0. 2 i g^. Peter ii. 25. 
 
 3 Ibid. iii. 22. * Ibid. i. 12. 
 
i02 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 The things which He is to show are Christ's. In 
 his First Epistle, St. John re-echoes St. Paul's de- 
 scription of the Spirit as an anointing from Christ 
 (" The Holy One ").i He describes the Spirit as the 
 Spirit of God, testifying to Jesus. ^ The Christ of 
 the Apocalypse is the personal Jesus now reigning 
 from the Heavens ; He has the Seven Spirits of God, 
 and from under his throne flows the River which 
 typifies that effusion of the Spirit which began from 
 Pentecost.3 The writer to the Hebrews occupies 
 himself almost entirely with the conception of our 
 Lord's presence in our nature in the Upper Sanctuary 
 and with His efficient ministry there ; while the 
 Spirit in the Church is, by His gifts, a witness from 
 God to the Gospel,* the Inspirer of the former dis- 
 pensation and its Scripture,^ and the Co-worker 
 with Christ in His offering of Himself to God.^ 
 
 The common view, then, of the New Testament 
 writers is that Christ is immanent in the Church by 
 the Spirit whom He mediates to it, but that per- 
 sonally He is transcendent to the Church, dealing 
 with it as its Creator and Ruler and Judge . This view 
 of the relation was implicit in His own primary 
 declaration that He would " build the Church on a 
 foundation " ; in His regulative purpose the Church is 
 to be from the first, and will always be, the work of 
 His hands. The saying is not one which could be 
 forgotten hj its hearers, but must have permanently 
 
 1 1 St. John ii. 20. 2 /^^^-^^ ^^ £-3. 
 
 ^ Apoc. xxi. 1 ; comp. St. John vii. 39. * Heb. ii. 4. 
 5 Ibid. iii. 7 ; ix. 8, etc. « Ibid. ix. 14. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 103 
 
 shaped their thought upon the subject ; St. Peter 
 long afterward shows how deeply it had entered into 
 his mind.i 
 
 In so far then as the term Evolution suggests for 
 the Church an independent life tentatively expand- 
 ing its own content, it is a term to be used in this 
 connection with caution ; we can more accurately 
 speak of the Church's development. The Church 
 is not a Body for the Spirit — it is Christ's Body. 
 It is not merely " a Body of which the Spirit of 
 Christ is the Soul " ^ — it is also a Body, of which 
 Christ is the constructive mind. Metaphor must 
 not run away with us. The comparison of the 
 Church to a Body is useful, and on one side of the 
 truth it is illuminative; but it is not exhaustive 
 of truth. In the midst of the exposition which 
 St. Paul, in his Epistle to the Ephesians, bases upon 
 it, he finds need to have recourse besides to the highly 
 contrasted metaphor of a building which develops 
 the plan of its author.^ From one point of view 
 (the vital) the Church may be best described as an 
 organism, Christ's Body; from another point of 
 view (the social) it is best described as a temple 
 which shows His workmanship. Both metaphors 
 are significant, and they have equal claim to govern 
 our thought. As to Christ's supremacy and author- 
 ity over the Church, their result is the same; for 
 if the Church be conceived of as a Body, it is a Body 
 of which Christ's personality is the norm and which 
 
 1 1 St. Peter ii. 4 f . 
 
 2 Lindsay, Church and Ministry, p. 69. ^ Ephes. ii. 20-22. 
 
104 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 must grow up into Him in all things, and we must 
 still think of Christ as determining its form as 
 absolutely as when we figure the Church as a king- 
 dom swayed by His sceptre, or as a structure reared 
 to His design. 
 
 If there is any one conception which is universally 
 present to the thought of the first age, it is that of 
 Christ's personal and active government of the 
 Christian community; and if there is any con- 
 ception for which we shall in vain search the 
 mind of the Canonical writers (who are at least 
 the earliest witnesses, and present us with clear 
 sections of the primitive Christian consciousness), 
 it is the conception of the Church as having through 
 the influx of the Spirit " life in itself," or of the 
 Church as inspired by a Spirit who exercises 
 a regulative initiative. We find everywhere the 
 keenest sense of the activity of the Holy Spirit; 
 but it is of the Spirit as an Agency for Christ, as the 
 Medium through whom Christ is Head over all 
 things to the Church, and fills all things, and is all 
 in all. Christ works with His servants as they go 
 forth ; the signs following, though the power in the 
 human minister of the signs is the charisma of the 
 Spirit, ^re Christ's confirming act. It is Christ who 
 adds to the Church those who, though it be by the 
 Spirit's enabling, are in process of salvation. It is 
 Christ who makes whole those who are charismatic - 
 ally healed. It is Christ who, by the Spirit, dwells 
 in the believer, and is present where two or three 
 are gathered in His Name. It is Christ to whom 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 105 
 
 the Spirit witnesses, whose mind the Spirit conveys, 
 whose will the Spirit impresses, whose institution 
 the Spirit follows. He glorifies Christ. The life- 
 giving function of the Spirit, enabling the Christian 
 Society to respond to Christ's will does not infringe 
 upon Christ's function as imposing the will which 
 governs. 
 
 Everything, therefore, of the Church's form, as 
 distinguished from its vitality, is attributed, not to 
 its possession of the Holy Spirit, but to the direct 
 action of Christ ; not, that is, to Christ immanent, 
 but to Christ transcendent. Pentecost does not 
 create institutions ; it quickens the already insti- 
 tuted. The outflow of the Living River found 
 prepared channels; the great origins are not from 
 Pentecost, but are from Christ's previous ministry. 
 It is not, for example, Pentecost which assembles the 
 Discipleship ; the Discipleship has been gathered 
 by Christ and waits for the promise of the Father — 
 its character as a society devoted to the continuance 
 and extension of Christ's work already indicated 
 and determined. Pentecost does not bring the 
 Gospel which the Church is to propagate — it is 
 Christ who has lived out the Gospel; the Spirit 
 comes to " bring to remembrance," and to illuminate 
 in the apprehension of the Apostles the redemptive 
 events with their proper significance ; now the blind 
 eyes are opened and the deaf ears are unstopped — 
 they are no longer without understanding ; but no 
 new fact is added — it is only that now the facts are 
 perceived to constitute Gospel. Pentecost does 
 
106 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 not institute the Sacraments; they are already 
 appointed by Christ. 
 
 Nor, it is submitted, does Pentecost produce the 
 ministry. That, too, had already originated in 
 Christ's sovereign act, and that, too, " waited for 
 the promise" "to receive power." In relation to 
 the constitution of the Church the appointment of 
 the Twelve must continue to appear the most deter- 
 minative of our Lord's actions. It involved His 
 purpose to continue His work throughout the ages 
 following His departure; these men were to be 
 executors of the New Testament; these are the 
 foundation stones. It fixed the nature of the Church 
 as an objective kingdom, a concrete society. It 
 finally negatived the idea of the Church as a thing 
 of Spirit only, and gave it at once place and shape 
 among visible things — thenceforth the Church is 
 stamped with the character of institution. It is not 
 only Holy, Catholic, One — but it is also Apostolic. 
 The Apostolicity of the Church is not a question of 
 words or names. It does not depend upon the looser 
 use of the term " apostle " in its etymological sense ; 
 it is not affected by the "numbering with the 
 Apostles " of a Matthias, or by the special vocation 
 of a Paul, or by the graded use of the word apostle 
 in application to " apostolic men." The Twelve 
 remain what their primary commission made them, 
 and what at every stage of the Church's conscious- 
 ness we discover them to be. The principle^of 
 ministry representative of Christ and of His author- 
 ity and pastorate is contained in their presence in 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 107 
 
 the Church at the point at which the Church came 
 into being as " a Spirit-bearing Body." Pentecost 
 did not produce ministry ; Pentecost found ministry 
 and vitalised it. Pentecost has not to do with form 
 but with power. 
 
 It is impossible then to represent Ministry as 
 depending upon Pentecost, because it is impossible 
 to represent the Apostolate as depending upon 
 Pentecost, and because it is impossible to group the 
 Apostolate with anything which is not institutional 
 in character but is purely charismatic. One cannot 
 at Pentecost make a new departure for apostle- 
 ship as being now one of a series of ministries 
 which owe nothing to exterior appointment, but are 
 warranted only by gift ; for the sufficient reason that 
 we cannot obliterate the fact that apostleship has a 
 history previous to Pentecost and, by the witness 
 of all, owes its status to appointment. It is true 
 that St. Paul does in two lists group apostles with 
 persons whose distinction is charismatic ; but it 
 does not follow that the common feature of the 
 classification is, in the technical sense of the word, 
 ministry ; it seems rather to be the character com- 
 mon to apostles and to charismatic persons as being 
 in both cases direct gifts from Christ to the Church. 
 St. Paul's grouping cannot reduce apostleship to 
 dependence for vocation upon charismatic equip- 
 ment, for apostles had already their vocation from 
 the lips of Christ. 
 
 To trace ministry alone of the great institutions 
 to the immediate action of Spirit is not only incon- 
 
108 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 sistent with the historical account (if the New 
 Testament documents are to be allowed any trust- 
 worthiness) ; but more — it diverts Spirit from its 
 proper function, which is to operate subjectively 
 by way of quickening or illuminating or empowering ; 
 and assigns to Spirit that function of creation and 
 rule which is everywhere else assigned to Christ as 
 Lord. 
 
 Here, then, we find the a priori difficulty in the 
 way of the theory of Twofold Ministry, a charismatic 
 and an institutional — namely, that it introduces a 
 confusion of thought ; it is wrong theologically. It 
 conflicts with a conception of the Church as " sub- 
 ject to Christ " which is otherwise in theology con- 
 sistently followed. The fact of the conflict is 
 indicated by the fact which has been noted, that it 
 necessitates at Pentecost a new departure in respect 
 of apostleship. This conflict becomes explicit 
 where Harnack's theory of double organisation 
 results in the supposition of a " tension and anti- 
 nomy " between the two systems, in which the 
 Divine system as spiritually inefficient goes down 
 before the human system and " passes away " — a 
 denouement to which the understanding has difficulty 
 in accommodating itself. 
 
LECTURE IV 
 
 MINISTRY AND CHARISMATA 
 
 In discussing the origin of " Ministry " we are 
 dealing with an exceedingly ambiguous term; no 
 conclusion can be reached unless there is some 
 common understanding of the sense in which that 
 term is understood. The technical vocabulary of 
 early Christianity consists mainly of words in common 
 use for common purposes, current in daily speech, 
 with applications usual to them before they were 
 appropriated to specific Christian uses. Such words 
 are Apostle, Bishop, Presbyter, Deacon, Baptism, 
 Eucharist and others. Some of these terms had 
 already been adopted in Jewish practice and, to 
 certain ears, carried a sense peculiar to Jewish use. 
 None the less they were part of the ordinary stock 
 of language used by every one for all purposes ; and 
 they are used by Christian writers, sometimes in 
 the sense which only Christians assigned to them 
 in certain relations — sometimes, without any such 
 special connotation, in their current etymological 
 usage. When we encounter any such term in the 
 New Testament or in other early writings we have 
 to ask ourselves whether it is used technically or 
 not — how far it carries some shade of specialised 
 association. 
 
 lOU 
 
110 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 Of such terms, however, the Greek equivalent of 
 our word " Ministry " is hardly one. The word is 
 diaxovla, and it means " service " ; its use in the New 
 Testament is etymological, and not technical. With 
 its CO -derivatives it is used there in the most various 
 application, physical and spiritual : of the activity 
 of angels, of our Lord, of Christians generally, and 
 of specialised function within the Christian society,^ 
 and among these with peculiar emphasis by St. Paul 
 of the work of the apostolate ; in all cases I think 
 the sense will be adequately given by the use of the 
 equivalent from the series derived from our own 
 word " serve." If we are to use the word Ministry 
 in an application as general as that of diaxovia in 
 the New Testament, there can be no reason why 
 we should not speak of a twofold, or, for that 
 matter, of a sevenfold or twenty -fold ministry; 
 still less why we should not distinguish broadly 
 between main types of usefulness — between, for 
 example, those miscellaneous services for which 
 grace fits and those restricted services which ap- 
 pointment to definite charge imposes; or, again, 
 between the missionary staff and the domestic 
 staff, both of which the Church will always need, 
 and which differ not in office but in sphere. The 
 word Ministry in its untechnical sense, translating, 
 
 ^ Principal Lindsay distinguishes no fewer than seven senses 
 in which Siolkovos with its derivatives is used in the New Testa- 
 ment of life within the Church itself, not to speak of its other 
 applications of which he gives an analysis {Church and Ministry^ 
 p. 62). AiuKovos does of course occur in a technical sense, as in 
 Phil. i. 1. 1 Tim. iii. 8, etc.) 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 111 
 
 as to the Elizabethan ear it apparently translated, 
 diaxovia, amply covers these and many other 
 possible classifications. 
 
 In modern use, however, the word Ministry has 
 definitely acquired a technical sense which we cannot 
 dismiss from our minds, but which obtrudes itself into 
 our thinking even where we handle material to which 
 such a sense is entirely foreign. To us it becomes 
 " the Ministry," with the associations which that 
 phrase carries, involving ideas of separation, func- 
 tion, specific charge, which diaKovla does not so much 
 as suggest. It would tend to clarity of thought as 
 well as to precision of treatment were it possible to 
 obtain a general practice of restricting the employ- 
 ment of the word Ministry to the technical sense in 
 which we now habitually use it, and of preferring, in 
 order to render Siaxovta and its cognates, English 
 words of neutral association which do not postulate 
 the ends to which we are reasoning. For the subject 
 of the Christian Ministry is one upon which in other 
 relations most of us are committed : it is easy for 
 us to imagine ourselves to be thinking forward from 
 the primary data when in reality we are thinking 
 backward from present positions, and so to import 
 into the unspecialised terminology of the first 
 generations more rigid conceptions than it properly 
 conveys. In the later and technical sense of the 
 word Ministry, the sense in which it appeals to our 
 immediate interest, there is only one ministry dis- 
 coverable within the evidence of our sources. Ser- 
 vices, usefulnesses, activities, exercises of gift are, 
 
112 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 and must always have been, multifarious ; these 
 are in the New Testament usage called diaxoviai, 
 and in the English of the authorised version diaxovia 
 is translated by ministry, when we should in modern 
 English say service. We are not, however, really 
 helped towards an understanding of the origins of 
 what we have in mind as the Christian Ministry by 
 treating passages in which diaycovia or its cognates 
 occur as if they referred to what we mean when 
 we speak of that Ministry. The equivalent of 
 " Minister " as we now speak of a minister is not 
 dtdxovog, but vnrjQsrrjg,^ a term which carries the 
 idea of office, commission, charge, and its fulfilment, 
 as didxovog does not, and is used by St. Paul with 
 defining words ^ which the Christian Ministry has 
 generally found appropriate to express its own 
 conception of itself. 
 
 How far this ambiguity of the term Ministry can 
 be pressed may be learnt when the late Bishop of 
 Salisbury, Dr. John Wordsworth, is found classifying 
 Asceticism as a ministry, which, he tells us, is lay 
 and charismatic and occasional. ^ Chastity is a 
 grace : that is, it is a charisma ; therefore its practice 
 is a ministry and a charismatic ministry ; and it is a 
 lay ministry, since laymen also may be chaste ; and 
 it is further a ministry because asceticism took 
 the place of martyrdom and confessorship, martyrs 
 
 ^ St. Luke 1. 2; Acts xiii. 5; xxvi. 16; 1 Cor. iv. 1. 
 ^ " And stewards of the mysteries of God." 
 3 Ministry of Grace, pp. 209-10 ; and see Harnack, Texte und 
 Vntersuchungen, p. 149 of the prolegomena. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 113 
 
 and confessors having been in the habit of giving 
 (in contravention of discipline) letters of peace to 
 excommunicates. The blessed martyrs and con- 
 fessors have thus also, it would seem, become a 
 ministry. It is difficult to see wherein we are helped 
 by so elaborate confusion in the use of words — which, 
 after all, are our only tools for discussion. The 
 instance given is extreme, but hardly singular. 
 
 Every Christian activity is a dtaxovca — a service 
 to Christ, or to the Church, or to the fellow Christian, 
 or to humanity at large ; even asceticism may, with 
 some stretching, be so named, in so far as it aims 
 to discipline self and so to exalt the standard of 
 Christian practice and of the Christian character. 
 Every believer is Christ's SidKovog, but not every one 
 is Christ's vTirjQsrrjg. It is impossible, again, to delimit 
 a ministry in the proper sense by the criterion of 
 gift; for all have gifts, and all (potentially or in 
 degree) have every gift,^ seeing that it is the same 
 Spirit which each has received ; though, for reasons 
 individual to the several subjects of the Spirit's 
 indwelling, the manifestation of the Spirit's influence 
 may differ. It is impossible to delimit a ministry 
 by the criterion of speciality of gift: speciality of 
 charisma is a matter of degree ; all have charismata, 
 and all have (potentially or in degree) all charismata, 
 and especially all have the charismata of prophecy and 
 of teaching — there is no disciple who cannot show 
 the way of the Lord, or who may not be the medium 
 of expressing the mind of the Spirit; there is no 
 1 1 Cor. xii. 6, 7, 31 ; xiv. 1, 31, 39. 
 
114 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 definite point at which possession of gift or of 
 grace can be said to remove its possessor into a 
 separate category.^ It is equally impossible to 
 employ for this purpose the criterion of the exercise 
 of gift; Timothy's diaKovia was what it was, and 
 his charisma was in him, whether he stirred it up 
 or neglected it.^ Least of all, perhaps, is it possible 
 in the sense intended to delimit a ministry by the 
 criterion of lifelong devotion ^ to a specific activity. 
 The Christian world is full of lifelong consecra- 
 tions to particular services and causes, which derive 
 much of their specific value from their spontane- 
 ous and unofficial character. " Temperance " work, 
 *' rescue " work, the circulation of the Scriptures, 
 are dtaxovlat of the highest efficiency ; but to classify 
 them as ministries in the sense in which we discuss 
 the origin of the ministry would in no way advance 
 knowledge. The work of foreign missions, again, 
 is a clearly demarcated diaxovia, but it is in no 
 relevant sense a separate " ministry " ; it offers 
 itself to Christians of every status ; it cuts across 
 all distinctions, and employs women as well as 
 men, schoolmasters, gardeners, carpenters, printers, 
 translators as well as " ministers," and draws with 
 it a host of fellow-workers who adhere to its organisa- 
 tion without engaging in its immediate operation. 
 
 1 See Principal Lindsay, op. cit., p. 69-71; where he is 
 extremely convincing and satisfactory. 
 
 2 1 Tim. iv. 14; 2 Tim. i. 6. 
 
 ^ Lindsay, op, cit.^ pp. 74-5, 82; Harnack, Expansion of 
 Christianity (trans. Williams & Norgate, 1904), pp. 435 ff. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 115 
 
 Foreign evangelism is a direction of effort and 
 interest which ought to appeal to all Christians 
 alike. The distinction of the Church's evangelistic 
 from its pastoral function is a valid one, but it is 
 not a distinction with separate " ministries " in 
 the sense under consideration. Any Christian 
 minister is available for either sphere; any Chris- 
 tian layman may find his individual vocation in 
 the service of either side of the Church's vocation. 
 In whichever service either prefers to engage, the 
 minister continues to be a minister and the layman 
 to be a layman. 
 
 Does any better criterion of what is properly 
 intended when we speak of a ministry suggest 
 itself ? 
 
 One clear note would unquestionably be that 
 which has sometimes been claimed for charismatics,^ 
 namely, that local Churches depended upon them 
 for ministrations, " special " or otherwise. Any 
 order of men upon whom the Church depends for 
 the ministration of grace must certainly be in every 
 sense of the word a ministry. For this claim on 
 behalf of charismatics it would, however, be difficult 
 to discover any ground whatever outside of the 
 Didache ; and a doubt as to the value of the evidence 
 of the Didache has already been suggested (see 
 p. 75). While as a matter of fact the Didache itself 
 does not either assert or imply such dependence, 
 
 1 Turner, Camh. Med. Hist., I. vi., pp. 144, 145; Rawlinson, 
 Foundations, App., p. 415. Cf. Gore, Church and Ministry, 
 pp. 255-7. 
 
116 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 but categorically asserts the contrary, that bishops 
 and deacons also minister the ministry of prophets 
 and teachers (c. XV. 1). 
 
 Or one might with some confidence suggest the 
 criterion of responsibility. All have graces, and all 
 are called to services — so far as these things go 
 there is no difference between Christian and Chris- 
 tian except difference of degree. We do not, how- 
 ever, ascribe to all that specific responsibility for 
 charge, the idea of which it is difficult to eliminate 
 from our conception of anything that calls itself 
 ministry. An irresponsible ministry is pretty well 
 a contradiction in terms. Apostles were responsible 
 persons : St. Paul carried the burden of all the 
 Churches ; there is clear acceptance of respective 
 responsibilities in the allocation of spheres which is 
 described in Gal. ii. 7-9 ; the note of conscious 
 responsibility runs through all the apostolic 
 epistles : we cannot imagine St. Paul, St. Peter, 
 St. James or St. John as repudiating it. The 
 apostolic delegates, Timothy, Titus and the rest, 
 were clearly responsible persons and could be taken 
 to task. A presbyter was a responsible person, 
 as St. Paul made clear to those who met him at 
 Miletus ^ : the presbyter had received his charge as 
 overseer of the flock of God, and it was his task to 
 watch over that and as its shepherd to feed it.^ 
 The deacon was a responsible person, " serving an 
 office " and answerable for trust. ^ In this feature 
 
 1 Acts XX. 17 £f. 
 
 2 Ibid. 28, 31 ; conf . 1 Peter v. 2-3 ; 1 Tim. v. 17. ^ 1 Tim. iu. 13. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 117 
 
 we find something definite and apprehensible by 
 which to recognise Christ's vnrjQerrjg. 
 
 This note of responsibility for charge attends the 
 ministry of subsequent periods. Clement supports 
 the presbyters of Corinth as men who have received 
 a trust and have been faithful to it.^ To Ignatius, 
 the bishop, the presbyter and the deacon are dis- 
 tinctively men placed in responsibility, the men to 
 whom his appeal must be directed and who shall 
 give account of their response to it. For Hermas 
 the presbyters are the responsible persons to whom 
 the Lady of his vision (i. e. the Church) requires 
 that her message be delivered, ^ Clement (as one of 
 them in particular office) having special duty to 
 deal with it. Polycarp, in his Epistle to the Philip- 
 pian Church, knows the responsibility of deacons 
 and presbyters, and mourns for Valens, the back- 
 sliding presbyter, that he has so little understood 
 the trust assigned to him. Ministry and responsi- 
 bility are correlative — to repudiate the one is to 
 repudiate the other. 
 
 The prophetic or charismatic ministry^ as it is 
 described, lacks this note of responsibility for 
 charge : " they were not responsible to any Society 
 of Christians." ^ But what is that but to say that 
 they occupied no defined relation to the Society of 
 Christians, were not parts of the articulation of the 
 Body * — that they were not a ministry ? Harnack 
 is logical when he speaks of the supposed authority 
 1 Ad Cor. xliv. 9. 2 yig^ i^ 4, 
 
 3 Lindsay, op, cit., p. 73. * Ephes. iv. 16. 
 
118 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 of such a ministry as '' despotism " ^ : power without 
 responsibility is despotism. An ethical responsi- 
 bility to conscience and to God, the Judge of all, 
 exists of course in every man's case and for any 
 course of action, but that is not to the purpose ; the 
 responsibility in question is obviously one which 
 the Church has laid upon its members, fidelity to 
 which the Church can require. In the case of the 
 charismatic there is no trace of such an attribution 
 or of such a demand. The prophet is never blamed 
 for what in the Church's condition or conduct is 
 blameworthy ^ ; the prophet is never called to 
 account ; the prophet is never asked for help. It is 
 not merely that specific instances of such appeal or of 
 such reprobation cannot be instanced — it is that the 
 idea is absent; there is nothing to suggest that the 
 charismatic person as such is a responsible person. 
 If there existed in or round the centres of Apostolic 
 anxiety a charismatic ministry which, as we are 
 told, "dominated or controlled," or even one which 
 exercised " very great authority," its responsibility 
 in certain cases must have been great, and it is 
 incredible that it should never have been reminded 
 of that fact : that St. Paul, for example, should 
 have made no call for the testimony of prophets in 
 Galatia, and should offer to Timothy no guidance for 
 
 ^ Theol. Lit. Zeitung, 1889, pp. 420, 421, quoted as above. 
 
 2 False prophets are blamed for prophesying falsely, but one 
 does not understand them to be a ministry. St. Paul's appeal 
 to the Spiritual, Gal. vi. 1 (conf. 1 Cor. ii. 14; iii. 1), is not an 
 appeal to prophets or to a charismatic order or class, but is an 
 appeal to Christian men on their profession. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 119 
 
 his relation to them at Ephesus, and that Clement 
 should not have invoked their support for his remon- 
 strance with the Corinthian Church. It is incom- 
 prehensible in that case that (to use a Hibernicism) 
 Ignatius should apparently have met no prophet but 
 himself between Antioch and Troas. Had there 
 been any Christian ministry besides that of bishops 
 presbyters and deacons in the Churches to which 
 he writes, any dominating controlling ministry or 
 even one of very great authority, he must either 
 have sought its advocacy in the cause of unity for 
 whose interest he writes, or if he did not (though it 
 is difficult to suppose that a spiritual ministry would 
 not be with him in that cause) he must at least have 
 allowed us to infer a reason why he should neglect 
 to invoke so powerful an ally. The argument from 
 silence is, of course, to be used with caution, but 
 sometimes it may approach to demonstration. In 
 this case the argument is not that the prophet is not 
 mentioned; it is that when his help is needed it is 
 not asked; no one thinks of asking it — he is not a 
 responsible person. But responsibility is a necessary 
 note of recognised ministry. 
 
 It is convenient to instance the prophet, because 
 the prophetic character is by general consent the 
 most distinctive in the conception of charismatic 
 ministry, and because the '' prophet " imports into 
 the question less ambiguity than the " apostle." 
 The " apostle " is claimed on all hands. He stands 
 at the head of both series of persons for whom the 
 character of ministry is asserted. The regular 
 
120 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 ministry of the Catholic Church traces derivation 
 from apostles ; the advocates of a theory of twofold 
 ministry place the apostle at the head of the charis- 
 matic series as it is supposed to be arranged in the 
 lists given by St. Paul. Unfortunately the opposed 
 theories do not employ the term in precisely the 
 same extent. In the Catholic system the apostle 
 is assumed in a narrower, for the theory of charis- 
 matic ministry in a wider, sense. ^ As has been 
 already pointed out (p. 109), Christian terminology 
 was in the first period in process of extraction from 
 the common stock of speech ; the words extracted 
 and specialised for Christian purposes were words 
 in frequent use for ordinary purposes, and their 
 partial specialisation did not interfere with that 
 ordinary employment of them — whence the need 
 of care in arguing from them where they occur. 
 This care is needed in the case of anooxelho and its 
 derivatives, such as ojiooxoXoi;. 
 
 The idea of Mission (dmooxolrj) is, as has been 
 said,2 the background of Christianity as an organised 
 system. Behind Christ is God, the Source of re- 
 demption. To Christ the Father is " He who sent 
 Him " 3; He Himself is '' the Sent of the Father." * 
 In His turn Christ became the Sender ; as the Father 
 had sent Him, so He sent others into the world ^ : 
 
 ^ " It was the Apostolate in its widest extent that was part 
 of the prophetic ministry of the primitive Churches :" Lindsay, 
 op. cit., p. 85. 
 
 2 Turner, Studies, p. 12. ^ St, John viii. 29, etc. 
 
 « Ibid. X. 36, etc. « Ibid. xvii. 18: xx. 21. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 121 
 
 these He named " the Sent," Apostles.^ As Christ 
 presented Himself to the world in the Name of the 
 Father, so they presented themselves to the world 
 in the Name of Christ. They now became the 
 Senders of others : " through them alone came the 
 gift of the Holy Ghost, conveyed by the laying on 
 of hands ; they or those commissioned by them 
 appointed or ratified the appointment of even the 
 local officials in each infant community." ^ The 
 Church founded on them is itself a mission and the 
 constant origin of mission. This idea of mission 
 was the inspiration of its activities and was at the 
 same time the safeguard of its order, for mission 
 was necessary to those who should represent it; 
 men could not preach (xtjQviovoiv, speak as King's 
 messengers) unless they were sent (dutooTaXcooLv).^ 
 
 "AnooxillsLv may then very well be, as it is, con- 
 stantly recurrent in the New Testament; and 
 dnoorohg, its cognate noun, might be expected to 
 occur with proportionate frequency. As a matter 
 of fact, however, it is not proportionately frequent, 
 the probable reason being that our Lord had assigned 
 it as the title of His immediate delegates. St. Paul 
 (who is outside of the circle of immediate Dominical 
 contacts and is not restricted by the usages of that 
 circle) uses the word much in discussion of his own 
 personal position ; St. Luke, who is St. Paul's disciple 
 and follows him in his application of the term, 
 employs it occasionally in his Gospel and habitually 
 in the Acts. Otherwise it is of rare occurrence. 
 
 ^ St. Luke vi. 13. ^ Turner, ut supra. ^ Rom. x. 16. 
 
122 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 St. Matthew has it only of the original commission 
 to the disciples,^ and St. Mark only of their return 
 from the first circuit ^ ; St. John only once, and then 
 in its etymological sense. ^ In his Gospel St. Luke, 
 besides the record of the call of the disciples and a 
 quotation in which it is used etymologically,* has 
 it three times,^ and in one of these places (the second 
 of them) substitutes it for the dajdexa of the other 
 synoptists. Elsewhere, outside of St. Paul and of 
 the Book of Acts, it is found, applied etymologically 
 to our Lord, in Heb. iii. 1 ; in 1 Peter i. 1 (twice in 
 2 Peter), and in St. Jude 17; in the Apocalypse 
 three times. ^ In the Gospels ' the ordinary style 
 is "the Twelve" (thirty-one times); and this 
 term is found, besides, once in Acts and once in the 
 Apocalypse. 
 
 In St. Paul's writings and in the Book of Acts, 
 which in a usage of this sort may be grouped to- 
 gether, the word " apostle " is found used in a sense 
 midway between that in which it applies distinc- 
 
 1 St. Matt. X. 2. 2 St. Mark vi. 30. 
 
 ^ " Neither he that is sent greater than He that sent him,"^ 
 St. John xiii. 16. 
 
 * Behold I send unto you prophets and messengers {airocToKovs), 
 St. Luke xi. 49. 
 
 ^ Ibid. xvii. 5; xxii. 14; xxiv. 10. 
 
 ^ The etymological use of " Apostle '- in these passages is not to 
 be confounded with the lower or more extended use of it in its 
 technical sense in such passages as 2 Cor. viii. 23 or Phil. ii. 25 
 
 ' Obviously the Gospels in their preference of " the Twelve " 
 to " the apostles '' represent a wider practice, and in the case of 
 St. John a later practice, than that of St. Paul and St. Luke, who 
 prefer to say " apostles." 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 123 
 
 tively to the Twelve and the colloquial sense in 
 which it appears in St. Luke xi. 49, St. John xiii. 16, 
 Heb. iii. 1 — to describe a delegate acting in special 
 commission, or perhaps as almost the equivalent 
 of our " missionary," which, apart from technical 
 association, would exactly render it.^ Paul thus 
 calls Epaphroditus the emissary (ojioorokog) of the 
 Philippians.^ To the Corinthians he describes cer- 
 tain brethren, the companions of Titus, as " messen- 
 gers " {dn6oro?,oi) of the Churches and of Christ the 
 glory,^ this last clause inserted to make clear that 
 they are not called apostles in relation to Christ. 
 In these passages St. Paul leaves no doubt of the 
 " lower sense " in which he there applies the term 
 apostle, and makes it no less clear that in using it in 
 this lower sense he is aware that the word has a 
 higher meaning. He is less clear in his description 
 of Andronicus and Junias, who are said to be 
 iniorjjuoi iv xolg ojiooxoloiq^ (A.V. "of note among 
 the apostles "); it is uncertain whether this means 
 " esteemed by the apostles " or " esteemed among 
 the apostles " — Zahn, for example, supports the 
 former, Lightfoot the latter, while Weizsacker treats 
 the point as undetermined, but favours '' among." 
 If the name Junias be, as some think, that 
 of a woman, there could hardly be question that 
 
 ^ We ourselves may speak of Ninian as apostle of the Plots 
 or Boniface of Germany without confusing them in office with 
 the apostles. 
 
 ^ ^fxS)V Se air6ffro\ov Koi \eirovpyhv rrjs xpe'cs l^-ov chap. ii. 25; the 
 
 u/x&v is emphatic. 
 3 2 Cor. viii. 23. * Rom. ivi. 7. 
 
124 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 apostle is here equivalent to " missionary " ; many 
 women are and have been missionaries, but Paul 
 did not suffer a woman to speak in the Church. It 
 is at least possible that here Paul uses the word in a 
 sense so far technical that he applies it to a class or 
 group ; if so, still in a sense etymologically deter- 
 mined, and not determined by analogy with its 
 specific application to the Twelve. I am not able 
 to find that Barnabas is called an apostle to the 
 Gentiles in the Epistle to the Galatians,^ though 
 the idea that he was an apostle (as St. Paul was) 
 may be implied there and in 1 Cor. ix. 5 : " We 
 ... as well as other apostles." St. Luke certainly 
 does bracket him with Paul in " the apostles " of 
 Acts xiv. 4, 14. Silas and Timothy may be included 
 in St. Paul's " we " of 1 Thess., and so be numbered 
 among " the apostles " of chap. ii. 6, though the 
 etymological meaning of apostle would there be quite 
 satisfactory. 2 
 
 ^ Lindsay, op. cit., p. 79. St. Paul is careful to maintain the 
 singular number in his narrative of the incident of the recognition 
 of respective spheres. 
 
 ^ In 1 Cor. XV. 5-7, St. Paul recounts a series of our Lord's 
 post-resurrection appearances. Among these he names two in 
 the following terms : "He was seen ... of the Twelve . . . 
 then of all the apostles."' It has been suggested that St. Paul 
 here distinguishes " the Twelve " from " all the apostles," 
 using the word " apostles " in a sense wider than that in which 
 it was applied to the Twelve. This would ascribe to Paul the 
 view that even before the Ascension, " apostle '^ had received 
 the wider extension ; looking back he found it proper to recognise 
 under that name a larger circle of our Lord's emissaries and to 
 distinguish them by it. Having regard to St. Paul's employment 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 125 
 
 To enter further into this seems hardly necessary, 
 since the instances given above suffice to make it in- 
 disputable that St. Paul applies the term " apostle " 
 to other than the Twelve. One can see reason why, 
 not being himself one of the Twelve, but claiming 
 (and the claim has been always admitted) to share 
 their prerogative, he should have inclined to em- 
 phasise the characteristic of mission in which he 
 did share with them, and then to recognise it, so 
 far as it existed in others, with a conciliatory 
 
 of the term in other connections it might not seem entirely 
 impossible that he should apply it, for example, to the Seventy. 
 
 At the same time it is improbable that he should have done 
 so. There is not a trace of such an extension of the scope of the 
 word " apostle " within the Gospels, and St. Paul could hardly 
 have learned it from the tradition which he here declares himself 
 to deliver as he had received it. The narrative as to the Seventy 
 is St. Luke's, and it carefully distinguishes the Seventy from 
 those whom Christ " named apostles " (St. Luke x. 1 ; comp. 
 chap. vi. 13). 
 
 The inference that St. Paul distinguishes the subjects of the 
 two appearances is unnecessary ; the two clauses do not immedi- 
 ately follow each other — if they did, a distinction between " the 
 Twelve '^ and " all the apostles '^ would, of course, be un- 
 mistakable ; as it is, St. Paul may merely be avoiding, as most 
 writers try to do, repetition of phraseology ; he may only mean 
 to say " then again to the Twelve '' ; or in the " all ** there may 
 be a reminiscence of the absence of one apostle, St. Thomas, 
 at the Lord's first appearance to the apostles as a group : or 
 St. Paul may wish to introduce the word " apostles "' immedi- 
 ately before mention of the appearance to himself, and to remind 
 us that he, like " all the apostles," had also " seen the Lord.'* 
 He is not in any case writing with care to be precise; at the 
 point to which he refers the exact description should have been 
 " the Eleven " (Acts ii. 14). 
 
126 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 generosity. It is evident that the original apostles 
 were customarily referred to as the Twelve — Paul 
 could not so speak of himself as to be included in 
 that title. For this plural, "the Twelve," the only 
 singular is " One of the Twelve," which in his case 
 would have been inaccurate. By a sort of necessity 
 Paul fell back upon that other title, which could be 
 used of an individual and which properly expressed 
 what he had in common with the Twelve : he, too, was 
 " sent " of Christ — in a manner which, indeed, was 
 not that of the sending of the Twelve, but which 
 was equally definite and was to the same effect. 
 Having adopted the word, which we must remember 
 was not to him, as it is to us, a purely technical word 
 of one single application, but was pregnant with 
 derivative force, he uses it with some freedom and 
 more frequently than others seem to have done : 
 he plays upon its grammatical meaning ; he shares 
 it readily with others, so far as they at all share in 
 what it implies ; in the quality, that is, of mission. 
 From St. Paul Luke has caught the trick of speech — 
 apostle is the word that comes most readily to his 
 pen — once in his Gospels he actually substitutes it 
 for " the Twelve," which the source before him 
 offered ; he calls the second book of his proposed 
 trilogy the Acts, not " of the Twelve," which would 
 not at all have suited his scheme, but " of the 
 apostles," so finding room within its scope not only 
 for the earlier Jerusalem incidents, but also for the 
 journey of his beloved master and leader ; and in it 
 he avoids, except once, mention of " the Twelve " 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 127 
 
 by that title, though we know from the Gospels 
 that it, and not " apostles," was the phrase currently 
 employed. 
 
 So far then as the Canonical sources ^ inform us, 
 
 ^ There is from non-canonical sources a certain amount of 
 evidence of a consciousness that the word "apostle" is capable 
 of the wider sense. Not in Clement: to him "the apostles" 
 are strictly the Twelve with Paul, from whom even Barnabas 
 is distinguished. Barnabas in speaking of Christ's tSiovs 
 airoardAovs may be thought to show the feeling that there 
 were also apostles who were not in the same sense apostles of 
 Christ, but it is doubtful if that is his thought — the "(Sioi, like 
 the other qualification, " who were afterwards to publish 
 His Gospel," may seem rather to be related to the statement 
 that these whom Christ chose to be His own apostles and 
 to evangelise were " men who had been very great sinners.'* 
 Hermas {Simil. ix. 15, 16, 25) unmistakably speaks of apostles 
 in the wider sense; the fourth course of his mystical Tower 
 consists of forty, who are " apostles and teachers of the preach- 
 ing of the Son of God." In the Visions, on the other hand 
 (iii. 5), he has in view the Ministry in its completeness, regarded 
 as foundational to the Church's life — " the square and white 
 stones which fit exactly in their joints are the apostles and 
 bishops and teachers and deacons " — in this classification 
 (in which teachers appear as the equivalent of presbyters) the 
 apostles intended seem to be strictly the Twelve, regarded as 
 the source of ministry ; for had the charismatic idea been present 
 to the writer's mind, prophets must have appeared in the cata- 
 logue along with apostles and teachers as in the catalogue of 
 the Similitudes. The conclusion would be that to Hermas 
 " the apostles " when named absolutely and without qualifica- 
 tion, mean the apostles in the higher sense, and stand at the 
 head of the "regular" ministries; but that he knows also of 
 apostles in the lower sense, whom he groups with teachers, and 
 names after prophets, and explains as " apostles ... of the 
 preaching of the Son of God," that is as evangelists : apostles 
 proper in this passage appearing as the ten stones placed at 
 
128 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 the lower or wider sense of " apostle " seems to be 
 only Pauline. 1 We have no evidence that it was 
 general. Paul himself seems to be perfectly con- 
 scious that he uses it somewhat loosely.^ He is 
 extremely sensible of the distinctive character of 
 the apostleship of the Twelve, equivalence to which 
 he asserted for his own apostleship. He certainly 
 would not, for example, have claimed for Epaphro- 
 ditus or for Junias in his commendations of them, 
 what in well-known passages ^ he claims for himself. 
 He concedes to them, certainly, a part in his voca- 
 tion — he recognises that they and he alike are men 
 who are *' sent " to their work and who go to it in the 
 supporting consciousness that they are not self -sent 
 — and he takes advantage of the grammatical force 
 of the word andoroXog to imply so much ; but not, 
 perhaps, to imply more.* St. Luke follows him in 
 giving the word the same somewhat undefined scope. 
 
 the foundation, who " were of the first age.^* Eusebius {H. E. 
 i. 12) remembers that such a wider usage of the term apostle 
 has existed and should be noticed ; but he knows little about 
 it, and commits himself to nothing, speaking of " many others 
 who were called apostles in imitation of the Twelve."' 
 
 ^ The exception to this statement may be the pseud-apostles 
 of Rev. ii. 2; but the terminology of Apocalypse is symbolic, 
 not historical, and the use of the word there is probably dependent 
 on its use by St. Paul. 
 
 2 Phil. ii. 25; 2 Cor. viii. 23. 
 
 3 ICor.ix. 1; 2Cor. xii. 13; Gal. ii. 7-8; ITim.ii. 7; 2 Tim. 
 i. 11, etc. 
 
 * It may not be without significance that St. Paul always 
 escapes directly describing Barnabas as an apostle, just as he 
 avoids calling Timothy an apostle : see Colos. i. 1 ; 2 Cor. i. 1 ; 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 129 
 
 But nothing shows that any confusion existed be- 
 tween the Twelve, " the Apostles," " the Apostles 
 of the Lord " (with whom St. Paul is to be num- 
 bered), and the general company of evangelists and 
 missionaries, or that the Twelve merged into one 
 order with evangelists and missionaries in general, 
 or that evangelists and missionaries in general were 
 ever reckoned in one class with the Twelve, or were 
 ever, in common with them, known as apostles. 
 
 " The true apostles," as Lightfoot calls them,i 
 stood alone ; they were apostles of Christ as Christ 
 was Apostle of the Father, the executors of the 
 
 Phil. i. 1. In the case of men so prominent his use of the word 
 might have led to confusion between the two senses in which 
 Paul seems to have applied it. In effect, he denies it to any 
 except himself and the Eleven : " when Paul places in the sub- 
 scription of some Epistle, together with his own name, the 
 names of some of his co-workers, he is careful not to give them 
 a title which is not theirs : " so Batiffol {Prim. Cath., p. 40), 
 comparing the phraseology of 1 Cor. i. 1 ; 2 Cor. i. 1 ; Ephes. i. 1 
 with that of 2 Cor. i. 1, and Colos. i. 1, and again with that of 
 Phil. i. 1 ; 1 Thess. i. 2 ; Thess. i. 1. In a sense — an etymological 
 sense — which for purposes of exposition could be pressed some- 
 what farther than the purely etymological, they might some- 
 times be described as apostles : but " Apostles of Christ Jesus,'* 
 as he was, they were not. The Apostleship proper, in fact, is 
 not in Paul's view a charismatic function — it is an office dependent 
 on Christ's appointment and limited to those to whom Christ 
 has directly given it. 
 
 ^ Dissertation appended to Commentary on Epistle to the 
 Philip'pians, 7th ed., p. 196. Principal Lindsay speaks of " the 
 unique position occupied by the Eleven and by St. Paul." It 
 is, at least, a tenable opinion that the pre-pentecostal choice 
 of Matthias was of no effect, and that St. Paul was divinely 
 called to be the twelfth apostle. « 
 
 K 
 
130 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 New Testament and the medium of the transmission 
 to the Church of Christ's deposit of doctrine and 
 ordinance. To use an old phrase which has sanction 
 in Scottish theology, they were the " first deposit- 
 aries of the Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven." 
 From them, if the New Testament sources are to 
 be trusted, the Church's historical ministry has 
 derived by way of delegation. At first containing 
 in themselves all ministry, they " committed to 
 other faithful men " such of its functions as were 
 transmissible : first relieving themselves of the less 
 sacred, but still sacred, charge of ministry to tem- 
 poral need — a demission of which we have detailed 
 record, probably intended (for it is St. Luke's 
 manner to illustrate methods, rather than to narrate 
 every instance of their application) to be illustrative 
 of further demissions which are undescribed ; and 
 next devolving functions which were directly spiritual 
 — those of pastorate, discipline and ministry of the 
 Word and Sacraments. The Apostles appear as the 
 centre from which mission and authority radiate. 
 There is no record of any other such source, and no 
 record of activity which dispenses with this source 
 or proceeds without dependence upon it. One figure 
 indeed, that of Apollos, moves for a moment upon 
 the fringe of the Christian Society in a unique in- 
 dependence, but forthwith is drawn into its orderly 
 system. St. Luke avoids detail as to this case of 
 Apollos and the dealings of " the brethren " at 
 Ephesus with it ; but he goes on immediately to the 
 case of '* certain disciples " whom St. Paul found 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 131 
 
 at Corinth, whose doctrinal and ecclesiastical posi- 
 tion was similar to that of Apollos ; and he is ex- 
 plicit as to St. Paul's dealings with them. Luke's 
 delicacy in reference to Apollos need not hide from 
 us what is so transparent^ — his intention to convey 
 to us that such cases as that of Apollos and of 
 those disciples at Corinth required to be and were 
 regularised. 
 
 The apostleship proper had a double function. 
 It had the pastoral care of the Church and its mem- 
 bers ; and in this it came to be represented by the 
 regular ministry to which pastoral affairs were 
 committed : we have record of the manner of the 
 apostles' provision for that end as the area of the 
 Church was extended.^ But they had also, and even 
 primarily, the function of evangelisation — that 
 missionary vocation to which the name " apostle " 
 most properly refers. In the discharge of this 
 function we find them associating with themselves 
 colleagues, assistants, delegates ; some of whom 
 may have in the general regard ranked almost with 
 themselves, as at least two, Barnabas and James 
 the Just, certainly did, and perhaps also Apollos ; 
 others who were their companions and subordinates 
 in their own circuits, as were Luke and Silas with 
 Paul, or Mark with Peter; others who were their 
 
 ^ Acts xiv. 23 ; Tit. 1-5. These give us St. Paul's practice, 
 but the same is recorded of St. John (Eus., H. E., iii. 23) ; 
 and at the date of St. Paul's ordinations in Lycaonia and 
 Pamphylia, the position of presbyters at Jerusalem was already 
 sufficiently defined to imply some length of prescription (Acts xv, 
 2, 4, 6, 22). 
 
132 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 trusted representatives in particular spheres, as 
 Timothy and Titus were for Paul ; and with these 
 it is at least possible, a body of the earlier Dominical 
 discipleship ^ — we have no certainty that the 
 Seventy, for example, may not have been recognised 
 as holding along with the apostles some prescrip- 
 tion,2 though less defined, from the Lord's selection 
 of them for His service, or that they did not continue 
 after Pentecost in active prosecution of it. It is 
 prudent, perhaps, to admit an uncertainty as to 
 the precise relation of men like Barnabas and James 
 to the apostles proper, and as to those gradations 
 within the circle around the apostleship, of which 
 there are indications. ^ There was an apostolic 
 function of world-wide evangelism, and there was 
 an apostolic staff which this function engaged. 
 This staff was in the nature of things ambulatory, 
 oecumenical, authoritative : it was a missionary 
 staff; and missionaries peregrinate, missionaries 
 exercise authority over local churches and their 
 infant ministries. But in all this, it is with a 
 working staff, a practical organisation, that we have 
 to do, and not with a charismatic ministry — with 
 apostolic agencies which are not self-validated 
 and are not qualified only by gift and are not 
 irresponsible, but are selected and are sent and are 
 accountable to the authority which they represent. 
 
 ^ Andronicus and Jrniias were kinsmen of Paul, therefore 
 Hebrews, and were in Christ before Paul, and were at least 
 " men of note." 
 
 2 See Gore, Church and Ministry, pp. 201, 213 n., 259. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 133 
 
 As to apostleship, however, this ambiguity of 
 usage, in a stricter and in a wider sense, does exist, 
 and for clearness it is convenient to take the prophet 
 as the typical charismatic and to investigate his 
 position. That it is proper to do so appears from 
 the fact that the terms prophetic ministry and charis- 
 matic ministry are not seldom used as interchange- 
 able. If the prophet is found occupying something 
 which can be recognised as a definite ministry, the 
 theory of "double ministry " is so far established. 
 
 What, then, is a prophet ? He is a man to whom 
 the mind of God is revealed. He has spiritual 
 intuition. Prophecy in the spiritual region corre- 
 sponds to genius in the intellectual, and like genius 
 has the quality of necessity. As Lord Lytton has 
 said, " Genius does what it must ; talent does what 
 it can." Like genius, prophecy has that character 
 of the unaccountable which we call inspiration : it 
 sees, it knows ; and what it knows seems to it not 
 its own, but given to it, and given for others as a 
 message to be delivered; both genius and prophet 
 are compelled to seek expression. The prophet is 
 conscious of God and of God's thought and will; 
 he reads God's purpose and thrills to the Divine 
 emotions, rejoicing with God's joy and angry with 
 God's indignation. He may even respond to God's 
 omniscience and be sensitive to the future as it lies 
 in God's knowledge, and prophecy may then show 
 itself as prediction ; though prediction is far from 
 being its characteristic, except in so far as sympathy 
 
134 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 with the Divine approbations and disapprobations 
 may make plain to the prophetic mind the issues of 
 conduct, or may impress it with foreboding or with 
 confidence, which rest upon insight into the prin- 
 ciples which determine the action of providence.^ 
 In both Old Testament and New, trance and vision 
 appear as modes of prophecy, but must be accounted 
 as lower forms of it and among those which may 
 " fail " and cease,^ as the higher and essential 
 prophecy cannot. Trance and vision may occur 
 to persons who are not prophets ; Ananias was no 
 more than " a certain disciple "3; and it is impro- 
 bable that Pilate's wife * was a prophetess. If 
 apocalypse is also to be reckoned with prophecy, 
 it would seem to be rather a " by-product " of its 
 energy — St. Paul clearly differentiates it from pro- 
 phecy, grouping it with a class of utterances whose 
 common characteristic is that they interpret or have 
 need of interpretation — ^while prophecy rather calls 
 for the exercise of discrimination.^ Jewish apo- 
 calyptic appeared on the wane of prophecy of the 
 more genuine type. As to recorded apocalypse there 
 must always remain the uncertainty whether it is a 
 record of actual vision or is prediction cast in the 
 
 ^ It is to be expected that narrative such as that of Acts 
 should emphasise the predictive side of prophecy, since pre- 
 diction, where it occurred, would affect the development of the 
 story which is recorded. Yet the Book of Acts records only two 
 instances of prediction, both by the same individual, chaps, xi. 
 28 and xxi. 10-11. 
 
 2 1 Cor. xiii. 8. 3 Acts ix. 10. 
 
 4 St. Matt, xxvii. 19. ^ i Cor. xiv. 26-9. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 135 
 
 literary form of vision described. For St. Paul the 
 criterion of prophecy proper was that the prophet 
 retained control of his faculties and exercised a con- 
 current criticism of his own utterances, as the subject 
 of trance or vision cannot.^ One ground of the 
 condemnation of Montanistic prophecy was, there- 
 fore, its ecstatic character. The prophet is not a 
 " medium " ; he is a man interiorly illuminated by 
 the Spirit to the apprehension of God and of the 
 mind of God. He is required to co-ordinate his 
 utterance with the norm of belief delivered to him 
 and to his hearers — it must follow " the analogy of 
 the faith." 2 
 
 One distinctive feature of the Messianic kingdom 
 was to be that the Spirit of God, formerly given to 
 the few, who by it were constituted prophets, should 
 then be poured upon all ^ ; not that the gift should 
 
 ^ As St. Paul conceives of it, prophecy under the New Testa- 
 ment is not " a supernatural power ** (Cotterill, Genesis of the 
 Church, p. 422), in such a sense that it should interfere with the 
 play of a man's own rational faculties or spiritual capacities, and 
 therefore be inconsistent with the perfection of either. It is a 
 manifestation of new nature created in man by his reception of 
 the Holy Spirit. The Christian nature is itself supernatural in 
 relation to humanity in general, but prophecy is not supernatural 
 to the Christian in whom the life of Christ is normal. It is the 
 exercise of faculties which are exalted, and of capacities which 
 are spiritualised. Not the power is supernatural, but the man 
 (1 Cor. ii. 12-16) — the power is one element of the nature which 
 he has received from on high, and prophecy is its natural exercise. 
 
 2 Rom. xii. 6, Kara tV avaXo-yiav ttjs iriarecas. " The prophecy 
 required to agree with the settled doctrines of the faith "' 
 (Weizsacker, Apostolic Age, II., p. 271). 
 
 3 Joel ii. 28-9. 
 
136 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 be more general, but that as within the kingdom 
 it should be universal — sons, daughters, old men, 
 young men, slaves and slave women should alike 
 receive the Spirit and should prophesy and see 
 visions and dream dreams ; St. Peter identified the 
 event of Pentecost as the fulfilment of this promise.^ 
 At Pentecost the Holy Spirit came upon the whole 
 Church : " they were all filled with the Holy 
 Ghost." 2 The prophetic gift is the direct and 
 inseparable result of possession of the Spirit of God, 
 and is therefore an essential feature of the new 
 nature begotten in all who are in Christ Jesus, and 
 is common to all Christians in measure as they are 
 Christian. Our Lord addresses His Discipleship as 
 a prophetic company, successors of the prophets of 
 the former dispensation : "So persecuted they the 
 prophets which were before you." The least in the 
 Kingdom of Heaven is greater than the greatest of the 
 prophets of the past age — greater than the Baptist, 
 who is himself more than a prophet. ^ Christ's 
 sheep know Christ's voice.* The children of God, 
 little children though they be, have an unction from 
 the Holy One, and they know all things and need 
 not that any man teach them ; the same anointing, 
 if they abide in Christ, teaches them all things. ^ 
 The spiritual man judges all things ; he has the 
 
 ^ Acts ii. 17. ^ Ihid. ver. 4. 
 
 ^ Tovs irpocp-fjras Tohs irph vfiwv, St. Matt. V. 12 ; jx^l^uiv . . . 'irpo(p^TT]s 
 IwdvvQv . . . ovSeis 4<ttiv. 6 Se fJiiKp6repos eV rfj ^aaiAeiq, tov @eov fxel^ajv 
 
 aiiTov 60-Tt, St. Luke vii. 28. St. Luke clearly understands the 
 comparison as being in respect of prophetic rank. 
 4 St. John X. 4. 5 1 St. John ii. 20, 27. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 137 
 
 mind of Christ; he has received the Spirit of 
 God.i 
 
 The primitive Church had constant occasion to 
 observe the fact that belief in Christ was followed 
 by the development of an understanding of the 
 things of God, of a power to judge life and conduct 
 from the Divine point of view, to evince insight 
 into Heavenly matters and to assent to Christ's 
 estimate of values. The man who received Christ 
 received power to become a son of God.^ We are 
 ourselves familiar with the experience of interior 
 
 1 1 Cor. ii. 11-16. That St. Paul is here dealing with an 
 esoteric caste of irv^vfiaTiKoi within the general discipleship, is 
 a supposition which has little to commend it. All Christians 
 are, or should be, nvevfxaTiKoi; it is to that fact that St. Paul 
 appeals. He speaks as a Christian man to Christian men; the 
 " we ^* of the passage does not refer to Paul and his associates 
 as charismatic or as apostolic persons, but to Paul and the 
 Corinthians as partakers in Christ and His Spirit. No doubt 
 St. Paul has in view a manner of speech which was probably 
 current at Corinth and elsewhere — then as now, there may have 
 been those who regarded themselves as " Christians '* in an 
 esoteric sense, and despised others. But it does not appear 
 that St. Paul accepted the claim, or that there existed any 
 definite group known as " the spiritual,'* or that it was com- 
 posed of prophets and charismatics. In Gal. vi. 1, St. Paul 
 appeals to " the spiritual " in a perfectly simple sequence from 
 a context addressed to all : " as we live by the Spirit, so 
 we should walk in the Spirit; men who have the Spirit of 
 Christ should do their best to restore the fallen and all of us 
 should bear one another's burdens.'* Possibly v/xus ol TrvevimriKoi 
 may contain a hint to the unco guid in Galatia to exercise 
 charity as well as judgment ; but it does not recognise them as a 
 charismatic group. 
 
 2 St. John i. 12. 
 
138 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 illumination which follows the change which we call 
 conversion, old things becoming new in the new 
 apprehension of their truth, so that to the converted 
 the Gospel at first seems a discovery peculiar to 
 himself, and next a truth which he finds to be echo- 
 ing round him in countless voices which he had not 
 before understood — for spiritual things are spirit- 
 ually discerned. It is this apprehension of the 
 Divine and Heavenly which is the proper fruit 
 of the Spirit as a prophetic Spirit taking the things 
 of Christ and showing them to us. " The testimony 
 of Jesus is the Spirit of prophecy." ^ 
 
 The prophetic illumination involves the impulse 
 to expression. At Pentecost those who were filled 
 with the Holy Spirit forthwith began to speak as 
 the Spirit gave them utterance, and men heard 
 them tell the wonderful works of God. In all cases 
 the soul illuminated desires to teach what it knows, 
 to commend what it perceives to be right, and to 
 reprove what it condemns. This desire is a dis- 
 tinctive note of inspiration, whether intellectual or 
 spiritual. The convert feels that it is laid upon 
 him to testify. He does not, however, in all cases 
 become the preacher; the prophetic soul does not 
 in all cases proceed to prophesy. Expression de- 
 pends upon a variety of condition : upon mental 
 equipment, temperamental inclination, fluency, 
 courage, circumstance. All are not so swift as 
 Isaiah to answer the call, " Whom shall I send? " 
 — there are many who rather say, with Jeremiah, 
 1 Rev. xix. 10. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 139 
 
 *' 1 cannot speak, for I am a child," or who protest 
 with Amos their lack of training. There are mute, 
 inglorious Miltons of the Spirit also. 
 
 In other cases the vocation may be urgent enough, 
 as it was with Jeremiah and Amos, to overcome re- 
 luctance, or there is natural facility, or there are 
 circumstances which push to the front the gifted 
 man and open his mouth to deliver his message, 
 so that his gift comes to be recognised. In the 
 differentiation of grace one is peculiarly adapted to 
 one service, another to another ; prophecy is indi- 
 cated by St. Paul as the service to which some are 
 distinctively called. At the same time it is not 
 the act of expression — it is the fact of illumination — 
 which constitutes the prophet. The gift is there be- 
 fore the use of gift ; and the gift may be possessed 
 without its utilisation. One may compare the 
 prophetic faculty to the musical. Every normal 
 person is sensitive to the power of music, has some 
 discrimination between the better and the worse 
 in music, and some power, if the power be developed 
 and trained, to reproduce music. But all have not 
 musical genius, and of those who have, all are not 
 composers, nor do all even possess the musical gift 
 in such degree that they can be called musicians. At 
 the same time the sense of music is common to the 
 genius who composes masterpieces or who interprets 
 and executes them, and to the ordinary person who 
 can only feel the value or perhaps judge the merit 
 of the work of genius : it is scarcely possible to say 
 at what point of ability or culture any individual 
 
140 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 should be described as a musician. In a somewhat 
 similar way it would be difficult to say at what point 
 the possession of the prophetic gift constitutes a 
 prophet — the prophetic Spirit is common to Chris- 
 tians ; it is as necessary in him who judges the 
 utterances of prophecy as in him who utters it. But 
 to judge prophesy in gs is the duty of all, and all have 
 capability to do so.^ 
 
 There will, however, be those in whom the spiritual 
 discernment, in which all share, is full and brilliant — 
 to whom that vision of Divine things which for most 
 of us is blurred and uncertain is clear. There will be 
 those who can utter what many feel, in whom the 
 common grace is rich and practised, and its utterance 
 is with power. There will be those through whom 
 men expect in their need to receive counsel, to whom 
 the Church is accustomed to hearken. Such were 
 probably those whom the New Testament calls par 
 excellence prophets ; in no sense an order or caste, 
 but men who in fact prophesied, and whose pro- 
 phesying commended itself. Prophecy was the 
 prerogative of no individual nor of any group. 
 St. Paul can wish for all that they might prophesy, ^ 
 and can direct how such a case should be dealt 
 with 3 ; and describes an actual state of things in 
 which " everyone " had a psalm, a teaching, an 
 apocalypse or an interpretation. According to the 
 highly instructive account of Hermas,* a man who 
 had the Spirit of God came into the assembly and 
 
 1 1 Cor. xiv. 29. ^ /^.^-^^ ^^^^ ^ 
 
 3 Ihid. vv. 24, 31. * Mand. xi. 9. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 141 
 
 in the course of ordinary worship was filled with the 
 Spirit, and spoke as he was moved. If this were 
 to occur frequently in the case of the same person, 
 he would no doubt come to be spoken of as "a 
 prophet; " but the difference between him and his 
 fellow Christian would be one of degree, not a differ- 
 ence, which should put such a man in a category by 
 himself. We speak of some men as thinkers, but more 
 or less we all think ; thinkers can never be officially 
 such, nor can prophets (within the Christian system) 
 be officially prophets ; an official prophet was not a 
 prophet, but a medicine-man. Prophecy is a grace 
 of the Spirit and an element of our common life in 
 Christ, underlying every Christian activity and con- 
 ditioning the whole development of Christian doc- 
 trine and morals ; but it is not a specialised ministry 
 — it is universally present wherever Christ lives in 
 His members.^ 
 
 Our knowledge of Christian prophecy in its recog- 
 nised manifestation is gained almost exclusively 
 from Pauline sources ^ — that is, from St. Paul 
 
 ^ St. Paul expects a negative answer to his question, " Are 
 all prophets? " (1 Cor. xii. 29). The question of nomenclature 
 is discussed later (p. 196). St. Paul addresses the Corinthians 
 in their own phraseology, and no doubt they are accustomed 
 to speak of some as especially prophets. None the less, St. 
 Paul treats prophecy as a gift common to Christians : "If all 
 prophesy," ver. 24; " Ye may all prophesy one by one," ver. 31. 
 
 2 The statement that the phenomena of prophecy followed 
 St. Paul's ministrations or was peculiarly frequent in the Churches 
 of his foundation does not seem to be supported by the facts. 
 The prophets of the Acts are all Judaean : see Acts xi. 27, 28 ; 
 xiii. 1 ; XV. 32 ; xxi. 9, 10. 
 
142 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 himself, or from the Acts narrative of his friend 
 and disciple St. Luke ; other explicit reference to it 
 occurs only in the Apocalypse, whose mystical 
 language can hardly be considered a source of 
 historical information. 
 
 1. In the Book of Acts prophets appear in con- 
 nection with three series of circumstances. The 
 first of these is the coming of certain prophets from 
 Jerusalem to Antioch.^ This incident is related in 
 sequence to the mission thither of Barnabas from 
 the Mother Church at Jerusalem. ^ St. Luke men- 
 tions it in order to introduce Agabus and his pre- 
 diction of famine, which had important consequence 
 since it led to the first Christian collection for distant 
 need; St. Luke does not concern himself with the 
 reason of their presence at Antioch, but the natural 
 inference is that they came as Barnabas had come, 
 that is, because they were sent, and that along with 
 Barnabas they represented the authority of the 
 Jerusalem Church where the apostles had their 
 centre. Those selected for this purpose were, as it 
 happened, prophets ; it is not suggested that they 
 were selected or sent as prophets. Barnabas was 
 also a prophet ; but he was chosen to go to Antioch, 
 not as a prophet, but because he was a kind man 
 iXQ'ilotog) and likely to take upon its good side the 
 movement there which he went to examine. Paul 
 was also a prophet, but it was not on that account 
 that Barnabas went to Tarsus to fetch him to his help 
 in developing that movement at Antioch, but because 
 1 Chap. li. 27. * Chap. xi. 22. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 143 
 
 at Damascus Paul had already proved himself to be 
 the right man for such work. Luke mentions that 
 the members of the reinforcing mission who followed 
 Barnabas from Jerusalem to Antioch were prophets, 
 not as if that had been their qualification for mission, 
 but because he is going on to tell how one of them, 
 Agabus, prophesied famine — a prediction which led 
 to the creation of an important precedent, whose 
 importance his later narrative will abundantly show. 
 
 It is this representative group which supplies 
 the agency for the separation of Barnabas and 
 Saul.i Luke now describes them as " prophets and 
 teachers " — he has no technical title by which to 
 name them in their immediate function : they are 
 not apostles (up to this point in Acts '' the apo- 
 stles " mean strictly the Twelve) ; and they are not 
 ' ' the presbyters of the Church which was in Antioch ' ' ; 
 they are a delegation from the Church in Jerusalem, 
 the Mother Church and source of mission. It is 
 stated that they are prophets, because as prophets 
 they offer to the Spirit a channel by which the call 
 to separate Barnabas and Saul may come; and as 
 apostolic delegates they obey the call, and con- 
 secrate and send forth their brethren. But the 
 circumstances do not imply that any group of 
 prophets might have acted to the same effect. 
 
 2. In Acts XV. 32, we are informed that Judas and 
 
 Silas, also of Jerusalem, who carried the decrees of 
 
 the council to Antioch, were prophets ; but that is 
 
 stated not in connection with their mission, or with 
 
 1 Chap. xiii. 1-3. 
 
144 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 their selection for it, but with the fact that they 
 exhorted and confirmed the brethren there.^ 
 
 3. The third point in St. Luke's narrative at which 
 we meet prophets is in the course of that journey of 
 St. Paul to Jerusalem, which resulted in his arrest 
 there. 2 The story here moves throughout in an atmo- 
 sphere of the prophetic, dense with foreboding which 
 compels us to realise (as the writer intends) the 
 Apostle's devotion and disregard of obstacles. In 
 every city, we are told, the Spirit witnessed of what 
 awaited Paul at Jerusalem. At Tyre they found 
 disciples who say " in the Spirit " that Paul ought 
 not to go thither. At Caesarea they meet the four 
 daughters of Philip who prophesy; and they en- 
 counter again Agabus, who with the girdle enacts 
 for Paul's warning his arrest and fettering. 
 
 So far as the statements of Acts inform us, we 
 would gather, I think, (1) that (even if we do not 
 take Paul's " in every city " literally) prophecy 
 was frequent, and one might meet with it anywhere 
 in the Church ; (2) that persons distinctively known 
 as prophets are not frequent ; (3) that Jerusalem, 
 the scene of the event of Pentecost, was the centre 
 of the activity of prophets : the Antioch prophets 
 came from Jerusalem; so did Judas and Silas; 
 Agabus came from Judaea to Caesarea (and had not 
 far to come) ; Philip, whose daughters prophesied, is 
 one of the first Jerusalem group ; (4) that the Book 
 
 ^ Kal avro\ irpocpTiTOA ovres ; it is a coincidence that they were 
 prophets, not a reason. 
 2 Chaps. XX., xxi. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 145 
 
 of Acts refers to no other " prophets " — of other 
 prophecy it is said that " the Spirit witnessed," 
 or that there were disciples who spoke in the Spirit ; 
 (5) that nothing which is told us as to prophets sug- 
 gests peripateticism — the only journeys of pro- 
 phets to which there is allusion are missions from 
 Jerusalem to Antioch, of which two are mentioned, 
 and the short excursion of Agabus from Jerusalem 
 to Caesarea to meet Paul ; (6) that prophecy was 
 not imperative; there is no hint for prophets of a 
 function of government or of a right to command : 
 the intimation to the prophets at Antioch as to the 
 separation of Barnabas and Saul is an intimation 
 from God to themselves, not through them to others ; 
 Agabus does not direct the collection of relief — he 
 predicts the scarcity, and the brethren resolve to 
 collect : the prophecies which Paul meets in every 
 city, and at Tyre and at Caesarea, foretell what will 
 happen to Paul, but do not direct what Paul is to 
 do, and Paul acts in the teeth of their apparent 
 inference. That is to say, that prophets prophesy 
 " and the others judge " ; those who hear the word 
 of the prophet discriminate whether it is, or is not, a 
 word of the Lord, and next they decide in what way, 
 if at all, they shall act upon it. A prophet's business 
 is to prophesy, not to command. He testifies to the 
 mind and purpose of God — the question of how to 
 give effect to that mind or to further that purpose, is 
 the affair not of the prophet but of his hearers. As 
 for the content of prophecy, so far as the narrative 
 of St. Luke exhibits that content, it falls under 
 
 L 
 
146 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 three heads : (1) in one case it is the designation of 
 persons to service (the case of Barnabas and Saul), 
 which we may parallel with that of Timothy,^ and 
 may believe to illustrate a frequent and important 
 function of prophecy; (2) in another case it is the 
 exhortation and confirmation of believers (by Judas 
 and Silas) ; (3) in two cases (that of the famine and 
 that of Paul's arrest) it is prediction of events ; 
 Agabus alone predicts with definiteness, the others, 
 who foretold harm to Paul at Jerusalem seem to 
 have been conscious only of general presentiment ; 
 (4) there is nothing at all to suggest that prophets 
 governed or dominated, or that they peregrinated 
 with a function of oversight, or that local Churches 
 depended upon them for special ministries or ser- 
 vices. St. Luke's picture of the New Testament 
 prophet has no feature in common with the charis- 
 matic of the theory of Twofold Ministry. There is 
 no evidence from him that as prophets they shared 
 at all in formal authority — the evidence is rather 
 that they did not. Those who conferred at Jeru- 
 salem, who issued " dogmata " and dispatched 
 these by their delegates to the Churches of Antioch, 
 Syria and Cilicia, were not " apostles and prophets," 
 but " apostles and presbyters." Though the per- 
 sons selected for special missions were in the cases 
 known to us, and probably in all cases, as was natural, 
 men markedly qualified by the prophetic gift, these 
 acted, not as prophets, but as apostolic commissioners. 
 The general position is adequately illustrated by the 
 1 1 Tim. i. 18. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 147 
 
 instance of Judas and Silas, who went to Antioch 
 as delegates of the council to deliver and expound 
 the decrees committed to their charge ; but who, 
 being in their personal capacity " prophets as well," 
 used their personal gift to exhort and confirm the 
 brethren there. 
 
 References to prophets and prophecy in St. 
 Paul's Epistles are perhaps less numerous than one 
 might suppose. While they are copious, they occur 
 mainly in one or other of two connections: (1) in a 
 practical connection in his First Epistle to the 
 Corinthians ; (2) in a theological connection in his 
 Epistle to the Ephesians. 
 
 In the first of these cases, St. Paul endeavours to 
 regulate Church life at Corinth in a crisis of spiritual 
 excitement. Circumstances there do not seem to 
 have been normal, but were comparable to those 
 which in modern experience are occasionally asso- 
 ciated with seasons of active "revival"^; and 
 this lessens the value of any deduction which can 
 be drawn from his discussion of the phenomena. 
 The incidents of such a crisis, including as they 
 may do, exaltations, paroxysms, ecstasies, uncon- 
 trollable voices, are anywhere difficult to explain, 
 difficult to regulate, and are scarcely illustrative of 
 the ordinary conditions of Christian fellowship. 
 St. Paul's treatment of the Corinthian incidents 
 
 ^ " Probably research would show that no ' revival ' has 
 been without something like glossolalia " (Kirsopp Lake, Earlier 
 Epistles of St. Paid, p. 245). The same thing might probably be 
 said of trance, etc. 
 
148 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 cannot be taken as helping us far to an under- 
 standing of the part which prophecy ordinarily 
 played in times and at places where Church life, 
 having attained to fuller development, was flowing 
 in its wonted channel ; his remarks and directions 
 and remonstrances are instructive mainly as enabling 
 us to estimate the Apostolic attitude of mind as to 
 what he classes as TcvevjuaxiJid or xapiojjLaTa^ Among 
 these St. Paul attaches high relative value to pro- 
 phecy ; but the prophecy which he discusses is not 
 that of an order of prophets or of the exceptional 
 individual — it appears as an impulse diffused among 
 the membership of the flock. Any one may pro- 
 phesy, even every one : and all should covet to 
 prophesy.2 Its value depends upon rationality and 
 
 ^ xdptfffxa in the New Testament is almost peculiar to St. 
 Paul, the only other writer to employ it being St. Peter (1 Pet. iv. 
 10, in connection with hospitality, speaking, ministering). With 
 Paul it has the sense of " free gift of God,'* and is applied (1) to 
 the gift of redemption in Christ (Rom. v. 15, 16; vi. 23; xi. 29); 
 
 (2) to providential deliverance from distress (2 Cor. i. 11); 
 
 (3) to the gifts of the Holy Spirit. It is improbable that in this 
 last application the word has become in St. Paul's mind merely 
 technical — x"P'<^M« remains for him actively expressive of the 
 fact that all which evidences the life of Christ in the Christian 
 is of supernatural grace. Our works are wrought in us, not by 
 us. Faith, wisdom, helpfulness, love are thus xapicr/xara equally 
 with tongues or miracles. The more valuable charisma is not 
 that which is most of a marvel, but that which is most practically 
 serviceable. The use of iruev/jLaTiKa as equivalent to xap^o-z^oTa 
 is peculiar to Paul— if there is any difference in their shades of 
 meaning, it may be that irvevfiaTiKa are x«pt<''AiaTa in the more 
 restricted sense (1 Cor. xiv. 1). 
 
 2 Ibid. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 149 
 
 fidelity to the faith and to conscience. It is " spoken 
 with the understanding," with conscious self-control ; 
 and its object is to edify. The emphasis of Paul's 
 thought throughout these discussions is upon " pro- 
 phesy ings," not upon " prophets " ; that is, upon 
 the matter of prophecy, and not upon the person 
 who is its channel of delivery. In this St. Paul's 
 treatment agrees with that of his more casual 
 references to the subject — these are references to 
 prophecy, not to prophets : in 1 Thess. v. 20, 
 " Despise not prophesyings " : in Rom. xii. 6, 
 where prophecy seems to be regarded simply as a 
 XOLQio/Lia depending upon x^^Q^^ — ^^ evidence of 
 grace, in the same sense that the power of teaching 
 or of service or the readiness to be liberal may be 
 tokens of grace, all Christians having capacity for 
 all these graces, but some fuller capacity than 
 others; and again in 1 Tim. i. 18, and iv. 14 : the 
 authority which indicated Timothy for his place in 
 the Church was the authority of prophecy, not of 
 prophets. 
 
 There is further the more important group of 
 passages in which St. Paul names together apostles 
 and prophets.^ It is upon these passages that the 
 theory of Twofold Ministry really obtains a claim 
 to consideration, for which otherwise there would 
 be comparatively slight ground. They undoubtedly 
 serve to show that in Paul's mind prophecy was a 
 fact of vast significance, and that the prophet — the 
 1 1 Cor. xii. 28; Ephes. ii. 20; iii. 5; iv. 11. 
 
150 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 person, that is, through whom in practice prophecy 
 exercised its function in the Church — was a person 
 essential to the development of the Divine purpose 
 in Christ Jesus. 
 
 That development depended on two factors : it 
 depended upon the one hand on the mission from 
 God which carried to the world grace and truth; 
 on the other hand it depended no less upon the 
 existence in humanity of the power to respond — 
 power to know truth and to receive grace, and 
 thereby to enter into fellowship with those sent in 
 the Name of the Lord — power, therefore, to assimi- 
 late, to illustrate, and to interpret the proclamation 
 of the Divine Gospel. Apostleship represents one 
 of these two factors, prophecy the other. In order 
 that the Church may come into being, both are 
 requisite ^ — the Church is founded upon apostles and 
 prophets. 
 
 There must be apostleship — the active aggressive 
 representation of Christ who comes to us bringing 
 life and light, moulding the new creation to the 
 pattern which is in the Heavens. But the labours 
 of apostleship would be futile unless those who are 
 evangelised could respond to the evangel and those 
 who are thereby added to the Lord become one Spirit 
 
 ^ As soon as our Lord discovered this power of response in 
 one human soul (St. Matt. xvi. 16), He hailed the success of His 
 tremendous experiment — on that rock He would build His 
 Church. He recognised also the supernatural grace evidenced 
 in the power to respond : " Flesh and blood hath not revealed 
 it unto thee, but My Father which is in Heaven." 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 151 
 
 with the Lord, attaining harmony with the mind 
 of God and capable of witnessing to its content. 
 The apostles minister the prophetic spirit — the 
 prophetic spirit in their converts is the measure of 
 the value of the apostolic labours. Apostles pass 
 on their way — the prophetic power remains in the 
 souls into which has been infused the new life ; 
 and by this power of prophecy (in its proper sense 
 of insight into the Divine thought and will) the 
 Gospel is worked out in practice to all its blessed 
 inference. 
 
 The Church, then, is founded on two things — 
 the Divine Mission of apostles and the Divine Life 
 created in believers by contact with that Mission 
 and what it bears. The supernatural life com- 
 municated to the disciple is the correlative of the 
 supernatural origin of the mission which results in 
 his discipleship : the Church is what it is not by 
 the operation of one of these, but in virtue of 
 them both — it is vitally Christ's Body and not 
 merely a numerical discipleship, because in the 
 case of this propaganda, the disciple is more than 
 a disciple — he is a man reborn; and the convert 
 is more than a convert — he is a new creation. 
 That is to say, that the mission of the Paracelete 
 is complementary to the mission of the Son. Every- 
 where around apostles and in their track there 
 rises up a fellowship instinct with the same ideas 
 and faculties which inspire apostles, having the 
 same consciousness of understanding God and of 
 knowing the truth and of willing the good, and with 
 
152 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 the same impelling necessity of testifying to what 
 in Christ is known, and of communicating what in 
 Christ is received. These two things, the mission 
 and the response, apostleship and prophecy, give 
 us the Church. In the actual work of its upbuilding 
 St. Paul recognises these two agencies — the one 
 represented by labourers like himself and his com- 
 panions (it is very possible that in these passages 
 St. Paul uses the word apostle in its widest sense) — 
 the other represented by the prophetic soul which has 
 not only caught from them the Divine fire, but also 
 propagates its impulse. Everywhere there is found 
 the Christian who is more Christian than others, 
 in whom the Christian type is realised, the man 
 who burns, who speaks, who testifies, the man 
 who not only receives but becomes a giver of what 
 he has received. St. Paul knows his debt to that 
 man and the Church's debt. St. Paul would, I 
 think, be foremost to assert that such a man is 
 no more than all should be, that he is only repre- 
 sentative of the faith of all and that all are partakers 
 of the same grace as he; nevertheless in him, the 
 man of fire and light and utterance, Paul finds the 
 typical disciple — among the prophetic people he is 
 distinctively the prophet; and upon the presence 
 of such men with and round the apostolic element 
 the Church depends for being what it is and for 
 growth to what it shall be. 
 
 St. Paul is a rhetorical writer and prefers to 
 express himself by means of the concrete example — 
 it is natural to him to speak of " apostles and 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 153 
 
 prophets " rather than of apostleship and prophecy. ^ 
 What he has in mind is the spiritual principle of 
 Divine action — that God works on the one hand 
 by mission to humanity, on the other by the exalta- 
 tion and renewal of human nature under contact 
 with mission. He expresses this graphically when 
 he says that the Church is founded upon apostles 
 and prophets. 
 
 We may think ourselves to be compelled to 
 understand him in this way by the difficulty of in 
 any other way finding facts which correspond to 
 the statement. While there are indications of 
 prophecy and of prophets elsewhere than in St. 
 Paul, these indications are comparatively few and 
 obscure — there is really nothing elsewhere to suggest 
 an order of prophets who play a part in the Church's 
 genesis comparable to that ascribed to apostles, so 
 that they and apostles should be thus bracketed 
 together. The Book of Acts does not suggest it; 
 the incident of the mission of Barnabas and Saul 
 from Antioch is the solitary instance in that Book 
 of the collocation of the ideas of apostleship and 
 prophecy, and in that case the part played by 
 prophets is purely instrumental : apart from the 
 group of passages under consideration, St. Paul's 
 own writings do not suggest it ; the extra-canonical 
 writers of the first period certainly do not suggest 
 
 ^ Compare irov cocpSs ; ttov ypaf^ixareis ', ttqv crv^riTrjT^s rov aluvos 
 Tovrov (1 Cor. i. 20); it is St. Paul's way of referring to 
 philosophy, scholasticism and sophistry as inadequate to deal 
 with the things of the Spirit. 
 
154 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 it.i St. Paul's language, if he is to be understood 
 as he is sometimes understood, would lead us to 
 look for prophets as everywhere the coadjutors of 
 apostles, or at least as the second line of the apostolic 
 advance, as after and around apostles the notables 
 of the Church, succeeding to their prominence and 
 growing in importance as apostles became fewer or as 
 they scattered to further regions . As a matter of fact 
 there is not a single example of this, unless the unique 
 incident at Antioch, the mission of Barnabas and 
 Saul, be an example ; and it occurs at the begin- 
 ning, whereas it is in later narrative that we should 
 find our examples increasingly abundant. Are we, 
 then, to suppose a general agreement to ignore 
 prophets and their activity ? If so, Paul is himself 
 accessory to it ; for while in his theoretical view of 
 the Church as stated in the passages under considera- 
 tion he appears to magnify prophets, he is habitually 
 silent of them in his concrete dealing with Churches 
 and with men. He speaks occasionally of prophecy, 
 noticing it incidentally as at Rome and at Thessa- 
 lonica, and having perforce to give it considerable 
 attention as at Corinth ; but he supplies us with no 
 actual instance in which prophets as a class or any 
 particular prophet appear as fundamental to the work 
 
 ^ Hermas is no exception, for though he recognises prophets 
 as having a distinct place in the structure of his mystical tower, 
 he does not set them " at the foundation " or in juxtaposition 
 with the stones which are of " the first age ^' ; and his descrip- 
 tion of the true prophet is simply that of a man who has the 
 Spirit of God and who comes into the assembly. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 155 
 
 of upbuilding the Church or even as co-operative 
 in that work with apostleship. The inference may 
 be, one concludes, that in those passages where he 
 seems to attribute so much to prophets, Paul is 
 writing mystically ; he writes there, not to describe 
 organisation, but to expound the operation of 
 principles ; the apostle, the prophet, the teacher, 
 are in his mind symbols of spiritual forces which 
 are at work to advance the Christian movement — 
 on the one hand, Christ is preached — on the other 
 hand, the preaching is not in vain. The fact of pro- 
 phecy — the illumination and exaltation of human 
 nature through reception of the Holy Ghost, so 
 that becoming spiritual man can discern spiritual 
 things — is one of the fundamental bases of the 
 Church's life and growth; apostleship, the impact 
 of Christ's Mission which apostles continue, is the 
 other. 
 
 The collocation in this aspect of apostles and 
 prophets is repeated a few sentences later,^ and 
 imports nothing fresh in addition to what is implied 
 in the passage just discussed. The Divine " secret " 
 (the Catholicity of the Church) is not only a revela- 
 tion communicated, but is also a revelation under- 
 stood : the discipleship apprehends it, the rising 
 consciousness of the Church hails it. It is a revela- 
 tion ev Uvevjuan, given in the gift of the Spirit, 
 and therefore the common conviction of those who 
 are taught of the Spirit; prophet answers apostle 
 in grasping and proclaiming the purpose which 
 ^ Ephes. ill. 5. 
 
156 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 God is now unveiling. The knowledge of the cosmic 
 significance of the Christ did not come as an oracle 
 communicated to the few and on their authority 
 delivered to the generality of the Church ; it came 
 " in the Spirit," as a thought with which the current 
 of the Spirit, flowing from Christ through Christ's 
 Body, was charged. Apostles might be the first to 
 be sensitive to the message (if Paul had been writing 
 prosaically he might have spoken, not of revelation 
 to " apostles," but of his own earliest apprehension 
 of the intimation, and perhaps of his labours to 
 communicate it to fellow apostles) ; those of the 
 flock who stood highest on the slopes might be 
 the next to catch the gleam of its dawn to which 
 apostles pointed, and to herald it to the less quick 
 of spiritual sense : it is thus that revelation spreads, 
 apostle and prophet working together effectually 
 each in the measure of his part, to make the whole 
 fellowship conscious of God's meaning. Because 
 all are prophets, all who are in Christ can share in 
 the apprehension. Faith is always revelation. 
 
 The exegesis applied to the passages already 
 quoted (Ephes. ii. 20, iii. 5) will largely determine 
 that of the so-called " lists " of 1 Cor. xii. 28, and 
 Ephes. iv. 11. To speak of these as lists of a hier- 
 archy, or to treat them as formal catalogues of 
 ministries, is misleading. Nothing could be less in 
 St. Paul's manner than a formal catalogue of any- 
 thing, and the last catalogue to be expected from 
 him would be a catalogue of ecclesiastical organisa- 
 tion — he thinks in terms of spiritual truth, and that 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 157 
 
 fact need not be obscured for us by his rhetorical 
 habit of referring to spiritual truths by their con- 
 crete forms — as that, for example, he should speak 
 of the " prophet," when he is thinking of prophecy. 
 A characteristic feature of his style is that he loves 
 to pile up what we may call lists, but which are 
 rather accumulations of example, loosely linked 
 together by some thought which they illustrate. 
 Thus in 1 Cor. iii. 22 he groups together terms so 
 incongruous as himself, Cephas, the world, life, death, 
 the present, the future — the link being that all these 
 belong to the Corinthians. So in Rom. viii. 33, 
 he has life, death, angels, governments, miracles, 
 things that are, things that shall be, height, depth, or 
 any other creature — the linking idea now being that 
 none of these can divide from God's love. A more 
 closely cognate series is that of charismata in 
 Rom. xii. 6-8; if it is a list, the list would be 
 prophecy, service, teaching, exhortation, giving, pre- 
 siding, compassionating ; but evidently it is not a 
 list, but a series of instances, rapidly supplied.^ 
 
 The series given in 1 Cor. xii. 28 £f. is certainly 
 more carefully arranged than this ; it is not merely 
 rhetorical, but is partly argumentative. The general 
 thesis of the passage is stated in ver. 7 : that the 
 manifestations of the Spirit (as all spiritual gifts 
 are) exist with a view to profitableness. This is 
 followed by an enumeration of instances, partly to 
 
 ^ Other indications of this habit occur, Rom. i. 29-31; 
 1 Cor. V. 11; vi. 9-10; 2 Cor. iv. 6-10; xi. 26-7; Gal. v. 
 19-23; Phil. iv. 8; Colos. iii. 5-8. 
 
158 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 suggest the variety of gift, but at the same time to 
 suggest that the more useful gift is the more worthy ; 
 and next to suggest that the more useful (and there- 
 fore the worthier) are not the more remarkable, as 
 healings or tongues, but are the commonplace 
 graces, wisdom, understanding, faith and (as appears 
 in the climax of the section^) love. At first sight 
 these appear simply as a parcelling out of gift; 
 but they are integrated in the unity of the Church, 
 considered as a Body of which the individual is 
 an organic part; and this integration represents 
 Divine purpose in the allocation. Then follows 
 the " list " — it is in reality an enumeration in 
 Paul's familiar manner — of JtvevfiariKa considered 
 TtQog TO ovjucpegov : on the ground of usefulness to 
 others. The highest usefulness is that of the 
 apostle, then that of the prophet, and next that of 
 the teacher ; and then, but only in a way secondary 
 to these, those gifts which seem more marvellous, 
 the power of working miracle or the power of heal- 
 ing. Such seems to be the leading thought of the 
 passage. St. Paul's habit of disorder in his enumera- 
 tions appears in the next particulars, dvxdTJyjeig, 
 Kv^EQvrjoeiQy which are not of the marvellous 
 type; but he returns to the marvellous in his 
 closing example, yevq ylcoooaJv, which in accordance 
 with his general proposition he places, as least 
 useful, last of all. 
 
 In this enumeration it is possible to see the 
 statement of a hierarchy only by confining atten- 
 1 1 Cor. xiii. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 159 
 
 tion to its first three items. As soon as we read 
 beyond " teachers," we find ourselves among 
 activities which refuse to fall into place in a hier- 
 archy. The change in the form of enumeration 
 from TiQojxov, demsgov, rqixov to ^jieira, iixa is 
 important — it marks Paul's point that the useful 
 gifts are the pre-eminent; but it does not so thor- 
 oughly break up the series and divide its earlier 
 numbers from the remainder as to change their 
 category, so that in the first group we should have 
 a hierarchy and in the second group a miscellany 
 of nondescript activities. If there is here any 
 hierarchy it is one which includes all that is men- 
 tioned, and we should have peripatetic miracle 
 workers, oecumenical healers and authoritative 
 speakers with tongues. What St. Paul really 
 contends is that there is a Divine scale of value in 
 gift, and that it is not the scale of prodigiosity, but 
 of serviceableness ; he is not comparing grades of 
 "ministry," but spiritual values; he is not regu- 
 lating ecclesiastical precedence — he is inculcating 
 the true principle of Christian ambition, " covet 
 earnestly the best gifts." 
 
 It is worth noting as significant that while at 
 Corinth there was so abundant prophecy, there was 
 evidently no " prophet " there competent to solve 
 questions, or of sufficient authority to decide in un- 
 certainties of practice, some of which, such as the 
 veiling of women, seem scarcely to have needed the 
 intervention of an apostle, and yet were forwarded 
 to Paul for determination. 
 
160 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 Much of what has been said applies to the other 
 " list," that of Ephes. iv. 11. We have here again 
 an enumeration, not of the ranks of a ministry, 
 but of gifts bestowed upon the Church. The ques- 
 tion now, however, is not of the gifts and their 
 comparative values, but of their source. The 
 statement is not that the following are to be regarded 
 as gifts of the Lord in the order in which they are 
 named : the statement is that all the forces which 
 are at work for the equipment of the holy society, 
 issue from the Ascended Christ and are for the 
 upbuilding of the society as His Body. The whole 
 emphasis is upon the word avxog — o xara^ag avrog 
 eoxiv Tcai 6 ava^ag .... xal avrog edcoxe ; He who 
 came down to us. He who is gone up to God, He 
 is the Giver of apostles, prophets, pastors and 
 teachers. Paul's subject is not ministries, but 
 Christ : it is almost grotesque to treat his eloquence 
 as a patent of dignities. 
 
 That neither this " list " nor that of 1 Cor. xii. 28 
 is a list of ministries as such appears from the fact 
 that they are different. Had the writer been 
 describing organisation, the description must have 
 been in each case approximately the same. They 
 differ because they are not lists, but are illustrative 
 series, occurring in different connections and re- 
 garding Divine gift from different points of view. 
 To the Corinthians Paul has to say that capacities 
 for service which are found in the Church are, 
 in all cases and whatever their form, from God 
 by His Holy Spirit, and are to be received and 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 161 
 
 employed in furtherance of God's method in the 
 Church : that method being to give, not all graces 
 equally to all, but to develop different graces un- 
 equally in each, so that each shall be necessary to 
 the full equipment of the whole. To the Ephesians 
 he has to say that the Ascended Christ is the radiant 
 source of supernatural energy and endowment : 
 the gifts are not an upheaval from within a Spirit- 
 filled Body — they are directly bestowed by Christ 
 in His Own Person through the action of the Spirit 
 whom Christ mediates to the Church. The enumera- 
 tion of gifts in the Corinthians passage is long and 
 complex, because the forms of usefulness which 
 the Spirit may evoke from regenerate humanity 
 are numerous and of varying value. That in the 
 Ephesians passage is short and simple because the 
 lines along which Christ pursues His purpose in 
 the Church are simple, and because it is on Christ 
 rather than on the Spirit that Paul's thought now 
 centres : for the broad statement of Christ's method 
 of giving to the Church he finds four terms sufficient, 
 namely apostleship, prophecy, evangelism and the 
 pastorate with its function of teaching as well as of 
 shepherding. 
 
 In any case it is obvious that this Ephesians 
 passage does not give a charismatic hierarchy ^ 
 whose characteristics distinguish it from a regular 
 or local ministry, since it includes under one category 
 prophecy which is certainly charismatic and pastor- 
 
 ^ Turner, Camb. Med. Hist., I., p. 144; Studies in Early Ch. 
 Hist., pp. 13, 30. 
 M 
 
162 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 ate which was certainly local. The common feature 
 which includes these is that both are gifts of the 
 Ascended Lord and both contribute to His end, 
 which is the edification and perfecting of the Church. 
 If the list be read as one of spiritual provision 
 towards this end, the regular ministry may quite 
 well be content with the place assigned to it, though 
 that be the last place. Prophecy and evangelism 
 as spiritual forces rank higher and are more funda- 
 mental to the Church's nature and existence than 
 pastorate is. The need of pastorate depends upon 
 the previous energy of evangelism, and the possi- 
 bility of its exercise presupposes prophetic intelli- 
 gence in the flock; while the whole depends upon 
 Christ's primary mission of His Holy Apostles,^ 
 without which there had been neither prophet nor 
 evangelist nor pastor nor teacher nor taught. To 
 understand St. Paul in these passages, it is needful 
 to perceive that his mind is moving among con- 
 ceptions of this magnitude — he is not arranging 
 office-bearers in a hierarchy. 
 
 In the pastoral Epistles there is no allusion to 
 prophecy or prophet or charisma except in relation 
 to Timothy's ministry; the Epistle to Titus being 
 silent on the subject. There had been, it appears, 
 prophecies indicating Timothy's vocation, of such 
 a nature as to encourage Paul to entrust to him 
 charge. 2 Timothy possessed charisma which had 
 
 ^ The " apostles " must be probably understood here as in the 
 restricted sense, since they are distinguished from evangelists. 
 * 1 Tim. i. 18. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 163 
 
 become his " by means of prophecy along with 
 imposition of hands " — those of the presbyterate ^ 
 and of Paul himself ^ ; the meaning probably is that 
 Timothy was indicated by the voice of prophecy 
 for ordination and perhaps for special mission — it 
 is in connection with special mission that Paul 
 refers to the matter. Paul, then, has not forgotten, 
 while he writes, that prophecy exists : his mind is 
 alive to its function. Yet he has nothing to say 
 to Timothy of reliance upon its guidance or assist- 
 ance, even in that matter of the selection of ordi- 
 nands.^ He has no direction for him how he is to 
 deal with prophets and their possible intervention, 
 though few questions might be more difficult for a 
 youthful and timid pastor. Paul carefully traverses 
 the field of Church life and order, and is particular 
 to instruct his delegate how to regulate relations 
 to so comparatively unimportant functionaries as 
 " widows " : it is extremely difficult, in face of his 
 silence as to prophets to suppose that these were 
 present at Ephesus in any obtrusive importance, 
 still more difficult to believe that they were domi- 
 nant next to apostles, and, if not of despotic, at least 
 of very great authority. Yet the Ephesian Church, 
 if any, had Paul's own warrant for holding prophets 
 in high estimation, and at Ephesus, if anywhere, 
 we might expect to find them in prominence. 
 Ephesus had apparently not understood St. Paul 
 
 1 1 Tim. iv. 14. 2 2 Tim. i. 6. 
 
 ' 1 Tim. V. 22; if the laying on of hands is to be so taken 
 here — it may have wider reference. 
 
164 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 in his Epistle to it to be prescribing for the Church 
 its hierarchy. 1 
 
 Prophets are alluded to in the Epistle to the 
 Hebrews ^ and in those of St. Peter, St. James and 
 St. Jude ; but they are in all cases the prophets of 
 the Old Testament. 
 
 1 I assume that the Pastoral Epistles are authentic. But it 
 makes little difference to the argument if they are not. They 
 are then evidence for a later date for which, perhaps, we need 
 evidence still more than for the latter years of Paul's lifetime. 
 
 ' It is impossible to discover a charismatic ministry under 
 so inevitable and neutral an expression as i\d\r](T€v vfuv rhv 
 xSyov rod Qeov, Heb. xiii. 7 (Lindsay, Church and Ministry, 
 pp. 69-72). The " Word of God,'' or "of the Lord," or "of 
 life," or simply " the Word " is the commonest of synonyms 
 for the Gospel. It occurs more than thirty times in the Acts 
 alone, and is associated with many verbs — to speak it, to hold 
 it forth, to send it, to receive it, to glorify it, to disobey it, and 
 so on. Among these verbs forms of \a\e7u occur in the Acts 
 nine times in the ordinary narrative of the apostolic preaching, 
 and the word occurs once in St. Paul's Epistles (Phil. i. 14, a(p60ws 
 rhv \6yov \aXuv) and once in Hebrews, loc. cif. There is nothing 
 anywhere to bear out that it is a technical expression denoting 
 the function of a charismatic class. It occurs in Didache IV. 1 : 
 " My son, night and day shalt thou remember him that speaketh 
 unto thee the word of the Lord," and it is this occurrence which 
 must have suggested that it is a technical formula of allusion 
 to the ministry of oharismatics ; for the solitary use of it in 
 Heb. xiii. 7 could not have conveyed that idea, and there is 
 nothing else at all which could. But in Didache IV. 1 it is in all 
 probability a survival from the primitive Hebraic manual, the 
 Tra^t of the Two Ways, and was originally applied to the Rabbi 
 of that manual and has nothing to do with Christian oharis- 
 matics. That the ordinary ministry was a ministry which also 
 *' spoke the word of the Lord " appears often enough, Acts xx. 
 28; 1 Pet. v. 2; 1 Tim. iii. 2; 2 Tim. ii. 24, 25; Tit. i. 9. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 165 
 
 In 1 St. John charisma appears only as an unction 
 diffused upon the Church and shared by the whole 
 flock, which gives to the whole Body a prophetic 
 character.^ His only allusion to prophecy is a 
 warning against ''false prophets"^; these are 
 certainly Docetic teachers, and this use of the word 
 by St. John is highly significant in view of his 
 allusions to " prophets " in the Apocalypse. St. 
 John, too, like St. Paul, can write mystically, and 
 prefers, especially when he must censure, a symbolic 
 to a direct expression. He " names no names " ; 
 he does not say in so many words, " Beware of 
 those heretics, the Docetists," and probably at that 
 date no specific name for their heresy existed; he 
 says instead that many false prophets were gone 
 out into the world ; that every spirit is not to be 
 believed, and that spirits must be tried by theii 
 testimony. It is not necessary to understand him 
 literally or to suppose that he had in view cases of 
 trance or forced utterance in which the inspiring 
 spirit was demoniacal and not the Holy Spirit. ^ 
 In the circumstances, which after all are extremely 
 common, we should now probably express the same 
 meaning by saying that the " spiritual-mindedness " 
 of a writer or teacher is no guarantee of his orthodoxy. 
 
 In the Apocalypse prophets appear repeatedly,^ 
 
 1 Chap, ii. 20, 27. « Chap. iv. 1. 
 
 3 See Lake, Earlier Epistles of St. Paul, pp. 206-7. 
 
 * Chap. X. 7 ; xi. 10, 18 ; xvi. 6 ; xviii. 20, 24 ; xxii. 6, 9 ; ^po<pr}T€la 
 is twice applied to the Apocalypse itself, i. 3; xxii. 7; to the 
 witness of the two witnesses, xi. 6 ; and to the spirit of prophecy 
 generally, xix. 10. 
 
166 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 and they appear in the collocation of " apostles 
 and prophets," ^ and especially of " saints and 
 prophets " ^ — a phrase in which St. John seems 
 in this writing to sum up the constituent elements 
 of the Church. A good deal has been made of 
 this 3 ; here, it may be said, are in fact the clergy 
 and laity of the time as St. John knew them : 
 " the saints " is his common expression for the 
 Christian flock as a whole — their ministers are the 
 prophets — if they had any other ministry it was 
 not of sufficient prominence to attract attention. 
 
 Apocalypse, however, is not history and still less 
 is it a digest of Church styles. Apocalypse has a 
 vocabulary of its own, and its vocabulary is symbolic 
 and poetic. It avoids the pedestrian, and prefers 
 terms which suggest spiritual ideas and which in 
 some measure appeal to the imagination. Bishops 
 and deacons are, after all, prosaic persons and, under 
 these names, would fit awkwardly into St. John's 
 heavenly vision. He introduces, indeed, the pres- 
 byter — not, however, as in plain fact we know that 
 respectable person, but as representative of the 
 economies and enthroned with Christ ; if presbyter 
 and prophet are to be understood literally, the 
 regular ministry * has every reason to be satisfied 
 
 1 Chap, xviii. 20. ^ chap. xi. 18; xvi. 6; xviii. 24. 
 
 3 See Swete, The Apocalypse of St. John, Intr., pp. xvi-xvii; 
 Turner, Studies, p. 15 n. But St. Paul has an exactly corre- 
 sponding summary, though couched in the language of prose : 
 it is " The saints . . . with the bishops and deacons," Phil. i. 1. 
 
 * Professor Swete observes that " local Church officials '* 
 have no place in the Apocalypse. It must be admitted that 
 under that description they have not. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 167 
 
 with the relative position thus assigned to it. It 
 is, however, apocalypse which St. John here writes. 
 When he speaks of Christians generally he does 
 not call them as in his epistle the " Brethren," 
 but the " Saints " ; it is natural that when he 
 speaks of their chiefs and great men he should 
 refer to these not by commonplace titles of office, 
 but allusively and with such figurative veil of 
 language as his literary form requires. One does 
 not suppose that St. John descends to the language 
 of bare fact only when he uses the word prophet. 
 He is describing the spiritual contest of spiritual 
 principles and forces ; we scarcely expect him to 
 talk of clergy and laity, as Clement in his sober 
 Epistle does, or to say in so many words that in 
 times of persecution bishops were likely to be first 
 victims. " Prophets," or in xviii. 20, " apostles 
 and prophets " (an association which may be 
 dependent on Ephes. ii. 20), are, one may conjecture, 
 the apocalyptic symbol in St. John's vocabulary 
 for the idea of ministry in general — they are 
 "Christ's own bond-servants"^; they are His 
 witnesses ^ ; and they are St. John's brethren. ^ 
 The fact that St. John does in this book use the 
 term " prophets " correlatively with " saints " to 
 embrace the whole membership of the Church, and 
 therefore presumably as synonymous with ministry, 
 would itself go so far to show that such was not 
 the usage of ordinary speech ; for apocalyptic is 
 necessarily transcendental in its language, not 
 literal, and avoids the factual commonplace. 
 1 Chap. X. 7. 2 Chap. xi. 3. ^ chap. xxii. 9. 
 
LECTURE V 
 
 THE PROPHET IN THE CHURCH 
 
 Passing now from the canonical sources to extra- 
 canonical — the Epistle of Barnabas contains no 
 reference to charismata or to charismatic persons 
 which can be identified as such.^ The prophets of 
 whom Barnabas speaks are those of the Old Testa- 
 ment. In his view it is the flock generally into 
 which the Spirit has been infused ^ and which is to 
 become spiritual, God's pure Temple.^ Nothing is 
 to be inferred from this silence ; the subject of the 
 Epistle does not call for allusion to Ministry. 
 
 The subject of St. Clement's (so-called First) 
 Epistle to the Corinthians, however, does; its 
 purpose is to deal with the treatment of the presby- 
 ters of Corinth by the Church there. This gives 
 the writer occasion to touch most of the points as 
 to ministry which are relevant to modern discussion, 
 its components, its evolution, its functions. ' He 
 knows apostles, bishops, presbyters, deacons and 
 
 ^ Barnabas (c. i. 8) repudiates the claim to be accounted a 
 teacher — ohx ^s SiMaKaKos. Nothing imports that he is using 
 the word as a title of ministry — it is the ordinary deprecation 
 of any exordium. Conf . 1 Pet. v. 1 ; Ignat., Ad E'phes., iii. 1 ; 
 Ad Rom. iv. 7, etc. Common words cannot be assumed as 
 technical on every occasion of their appearance, even though 
 they are capable of a technical sense. 
 
 2 c. i. 3. 3 c. iv. 18. 
 
 168 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 169 
 
 he knows of " distinguished men," ^ who after the 
 apostles chose presbyters with the consent of the 
 whole Church. To go into the questions of succes- 
 sion which lie round these allusions and statements 
 would be aside from the present subject. What is 
 relevant is that Clement's Epistle contains no word 
 which implies as such the charismatic person in 
 any form. His apostles are the Twelve (including 
 Paul ; c. V. 3) ; ApoUos is carefully distingushed as 
 ''another" from the apostles (c. xlvii. 4). The 
 only prophets of whom he speaks are those of the 
 Old Testament. Yet his subject and his treatment 
 of it positively require that if a dominating or any 
 authoritative charismatic influence — not to say a 
 recognised charismatic ministry — had been known 
 to him or had been conceived of by him to exist 
 in or round the Christian system with which he 
 deals, he should have referred to it and should have 
 invoked it. The controversy was evidently one 
 in which prophets might well be interested, one in 
 which — even if we think of them as no more than 
 valued counsellors to the Church — appeal to them 
 would be apparently inevitable. One can hardly 
 
 1 c. xliv. 3, ixxoyiixwv av^pSov. Gore is probably right when 
 he identifies these as apostolic delegates of the type of 
 Timothy or Titus [Orders and Unity, p. 104). There is noth- 
 ing to hint, however, that as the same writer [Church and 
 Ministry, p. 293) thinks, their distinction was charismatic, in the 
 sense that they are a class similar to the prophets and teachers of 
 the Didache. 'E\\oyljj.os occurs again, c. Ivii. 2 and c. Iviii. 2, in 
 the simple sense of " reckoned among the elect," and in the 
 superlative, c. Ixii. 3. It is not, then, a word of very pregnant 
 sense in Clement's use of it. 
 
170 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 doubt that both at Rome and at Corinth prophecy 
 existed ; but if so its function was not such as to 
 suggest to Clement's mind that in the testimony of 
 prophecy he might find confirmation of his pleading. 
 As a factor in organised Church life prophecy does 
 not come within Clement's horizon, wide as that is — 
 the prophet is not in his picture.^ As for the theory 
 that " prophets " at Corinth were themselves the 
 leaders of the disorder, the thing is more than 
 possible ; but in that case Clement's refusal to name 
 them is entirely inconsistent with the supposition 
 that they occupied a recognised and authoritative 
 ministry. Had they done so, Clement's plea for 
 orderly procedure and his respect as a Roman for 
 lawful authority would have compelled him at 
 least to deal explicitly with their position and with 
 the question of their right as against the right of 
 " local ministry." ^ It is once more a case in which 
 the argument from silence is almost conclusive. 
 
 Ignatius again is witness for a very wide region. 
 He is Bishop of Antioch, the chief city of Syria and 
 Mother Church of Gentile Christianity, next to 
 
 ^ The only possible reference to charismatic persons as such 
 
 would, I think, be C. xlviii. 5 : iJTw ns ttio-tSs, ijTw Swarhs yvSxnv 
 i^enre7Vf ^rco arocphs iu htaKplorei \6ywv, and that is doubtful enough, 
 for the passage goes on : ^tw yopyhs iu epyois, ^tw ayv6s : " Let him 
 be energetic, let him be pure." 
 
 2 Mr. Turner's remark {Camb. Med. Hist., Vol. I., p. 144) that 
 the treatment of presbyters at Corinth shows that local minis- 
 tries, since such treatment of them was possible, were still held 
 in light esteem in comparison with peripatetics, scarcely takes 
 sufficient account of what " local ministries " may have to 
 endure, even where they have more than half a century of 
 history behind them. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 171 
 
 Jerusalem itself the most ancient of Churches and 
 depository of the most authentic tradition. His 
 letters trace him through Asia Minor and reach be- 
 fore him to Rome. He writes in the interest of 
 the preservation of the unity and orthodoxy of the 
 Church under its ministry of bishops, presbyters 
 and deacons. He has constantly to treat of Church 
 organisation and of the place and function of their 
 several ministries; incidentally he has occasion 
 to speak of elements which are hostile to unity or 
 which interfere with the orderliness of the Church's 
 life. Of such elements it is evident that from this 
 point of view prophecy, and still more the presence of 
 a rival charismatic ministry, might have been one. 
 His style is vivid, concrete and detailed ; he makes 
 us intimately acquainted with the Church life which 
 has confronted him at centre after centre as he 
 passed upon his route to Troas. He is aware of 
 prophecy and he speaks of it casually, not as of a 
 thing in any way remarkable; he tells us how at 
 Philadelphia he himself prophesied. He records 
 the utterance and it does not seem to be markedly 
 different from the tenor of his habitual testimony — 
 if Ignatius spoke as he wrote these are precisely 
 the things which we would expect him to say : 
 " Attend to the bishop and to the presbytery and 
 to the deacons " ; " Do nothing apart from the 
 bishop : keep your bodies as the Temple of God : 
 love unity : flee divisions : be followers of Christ, 
 as He was of the Father." ^ Ignatius believed 
 himself to be inspired to say these quite unremark- 
 ^ Ad Philad. chap. vii. 
 
172 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 able things : " The Spirit spake," he says. He 
 believed this, because, as it proved, they were apt 
 to the circumstances of the position at Philadelphia 
 — so apt that some, it seems, believed that Ignatius 
 must have had private information of the position 
 and was talking at them, which (he protests) was 
 not the case. The passage then is instructive; it 
 shows us what prophecy was understood to be and 
 what it was not — how far from being the oracle of 
 a recognised or almost despotic authority. Ignatius 
 prophesies, yet has no pretensions to be a prophet. 
 His prophecy has no character of revelation ; it has 
 not that novelty of content which we are told is 
 necessary to prophecy ; ^ it is merely his habitual 
 testimony, it is in fact his monotonous repetition ; 
 only on that occasion it was impulsive, emotional, 
 forcible (" I cried ... I spoke with a loud voice ") ; 
 he was, as we might say, led to speak as he did, 
 and his words showed a providential appropriate- 
 ness to the need of the moment and the place. 
 God then, he opines, was behind his speaking 
 — he prophesied. In the same Epistle Ignatius 
 twice alludes to " prophets," ^ but the context 
 leaves little doubt that it is the prophets of the 
 Old Testament who are intended. That is less 
 clear as to a third passage which occurs in the 
 Epistle to the Church at Smyrna.^ Ignatius is 
 there warning against certain Docetists who de- 
 parted from the common Eucharist, and is ex- 
 horting his readers to avoid them. The Smyrnaeans 
 
 ^ Lindsay, Church and Ministry, p. 94. ^ c. v. 2; c. ix, 1. 
 ^ Ad Smyrn. vii. 2. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 173 
 
 are not to speak with these in public or in private, 
 " but are to hearken to the prophets and especially 
 to the Gospel in which both Christ's passion is 
 manifested to us and His Resurrection perfectly 
 declared." The allusion seems to be to the reading 
 of prophet and gospel in the Eucharistic service — 
 we are to hear these and learn to believe in Christ's 
 true humanity, which Docetists deny. It is not 
 apparent that Ignatius speaks anywhere of the 
 Christian prophet — if he does, it is as of a person 
 to be loved and listened to, not as a person who 
 rules, or who exerts any influence, not to say 
 authority, worth conciliating to the cause which he 
 writes to advocate.^ Prophecy he does know, but 
 the " prophet " is not in his picture of the Church any 
 more than in Clement's. The only ministry known 
 to him is such ministry as is known to ourselves. 
 
 This silence of Clement and of Ignatius is par- 
 ticularly impressive. Both are authorities of the 
 first value. Both write copiously enough to make 
 us feel that we know their mind over the area which 
 their discussions cover. Both deal directly with 
 Church organisation and ministry. Both handle 
 concrete situations ; their disclosure of the general 
 Church position is incidental, not studied, and is 
 perfectly ingenuous. It has been already pointed 
 out that their evidence speaks for a very large part 
 of the then Christian world, Rome, Achaia, Asia, 
 Syria. The evidence is negative; it shows only 
 
 ^ If anything is discoverable in Ignatius which can refer to 
 peripatetics, charismatic or otherwise, it would be in Ad Ephes. 
 vii. 1, where he warns against certain sowers of heresy. 
 
174 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 that these writers were unconscious of the inter- 
 vention of prophets in the Church life which they 
 knew; but such evidence is exactly that which 
 leads most directly to a negative conclusion as to 
 the existence of any recognised charismatic system 
 or influence alongside of the regular ministries in 
 which they are interested. 
 
 The evidence of Hermas must be measured by 
 another standard. It is positive, not negative : 
 for actual information as to prophecy in the sub- 
 apostolic period he is the really important source. 
 Hermas is certainly not an official " prophet " — he 
 has no confidence in official prophets : ^ but he is a 
 prophetic man who is conscious of his message for the 
 Church, and he will deliver it for the Church's judg- 
 ment. ^ He is a mystic and a spiritual man and, as 
 such men commonly are, he is ill content with himself 
 and with the Church as he finds it. He has his con- 
 ception of the Church as it exists in God's purpose 
 and ought to be in fact, and of the elements in its 
 life which conflict with that ideal. This then is 
 his burden, and he expresses it in allegory — he does 
 not, one would gather, suggest himself as recording 
 actual trance experience, but he uses a literary 
 form. His method requires him to be historical — he 
 must describe the Church as it has come into being 
 under the hand of its Divine Founder — but his history 
 is that of the mystic : like St. Paul he has to reckon 
 the Spiritual forces which have contributed to the 
 Church's development. He does this by describing 
 a Tower and its building — which tower is the Church. 
 ^ Mand. xi. * Vis. ii. 4, etc. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 175 
 
 Of this tower he gives two separate descriptions : ^ 
 the first as it were only in sketch, showing his idea 
 in the rough as it rises to his mind out of the super- 
 ficial experience of every day. Describing the 
 Church from this factual point of view, its funda- 
 mental courses are " Apostles and Bishops and 
 Teachers and Deacons " : he thinks, that is, of the 
 Church in terms of its regular organisation as he 
 actually knows it. His second description repre- 
 sents a deeper reflection ; it is more elaborate, more 
 comprehensive of the historical aspect of the subject 
 and truer as an account of the Church's spiritual 
 genesis. Among the Divine Agencies out of whose 
 operation the mystical fabric has arisen, certain 
 which have been named already in his former list 
 must necessarily appear again in this — they are 
 essential to any account of the matter. The 
 Twelve, the " Apostles of the Lord," must under 
 whatever style be set first ; and the Ministry in the 
 proper sense of the term must have its place, as 
 St. Paul assigns it in his Ephesians " list." But 
 from the point of view which Hermas now assumes, 
 the primary apostles and the derivative orders of 
 ministry are not alone in the Church's story ; other 
 factors deserve to be reckoned. He therefore 
 counts over afresh the fundamental courses of the 
 living masonry — this time as they are spiritually 
 discerned. There are ten stones " placed at the 
 foundation " — " these are the first age." There 
 are next twenty-five " of righteous men," then thirty- 
 
 ^ Vis. ii.-vii. ; A.S'tm. ix., xv. 
 
176 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 five T^o are " prophets and servants of the Lord " ; ^ 
 and the fourth course is of forty stones who are 
 " the apostles and teachers of the proclamation of 
 the Lord." The first course is unquestionably the 
 Twelve — though in order to shew that he writes 
 mystically, Hermas deliberately avoids the historical 
 number twelve. The second course, of righteous ^ 
 men (Clement's iUoyijuoi dvdgsgl), seems to repre- 
 sent the halo of " apostolic men " who surrounded 
 the activity of the Apostles and leaned directly 
 upon their authority, who were their companions, 
 coadjutors, or delegates — a group whose limits it 
 is so difficult to define and as to whose precise re- 
 lation to apostles we are not likely to reach cer- 
 tainty : Hermas apparently judged them to be 
 comparatively numerous, and expresses this by 
 assigning to them the round number twenty-five, 
 
 1 Hamack incomprehensibly asserts that here " Old Testa- 
 ment prophets are meant." He gives no reason for saying so, 
 and none is apparent : the prophets of the Old Testament would 
 appear strangely in the third generation, or at all events as built 
 upon the first and second generations {yeved) of the Church. 
 He proceeds to say that the New Testament prophets are never 
 mentioned in Hermas' enumerations; that the reason of the 
 omission is that " Hermas passed over the prophets because 
 he reckoned himself one of them " — and that, therefore, it is 
 justifiable to supply " prophets '- wherever Hermas names 
 " apostles and teachers " ; so that "he, too, becomes an indirect 
 witness to the threefold group of ' apostles, prophets, teachers '- " 
 {Expansion of Christianity, trans. Moffatt, 1904, Vol. I., pp. 425-6). 
 This is the creation, rather than the collection, of evidence. 
 
 ^ 'Avdpwv BiKaicov: may this phrase possibly be intended to 
 allude to the fixed epithet 6 SUaios given to James ? See Hege- 
 sippus, quoted Eus., H. E., ii. 23 ; etc. There must be a reason for 
 ZiKalwv — it is not exactly the word one would have expected here. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 177 
 
 as compared with the ten who represent " the true 
 apostleship." Next to these in extending number 
 (they are thirty-five) rank " prophets and deacons 
 of the Lord " — one must conjecture that under this 
 style Hermas intends to include the " regular " 
 ministries as sharing with prophets the interpreta- 
 tive function. Finally " apostles and teachers " who 
 are made the more numerous (they are forty) stand 
 for the Church's missionary activity; they are "of 
 the preaching of the Son of God," so that " apostle " 
 is here used in Paul's " lower " sense, the etymo- 
 logical sense, of a type of worker in whose work 
 evangelism and instruction necessarily go together.^ 
 The whole passage is probably reminiscent of 
 1 Cor. xii. 28, but also expresses original thought — 
 the relative importance ascribed to the agencies 
 enumerated and the order in which they are placed 
 is different from St. Paul's. Nor does Hermas more 
 than Paul describe a hierarchy — he states ministra- 
 tions of the Spirit which have underlain the process 
 of the Church's growth. He speaks of the past — 
 " these " he says, " have died in righteousness " ; the 
 period which he idealises is over. For his description 
 of prophecy in his own time we must look elsewhere. 
 In his Commands Hermas depicts " prophets " true 
 and false, as in the flesh he knows them. The true 
 prophet is, it seems, simply the Christian man among 
 his fellows in worship, if the Spirit of God should have 
 anything to say by his means and he should say it. 
 
 1 Hermas again groups together " apostle "^ and " teacher.** 
 Sim. ix. 16; and in ix. 25, speaks of " apostles,*'- some of whom 
 were " teachers.** In both passages these are connected with 
 evangelisation. 
 
178 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 The empty prophet is the professional, the diviner, 
 the mystery-man, who in the assembly of prayer is 
 silent, but sits apart and is open to consultation in 
 private and for a consideration answers questions. 
 
 Hermas does not seem to expect much from even 
 the true prophecy of his day — he rather apologises 
 for it : hailstones, he says, are very small, but being 
 many they make themselves felt; and little drops 
 falling to the earth may wear hollows in stones. 
 " The least things that come from above . . . have 
 great force ; . . . understand the power which 
 cometh from above in this similitude." The least 
 things — such in Hermas' view seem to be the 
 prophecies of which he has experience. 
 
 Limitations of space will not permit to follow 
 out this examination in further detail. Polycarp's 
 Epistle, it may, however, be noticed, does not touch 
 our subject. Polycarp himself is called " a pro- 
 phetic teacher," ^ and is said before his martyrdom 
 to have seen a vision of his pillow in flames and 
 thereupon to have " said prophetically " that he 
 should die by fire.^ One notices that to call him 
 "a prophet" is avoided; to prophesy was the 
 incident of his last consecrated hours — it was not 
 apparently the characteristic of his ministry — there 
 is really no ground for describing him as " a prophet 
 who had become a bishop." ^ We have seen that 
 Ignatius' prophesying was of the same incidental 
 character. To prophesy seems to have been natural, 
 and perhaps frequent, where such men as Ignatius or 
 1 Mart. Pol xvi. 2. ^ j^^^^ y 2. 
 
 ^ Gore, Church and Ministry, p. 257. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 179 
 
 Polycarp were concerned ; the person whom we do 
 not easily discover is the person who is distinctively 
 "a prophet," who is listened to, not on the merits 
 of what he has to say, but on the authority of pro- 
 phetic rank. The so-called Second Epistle of Clement, 
 a homily of the second century, contains no reference 
 to any charismatic or general ministry; the ad- 
 monishing influence to which the preacher desires 
 attention (c. xvii. 5) is that of the presbyters, not 
 of prophets.^ The anonymous Epistle to Diognetus, 
 also as is likely of the second century, has in view the 
 prophetic gift where (c. xi. 5) the writer speaks 
 of Christ " through whom the Church is enriched, 
 and grace is unfolded and multiplied among the 
 saints, granting understanding, revealing mysteries, 
 announcing seasons " ; but the prophets of his next 
 sentence seem to be those of the Old Testament. ^ 
 
 1 Dr. John Wordsworth {Ministry of Grace, p. 147), following 
 Hamack and Hilgenfeld, speaks of the author as himself a 
 teacher of the charismatic order. Lightfoot, however [AposL 
 Fathers, Vol. II. Part I., p. 195), has dealt with the argument for 
 this, that he distinguishes himself from the presbyters. There is 
 certainly no suggestion of special inspiration in the delivery of a 
 written sermon. 
 
 2 *' Then the fear of the Law is sung, and the grace of prophets 
 is known, and the faith of gospels is established, and the 
 tradition of apostles is guarded, and the grace of the Church 
 exults.'* The writer uses a hidden language, comprehensible to 
 Christians but not to the uninitiate, and perhaps presents the 
 life of the Church under liturgical forms (comp. Heb. x. 19-23). 
 The reference might possibly be to the lections of Law, Prophet, 
 Epistle and Gospel, in the Eucharistic Celebration, and hence, the 
 plural. Gospels. If the prophets meant were of the New Testa- 
 ment, prophets would scarcely precede gospels. On the other 
 hand, the order in that case should rather be " Apostles . . . 
 
180 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 Eusebius in his Ecclesiastical History feels that he 
 ought to have something to say in mention of the 
 prophet as well as of the apostle and evangelist, 
 but has evident difficulty in finding anything that is 
 usable for the purpose — he has but one of whom to 
 speak and of him he knows only the name : " Among 
 those that were celebrated at that time " (the age of 
 Polycarp and Ignatius) " was Quadra tus, who, report 
 says, was renowned along with the daughters of 
 Philip for his prophetical gifts." ^ Later he quotes a 
 writer as mentioning this same Quadratus along with 
 another, Ammias of Philadelphia. This writer seems 
 himself to have the same difficulty in instancing 
 prophets, for twice he in turn names this same pair, 
 Quadratus and Ammias ^ — and these are the only 
 
 Gospels." In the Muratorian Canon, not much later than 
 Hermas, the Gospels precede the Epistles, and this customary 
 order may be in Hermas' mind in the passage quoted. A similarly 
 veiled passage follows (xiii. 8-9) : " Nor is Eve corrupted, but is 
 trusted as a Virgin ; and Salvation is manifested : and Apostles 
 are filled with wisdom ; and the Passover of the Lord goes forth ; 
 and choirs (or ' chosen peoples,' if KXrjpoi, not x^poi, be read) 
 are gathered and ranged in due order; and the Word who 
 teaches the Saints rejoices.'' The terms are mystical — Eve is 
 the Church ; the x^poi or KKrjpoi are ecclesiae ; the Passover 
 may be the Eucharist, but is, perhaps, rather the progress of 
 Evangelisation; and the Apostles stand probably for ministry 
 in general. For this writer, too, deals in great primary ideas; 
 and apostles with him (xi. 1; xii. 5) seem to be the "apostles 
 of the Lord," who is Himself the Word who teaches us. 
 
 1 H. E. iii. 37. 
 
 2 The anonymous anti-Montanist is comparing true prophets 
 of the New Testament with Montanistic " prophets."^ In addi- 
 tion to those of the New Testament (Agabus, Judas, Silas, the 
 daughters of Philip) he seems to know only these two, for he 
 instances them twice and instances no other. Eus., H. E., v. 17. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 181 
 
 names of prophets (excepting those of the Acts and 
 of Montanism) which have reached us. The fact 
 is eloquent — poverty of reputation could hardly be 
 more extreme — and possibly is enough by itself to 
 dispose of the idea that prophets for any period 
 exercised a dominating or controlling ministry or 
 one on which local Churches depended. Prophecy, 
 however, continued in the Church — Justin Martyr 
 witnesses that even down to his own times " gifts 
 of prophecy " shone forth in the Church. ^ So too 
 Irenaeus as Eusebius paraphrases him ; " Even down 
 to his times instances of Divine and miraculous 
 power were remaining in some churches " ; Irenaeus 
 seems to admit that cases in which the dead were 
 raised belong to the past, but contends that exor- 
 cisms, the speaking with tongues, healings, super- 
 natural knowledge of the future, visions and pro- 
 phetic communications still occurred : "as also we 
 hear that many brethren in the Church possess 
 prophetic gifts, and speak, through the Spirit, with 
 all kinds of tongues, and bring to light the secret 
 things of men for their good, and declare the 
 mysteries of God."^ ''Prophetic gifts" still existed, 
 as we may hope that whether acknowledged under 
 that name or not they exist now and will always 
 exist in the Church: it is " the prophet " who is 
 to seek — the man who is not Hermas' true prophet, 
 one of the brethren on whom the Spirit of the 
 Lord comes — but who is formally a prophet, and 
 
 1 Dial with Trypho, chap. Ixxxii. The Holy Spirit in Justin's 
 conception is distinctively irvev^ia irpo<pririK6vt First Apol. 6, 13. 
 
 2 Eu8., H. E., V. 7. 
 
182 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 in that character is a marked and authoritative 
 person; who (as the theory of Twofold Ministry 
 requires) directs or governs or oversees or goes from 
 place to place, with a general habit or function for 
 representing the Church at large : of such a person 
 there is no trace. So far as evidence will carry us, 
 it is that prophets prophesied, not that they ruled. 
 
 How far on this extended survey can we gather 
 the content of New Testament prophecy ? 
 
 1. It was occasionally predictive. Agabus in two 
 cases predicted. Irenaeus speaks of knowledge of 
 things to come as a charisma enduring to his time, 
 and classes it with " visions and prophetic com- 
 munications." Of this type too is Polycarp's vision 
 of the fiery pillow. 
 
 2. Vision and trance occur and are sometimes to 
 be accounted prophetic phenomena. ^ They are 
 then usually connected with crises which call for 
 providential direction,^ and cannot be regarded as 
 a normal method of prophetic inspiration or likely 
 to be usual in Christian experience. Hermas cannot 
 be instanced, for there is more than a probability 
 that his visions were only literary. 
 
 3. There are subjective impressions, interpreted 
 as Divine leadings. Of this class may be Philip's con- 
 sciousness of errand to meet the Ethiopian Eunuch, ^ 
 and those spiritual resistances through which Paul 
 
 ^ Not always : vision may come to one who is not in the 
 Communion of the Holy Ghost. 
 
 2 The vision of Ananias, Acts ix. 10 ; of Cornelius, ibid. x. 3 ; 
 of Peter, ihid. x. 10 f . ; of Paul, ibid. xvi. 9 ; xviii. 9. 
 
 3 Acts viii. 26. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 183 
 
 and his party groped their way to Troas ^ ; and per- 
 haps St. Paul's visit Kaxa cmoKaXvxpiv to Jerusalem. ^ 
 
 4. There is, as already specified, the indication 
 of individual vocation — of which the New Testa- 
 ment supplies examples in the cases of Barnabas 
 and Saul and of Timothy. ^ 
 
 5. There is Apocalypse in the technical sense. 
 We are compelled to include this as prophetic by 
 St. John's repeated characterisation of his own 
 Apocalypse as " prophecy." * 
 
 6. Finally, there is apocalypse (ajioKdlvxpig) in 
 the ordinary grammatical sense of revelation. In 
 this sense dnoKaXviptg means the granting of insight 
 into the Divine — into the significance of events or 
 the scope of truths ; distinctively, the apprehension 
 of the Person of our Lord. Paul was made aware of 
 the mystery of the Body of Christ, Kara djzoxdXvyjLV.^ 
 He prays that the Ephesians might be given the 
 " spirit of wisdom and of revelation {dnoxalvxpeoyg) 
 in the knowledge of God, the eyes of their under- 
 standing being enlightened," that they might know 
 God's purpose and be able to understand and believe 
 it.® In his own case "^ Paul classes dnoxaXvipeiq 
 with dnraocag, and speaks of their exceeding abund- 
 ance ; the "visions" including his mystical ex- 
 periences of direct communication with Christ 
 
 1 Acts xvi. 6-8. 2 Qal. ii. 2. 
 
 3 According to Irenaeus, St. John from Ephesus went, when 
 called to neighbouring regions, in order, among other things, to 
 appoint to the ministry some one of those who were indicated 
 by the Holy Ghost : Eus., H. E., iii. 23. This probably may 
 refer to indication by prophecy. 
 
 4 Apoo. i. 3; xxii. 7, 10, 18, 19. ^ Ephes. iii. 3. 
 
 « Ephes. i. 17, cf. iii. 14. ' 2 Cor. xii. 1, 7. 
 
184 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 (vv. 2-4), and the " revelations " being the resultant 
 acquaintance with Christ's mind. Of this class is 
 the revelation {ojioKalvxpiv) of First Corinthians,^ 
 which any brother might bring to the common 
 edification — which St. Paul groups with discern- 
 ment prophecy and teaching as rational and useful, 
 in contrast with the unintelligibility and uselessness 
 of the glossolalia. 
 
 St. Paul's own " revelations " result in that Gospel 
 which was not after man, nor received of man, nor was 
 taught to him " except by revelation {di anoKokvipecog) 
 of Jesus Christ " : the record of it is in his preaching 
 and writing. 
 
 Here we reach what is essential in Christian 
 prophecy, as the spirit in us which is in us by the 
 pouring upon the Church of the Spirit of God that we 
 may know and speak the things of God. No man 
 can either know God for himself or teach his brother 
 to know God unless it is given him from above. 
 Flesh and blood has not revealed to any one that 
 Jesus is the Son of God ; no man can say that Jesus 
 is Lord except by the Holy Ghost. Faith is itself 
 God's gift. Belief, as belief exists in Christian 
 souls, is always revelation ^ ; and the revelation 
 communicated is always communicated that it 
 may be delivered to others; the consciousness of 
 Christ and of God in Christ then becomes the soul's 
 burden, a fire within self, so that he who knows 
 wearies of silence and cannot forbear. The root 
 
 1 Chap. xiv. 26. 
 
 2 Gal. i. 15, 16 : "When it pleased God ... to reveal His 
 Son in me." 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 185 
 
 fact of Christian prophecy was and is that unction 
 from the Holy One, in virtue of which we are aware 
 that we know. The Christian prophecy of the first 
 age, with whatever incidental manifestations of a 
 teratic nature such as vision or prediction, was in 
 essence that perception of God in Christ and of the 
 truth as it is in Christ which makes wise the simple 
 and compels whoever has it to bear Christ witness. 
 Whoever speaks by the impulse of, or as he is 
 taught by, the Holy Ghost "prophesies." Judas 
 and Silas, inasmuch as they were prophets, exhorted 
 the brethren and comforted them — so essentially 
 commonplace was prophecy : jtaQaxaXelVf oxriQl^eiv, 
 these familiar exercises, were the dtaxovcat to be 
 looked for from prophets. 
 
 When Ignatius speaks in the Spirit, he merely 
 reiterates his invariable teaching of unity and 
 purity and fidelity to Christ. Hermas probably 
 intends to exemplify actual prophecy, when the 
 Lady of his vision reads to him from the Book 
 which is in her hand " terrible words such as no 
 man could bear." The last of these words he re- 
 members, for they were few and of great profitable- 
 ness : they are a simple testimony to God and to 
 His purpose to fulfil promises to the elect, if they 
 keep the commandments which with much faith 
 they have received. ^ Those brethren who in 
 Irenaeus' day manifested prophetic gifts and spoke 
 with tongues, brought to light the secrets of men's 
 hearts for their good and expounded the mysteries 
 of God. Prophecy was not in the usual course 
 1 Vis. i. 3. 
 
186 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 predictive : it was not trance-speech ; its note was 
 not of the prodigious ; its power did not lie in marvel : 
 prophecy was a spiritual force — the force of insight 
 into the thought of God and into the heart of man. 
 He who was Christ's, when he heard it knew the voice 
 of Christ; the stranger to Christ, when he heard 
 it, knew himself — conscience responded to its de- 
 scription of his need — the secrets of his heart were 
 made manifest to him.^ Irenaeus as well as St. 
 Paul observes this peculiar power of prophecy — 
 the prophet, he says, brought to light the secret 
 things of men for their good. God Himself, 
 Barnabas writes, prophesies within us and opens 
 for us the mouth; he who desires to be saved 
 looks not to the man who speaks, but to Him who 
 speaks by the man, " being struck with wonder, 
 forasmuch as he never heard him speaking such 
 words out of his mouth nor himself ever desired 
 to hear such things." ^ In Barnabas' view it is not 
 the prophet who is authoritative, but the prophecy : 
 not the man, but God who speaks by the man. 
 
 It seems probable in fact that very much of 
 what in writers of the first age is called prophecy 
 would, if we could hear it now, present itself to us as 
 simply the spiritual exposition of truth, keen discern- 
 ment of the Divine intention, vivid discrimination 
 between practical alternatives, or intuitional ap- 
 preciation of individual values and of states of soul 
 — manifestations of the Spirit with which, in the 
 measure of our fitness to offer to the Holy Spirit 
 a medium of expression, we ourselves are happily 
 
 1 1 Cor. xiv. 25. ^ Epistle, xvi. 8, 9, 10. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 187 
 
 not entirely unfamiliar : albeit that familiarity 
 itself has dimmed our sense of their supernatural 
 origin and heavenly character. There were no 
 doubt other manifestations than these — predictions, 
 tongues, perhaps trance-speech, visions, apocalyptic 
 transport. Of this class, it may be supposed, are 
 the prophecies of which St. Paul, himself prophesy- 
 ing, could foresee the failure as he foresaw the 
 cessation of tongues, not as a decadence but in 
 process of approximation to completeness, to 
 tsIelov} Such forms of prophecy were (it has 
 been suggested, p. 89) the natural incident of the 
 impact of the Divine Spirit upon the human spirit, 
 not yet docile to its suggestion or disciplined to 
 afford to such a Presence an adequate channel of 
 expression. No doubt these are the manifestations 
 which would attract notice. To superficial obser- 
 vation, which is the commoner, they might seem 
 the typical and verifiable forms of prophecy. They 
 are in fact still discussed (and this may seem as- 
 tonishing) as if they were prophecy itself. Whereas 
 they were its least important concomitant, its 
 danger rather than its strength. They served a 
 purpose as signs to them that did not believe — 
 perhaps also for confirmation of faith to those who 
 believed imperfectly — marking as they did the 
 entrance of a new force into the sphere of human 
 life. But it is not in the aspect which such mani- 
 festations present that we can identify prophecy as 
 one of the foundations of the Church of God. The 
 Church is not based on such things as visions or 
 1 1 Cor. xiii. 10. 
 
188 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 trances or tongues ; the " signs " on which it depends 
 to convince the world are those of truth to God and 
 to conscience, of the energy of its message to convert 
 the soul and to regenerate society. The impulse of 
 its interior force has not been derived from such com- 
 munication with Heaven as can find its vehicle in 
 spasmodic voices, but from conscious knowledge of 
 God and of His Son Jesus Christ. The prophetic 
 power which underlies its development is the power 
 to receive and to communicate that knowledge. 
 
 As regards the record of prophecy, it is to be looked 
 for, not in such fragments as have survived, for 
 example, in Ignatius' outcry at Philadelphia or in 
 Polycarp's dream before his martyrdom or in the 
 laboured allegory of Hermas ; the record of prophecy 
 is in the Scriptures of the New Testament. In our 
 reverence for these Scriptures as our sacred Canon 
 we need not forget that they are also the contem- 
 porary documents of the Christian origins, and that 
 they incorporate the results of the earliest study 
 of the Christian data — of the person of our Lord, 
 of the significance and effect of the redemptive 
 events, of Christ's ethical and spiritual teaching, 
 of the relation of the Old Testament dispensation 
 and its scriptures to that which had now begun, 
 and of the relation of all of these to human salvation. 
 These data did not in themselves constitute a gospel 
 or supply a theology. The apostles were already 
 in possession of all their material when on the eve 
 of the Ascension they were still inquiring when the 
 Christ would fulfil their nationalist aspirations.^ 
 1 Acts i. 6. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 189 
 
 They knew the facts of the Gospel, but these facts 
 remained to them incoherent and unintelligible 
 until the advent of the Holy Spirit to illuminate 
 their understanding : no man knows the things 
 of God, save the Spirit of God who is in him. What 
 we know summarily as " Christianity " is an in- 
 terpretation of the evangelic events, which under 
 the Spirit's teaching has been reached in human 
 hearts and minds : and that interpretation is 
 the supreme work and the supreme example of 
 prophecy. 
 
 The New Testament Scriptures are not the work 
 of Apostleship as such, but of prophecy. Only 
 four of the nine sacred writers are of the number of 
 the great Apostleship. The Church has accurately 
 recognised that the authority of these writings is 
 not that of their human authorship — but rests on 
 their inspiration : it is the Holy Spirit who speaks 
 in them. Their place in the Church's value depends 
 not on the personality of the writers, for at least 
 one of these is absolutely anonymous : it depends 
 upon the character of their contents. The prophetic 
 Spirit lies behind the work of the Synoptists in the 
 selection and arrangement of material and in the 
 method of their narrative. That greatest of all 
 tragedies, the Fourth Gospel, is more than the 
 record of the intercourse of the Bosom Disciple 
 with his Lord — it is the interpretation of the Person 
 of our Lord by the prophetic spirit through St. 
 John. The Book of Acts is prophecy in the form 
 of history — it is the prophetic reading of the purpose 
 of God in those events which carried the Gospel 
 
190 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 from the world-centre at Jerusalem to the world- 
 centre at Rome. Behind St. Paul's Epistles lies 
 the " abundance of revelations " — that conscious- 
 ness of insight into mysteries — the knowing of 
 Christ and of the power of His resurrection which 
 Paul had never apprehended, but which he felt to 
 be progressively apprehending him. In greater 
 detail, we may see what prophecy, where it is most 
 clearly prophetic, is, when we read those marvellous 
 parentheses in the Fourth Gospel in which St. John 
 comments on his story as it goes, or those prolonga- 
 tions of our Lord's discourses which so carry on 
 Christ's thought that we are at a loss to say where 
 the living Voice has ceased and where the voice 
 of the Spirit takes up its burden; or in another 
 aspect in those passages of his Epistles where St. 
 Paul deduces a specifically Christian theory of life 
 as the proper inference from the great verities of 
 Christian dogma. Or we may find a singularly 
 perfect example of the work of Christian prophecy 
 in the Epistle to the Hebrews, borrowing as it does 
 nothing from the weight of any name, offering itself 
 to be judged only by the self -verifying nature of 
 its content; in its vision of the Heavenly Christ, 
 in its exposition of the symbolism of the Ancient 
 Covenant, and in its practical exhortations to the 
 Christian : — there we see what prophecy had to do, 
 and we see something of how its work was done; 
 we understand how St. Paul should have recognised 
 prophecy as one of the two foundations on which 
 the Church's life rested : prophecy, not as a system 
 of teratics, but as the presence of a supernatural 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 191 
 
 intelligence and sensibility operating within a 
 regenerate humanity, the Body of Christ. 
 
 The New Testament Scriptures give us such 
 record of prophecy as Divine wisdom has judged 
 to be necessary for a Rule of Faith and Morals. 
 In one aspect it only shows us at its highest 
 a process which nolvfjLeQ&Q kol noXvTQoJicog went 
 on throughout the area of the Spirit's indwelling. 
 The prophetic Scriptures have taken their place 
 in Christian acceptance and reverence because they 
 correspond with that Christian experience to which 
 they continually appeal for verification. St. Paul 
 requires from Heaven a Spirit in the Ephesians 
 which shall be able to comprehend him, in order 
 that he may expound to them the mystery revealed 
 to himself.^ St. Peter writes as reminding the 
 flock of " things that they know, a present truth 
 in which they were established " ^ ; and Paul appeals 
 to the Galatians for confirmation of his Gospel, 
 which he had himself received by direct revelation 
 from Christ. 3 The apostles, " first depositaries " 
 of the oracles of God as they were, yet lived in the 
 Church's life and breathed its atmosphere, and the 
 Church shared with them one Spirit. The expis- 
 cation of Christian doctrine. Christian morals, 
 Christian duty. Christian worship, went on diffus- 
 edly in countless Christian congregations. Christian 
 homes. Christian lives. The questions addressed 
 from Corinth to St. Paul give a glimpse into the 
 activity of the process, and they are few as com- 
 
 1 Ephes. iii. 14-19. ^ i p^^^ ^ i2; 2 Pet. i. 12; iii. I. 
 
 3 Gal. iii. If.; i. 11, 12. 
 
192 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 pared with the multitude of questions which dis- 
 ciples were answering for themselves everywhere, 
 forced to find answers to them, with every hour. 
 " Put them in mind," St. Paul writes once and again ^ : 
 the Church has learnt to know for itself those things 
 which Apostles taught. 
 
 Inasmuch as the Apostles represented the primary 
 delivery of the deposit of faith and determined 
 its form,2 it lay also with them to correct diver- 
 gence from the Christian type of doctrine, to settle 
 principles and to decide emergent questions of 
 faith and practice ; cases of their doing so are too 
 numerous for recapitulation, but one may instance, 
 besides the questions answered to the Corinthians 
 (which include matter so important as that of the 
 Resurrection to come), St. Paul's dealing with 
 nascent Gnosticism at Colossae, or with the question 
 of prayer for the Emperor, involving so much as 
 to the relation of the Church to civil order; St. 
 Peter's provision for the conduct of the Church 
 in presence or anticipation of persecution : and 
 St. John's denunciation of Docetism. Authority 
 had its source and centre in the Apostolate — they 
 carried the burden of all the Churches, and watched 
 as men who must give account. It lay always 
 with them in the last resort to determine whether 
 any conclusion in doctrine or inference in practice 
 was or was not true to the norm of faith or to the 
 rule of the Spirit of Jesus, as they had committed 
 
 1 2 Tim. ii. 14; Tit. iii. 1 ; conf. Jude 3. 
 
 2 Rom. vi. 17; 1 Cor. xv. 1-8; 1 Tim. ii. 7. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 193 
 
 these to the Christian society. Nevertheless there 
 remained for the diffused body of the Church an 
 extensive task of the assimilation and exegesis of 
 the apostolic deposit. Where Apostles determined 
 *'the way," 1 they who followed made the beaten 
 track upon which succeeding generations should 
 tread safely. They formed a Christian experience ; 
 they developed in detail a Christian code of the 
 better and the worse, to Ka?.6v and to aioxQov ; 
 they learnt a devotional life, an doxrjoig, and formed 
 a " custom of the Churches," ^ which embodied 
 *' the law of the Spirit of life through Christ Jesus." ^ 
 This was the work of the prophetic spirit and pro- 
 phetic energy which are throughout the Christian 
 fellowship. It is a work which the apostolic nucleus 
 could originate and could regulate and could shape 
 to a definite and accepted result, but which from 
 the nature of the work it could not by itself carry 
 out, any more than a gardener can carry out the 
 life and growth of the plant which he has planted 
 and prunes and waters. It is God who gives the 
 increase. 
 
 This work then of the application of faith to 
 circumstance and of the ascertainment of concrete 
 Christian experience which went to build up by 
 degrees the system of life, thought, and conduct 
 which we summarise as '' Christianity," was the work 
 of the prophetic spirit immanent in the Church as a 
 whole and diffused throughout its general activity. 
 At the same time it was not work in which all would 
 be found equally active. In every movement there 
 
 1 Acts ix. 2; xix. 9, etc. ^ i Coj.. xi. 16. » Rom. viii. 2. 
 o 
 
194 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 are those who lead and those who accompany, 
 those who perceive and those who are made to 
 understand ; it is the former who represent and even 
 seem to constitute the movement. In any associa- 
 tion of Christians there are such men, who may 
 or may not be its official leaders, but who are in 
 fact its spiritual force. Such men must have 
 been found in each ecclesia — men who saw more 
 clearly and felt more deeply and were driven by the 
 stronger conviction; and these might be regarded 
 as par excellence the prophets in that ecclesia — not 
 necessarily men in office, though such men must have 
 been and unquestionably were sought and chosen for 
 office. It would not follow that officially they were 
 prophets : by its nature prophecy cannot be official. 
 
 It is significant that, except in St. Paul's idealistic 
 presentation of the Church from the standpoint 
 of Heavenly endowment, and in the symbolic 
 vocabulary of the Apocalypse, we meet the actual 
 " prophet " as a concrete and factual person only 
 in the Judaean group which is mentioned in Acts.^ 
 
 The Church grew out of Judaism, and in Judaism 
 the prophet was strictly the exceptional person, 
 defined from his fellow Israelites by a real spiritual 
 difference — he had what they had not, and he was 
 
 ^ The exception, if any, would be the " prophets " of 1 Cor. xiv. 
 29-32 ; but these seem to be merely of the rank and file of the 
 Church, considered in the act of exhibiting prophetic impulse. 
 The " prophets " of Acts all hail from Jerusalem — Agabus, 
 Barnabas, Saul, Simeon, Lucius, Manaen, Judas, Silas. The 
 daughters of Philip prophesied, but are not denominated prophet- 
 esses. The Judaean prophets seem possibly to represent in some 
 way a fruit of the original outpouring of Pentecost. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 195 
 
 what they were not; on him rested the Spirit of 
 the Lord ; God revealed to him what God would do, 
 and for God he spoke the mind of God. Under 
 the Gospel the Spirit was " poured upon all flesh " ; 
 whoever was in Christ was one Spirit with Christ. 
 The prophetic gift became the common possession of 
 believers. But it is possible that at first this oblitera- 
 tion of distinction was not realised. Men were accus- 
 tomed to regard one as distinctively " a prophet," 
 another as "no prophet." There are other respects 
 in regard to which the Church did not immediately 
 grasp the law of its own being ; it came but slowly 
 to recognise that it is Catholic — perhaps as slowly 
 to perceive that it is prophetic, and that it is pro- 
 phetic in its whole membership — that prophecy, 
 while manifest in one with greater power than in 
 another, is no distinction of kind among Christian 
 men. Here or there the gift was evident; in an 
 Agabus or a Barnabas it leapt to the eye ; these 
 then, it was assumed, were " prophets." Next, 
 however, it was found that many prophesied, 
 exhibiting in degree the same gift, used by the same 
 Spirit to declare the same message or to communicate 
 the like counsel — they also in their measure showing 
 that insight, and they also urged by that necessity 
 of expression, which are the characteristics of pro- 
 phecy. Prophesyings were discovered to be usual, 
 so that it was needful to warn against despising 
 them . It even came to seem that all might prophesy . 
 At this point perhaps the distinctively Christian 
 way of referring to these matters began to be sub- 
 stituted for the more Judaic nomenclature which 
 
196 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 had been at first inevitable — men ceasing to speak 
 of " the prophet " as a person distinct among his 
 brethren, and speaking instead of prophecy, pro- 
 phesyings, prophetic gifts, prophetic men ^ — as one 
 may hope we shall always have occasion to do. 
 Prophecy we meet with constantly as a recognised 
 and treasured element of the Church's life — not 
 even the misuse of prophecy by Montanism shook 
 the Church's conviction of its own prophetic char- 
 acter ; " the apostle shows " (writes the anti-Monta- 
 nist quoted by Eusebius) " that the gift of prophecy 
 should be in the whole Church until the coming of the 
 Lord." 2 The individual prophet on the other hand, 
 except in mystical writing such as St. Paul's enu- 
 merations, St. John's Apocalypse, Hermas' Pastor, 
 does not appear later than Agabus at Caesarea ' 
 until we meet him again in the shadowy pages of 
 the Didache. 
 
 Prophecy has always been dogged by its counter- 
 part; over against the true prophet has stood the 
 sinister figure of the false prophet. Deuteronomy 
 warns against false prophets.* Jeremiah and Ezekiel ^ 
 repeatedly complain of them. Our Lord foretold 
 
 1 1 Thess. V. 20; 1 Cor. xii. 10; xiii. 2, 8; xiv. 6, 22; 1 Tim. i. 
 18 ; iv. 14. Ignatius prophesies, but does not speak of prophets. 
 ■ Poly carp is " a prophetic teacher," not a prophet. Quadratus 
 was " noted for his prophetical gifts.'^ Ammias and Quadratus 
 are said to have " prophesied under the New Testament."' 
 Justin and Irenaeus speak of " prophetic gifts " enduring in the 
 Church of their respective times. 
 
 * Eus., H. E., V. 17 : ^weXP* '''Vs reXdas rcapovaias. 
 
 » Acts xxi. 10. * Deut. xiii. 1-5 ; xviii. 20-22. 
 
 5 Jerem. xiv. 13-16; xxiii. 9-40; Ezek. xiii. 16; xxii. 26, 28. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 197 
 
 them — He bade beware of them ; ^ He said that 
 many false prophets should arise. ^ St. Paul is aware 
 that false prophecy is in the air, and bids men 
 discriminate between it and the true by the broad 
 test of attitude to the person of Christ — a test 
 suited to the circumstances of a time and place 
 where in the midst of Paganism the question was 
 one of acceptance or rejection of a freshly pro- 
 claimed Gospel. For St. John, writing at a later 
 stage and within a formed Christian society, the 
 question is not now between a Jesus who is Lord 
 and a Jesus who is Anathema, but between differ- 
 ent presentations of a Christ who is accepted by 
 all in whom St. John is interested ; and to him the 
 test of true prophecy or false is that of doctrinal 
 truth : — the Spirit of God witnesses to a real incar- 
 nation, but the spirit of antichrist shuns that con- 
 fession. Many false prophets, he says, are gone 
 out into the world. In his apocalypse the false 
 prophet figures along with the dragon and the beast 
 as one of the forces which oppose the Kingdom of 
 Christ. 
 
 The safeguard of prophecy was its impersonal 
 character. It had no warrant except that of its 
 intrinsic worth. Men spoke it under an impulse 
 which to themselves seemed to be Divine, ^ with the 
 sense that what they said was given them to say 
 it. They were required to give it with intelligent 
 responsibility and not as an oracle of which they 
 were only the medium.* Others judged of what 
 
 1 St. Matt. vii. 15. ^ j^^^ ^xiv. 11. 
 
 » 1 Cor. vii. 40. * Ibid. liv. 19, 32. 
 
198 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 they said, whether it was of God or not. All was 
 to be tested ; only that which was good was to be 
 observed.^ These formed their own estimate of 
 what the prophecy required of them, even when 
 it was accepted as true prophecy — as for example, 
 Paul did at Caesarea * ; for the Christian is a free 
 man in the manner of his obedience. In proportion 
 as prophecy should lose this impersonality and should 
 become the dictum of an individual, taking weight 
 from his position as a recognised prophet, prophecy 
 would necessarily become a danger and the prophet 
 himself tend to be a charlatan. A person who sees 
 visions, falls into trances, or delivers oracles which 
 must be obeyed because he delivers them, is a 
 danger, to himself and to others. It is, as Hamack 
 has said, easy for him to degenerate. If he is 
 genuine and sincere, he will have difficulty in main- 
 taining his sincerity intact. If he is himself sincere, 
 he is likely to have imitators who are not. He is 
 in any case an anomaly in the free spiritual life of 
 the Christian society ; for he demands of men what 
 Christians may not lawfully give, namely submission 
 of conscience upon other grounds than those of moral 
 conviction, or belief on other ground than that of 
 perception of truth. Such a person requires for his 
 activity an atmosphere not of faith but of superstition. 
 Such prophets as we meet in the pages of the 
 sub-apostolic writers are mainly, if not always, of 
 this professional type. When Hermas deals with 
 the actual circumstances of his time, it is this sus- 
 
 ^ 1 Thess. V. 21, connected with the vpo<pr]Teias of v. 20. 
 
 * Acts IX. 23-4; xxi. 4, 10-14. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 199 
 
 pect person whom he knows best under the claim 
 to be prophet. Those prophets who have entered 
 into the foundation of the Church belong to the 
 past in its ideal truth — in the hard fact of his day 
 the prophet has become the Empty Prophet who 
 exalts himself and claims regard as an inspired 
 person, a clairvoyant in quest of fees. Hermas 
 has a vivid and intelligent conception of what 
 prophecy really is, its humility, its spontaneity, 
 its impersonality, its readiness to be tested on its 
 merits, and its submissiveness to the mind of God : 
 " Thus, therefore, is the Spirit of the Lord known, 
 because whosoever speaketh by the Spirit of God 
 speaketh as the Lord wills." He is, however, but 
 slightly concerned with this ideal figure of the true 
 prophet. He describes him only in order to contrast 
 him with the empty prophet in whom he is really 
 interested, who evidently is the person who occupies 
 the stage. Justin Martyr ^ admits that " many 
 false teachers," whom he parallels with the false 
 prophets of the Old Testament, were to be found 
 within Christianity. He does not claim as against 
 them the possession of true prophets, but of the 
 " prophetical gift " which he says " remains with 
 us even to the present time." The gift remains, 
 but individual or recognised prophets are not 
 instanced. Irenaeus ^ describes the methods of 
 one such teacher, who, heretic as he is stated to 
 have been, must have operated within Christian 
 circles, for Irenaeus accuses him of attempting to 
 corrupt " some of the most faithful women," and 
 ^ Dial, with Trypho, Ixxxii. ^ ^^^^ Heres., I., xiii. 3, 4, 6. 
 
200 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 in the case of one, wife of a deacon, of succeeding. 
 Origen ^ tells us that no prophets bearing any 
 resemblance to the ancient prophets have appeared 
 in Celsus' time, so that Celsus cannot have heard 
 such prophecy, and demands the names of those 
 whom Celsus professes to describe. 
 
 The prophet of the Didache, so far as he may 
 stand for anything actually existent, represents a 
 final stage of this degeneracy. Once acknowledged 
 for a prophet he may not be called in question.^ 
 His unpleasant practices, which are apparently to 
 be expected, are to be condoned, since such (it is 
 to be believed) have been the manners of his pre- 
 decessors — the line is to be drawn only when he 
 may propose to invite imitators.^ Lower than this 
 the conception of prophecy could hardly sink : yet 
 this is the " true prophecy " of the Didache * — even 
 it maintains the traditional attitude of suspicion 
 that a false prophecy is only too possible; though 
 what under the circumstances that may have been 
 it is less easy to conjecture. 
 
 Not much weight can be given to hostile descrip- 
 tions of the Christian prophet by such writers as 
 Celsus or Lucian. They knew the false ; they did 
 not know the true. Lucian gives what is frankly 
 satire, telling us what he thought might be conceived 
 to happen in case of a very unscrupulous man playing 
 the part of prophet. Celsus, however, writes gravely, 
 and though he shows confusion and is imperfectly 
 informed has, one can see, certain facts before him, 
 
 1 Cmt. Cels., vii. 11. 2 Didache, XI. 7. » 75^. n. 
 
 * " Every approved true prophet."' 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 201 
 
 which Origen in his answer does not deny. The pro- 
 fessional prophet had in so far become a scandal. 
 
 There were, as on a general survey is evident, two 
 possible lines which the development of prophecy in 
 the Church might follow, both of which were actually 
 followed — a line of truth and a line of error. From 
 the beginning the prophetic energy showed itself 
 in two different aspects, which, as they existed at 
 Corinth, St. Paul contrasts. On the one hand, there 
 were forms of prophecy which were teratic and 
 abnormal to the ordinary conditions of life, glosso- 
 lalia, ecstasy, trance and the like ; on the other hand, 
 there were forms of it which were unremarkable but 
 serviceable, " for edification," " with one's under- 
 standing," hortatory, expository, interpretative, 
 directed like that of Judas and Silas at Antioch to 
 exhortation and confirmation.^ Prophecy of the one 
 type St. Paul almost deprecates — as Batiffol says,^ 
 he is afraid of it — prophecy of the other type he 
 desired for himself and for every one. The false 
 development would be that which should emphasise 
 the abnormal and marvellous ; the true development 
 would be that which should be willing that the ex- 
 ceptional and less useful should lapse by neglect, 
 and should pursue in preference the rational and 
 the consciously edifying. The false development 
 would tend to exalt and separate the gifted man; 
 the true development would aim at the elevation 
 of the general life of the Church. It is this latter 
 development which the course of events has actually 
 
 ^ Acts XV. 32 : irapcKoi^eaav rovs aSeXcpobs Koi iiriorr'fipi^av. 
 
 2 Prim. Cath., p. 30. 
 
202 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 shown. As that which at first could appear only as an 
 aggregation of converts grew into a spiritual whole, 
 the individual of special illumination became less 
 important and less distinguishable. What had been 
 exceptional became usual. The prophetic ceased 
 to be the extraordinary. The opportunity of 
 spiritual originality diminished. What had at first 
 been a very revelation, requiring for its perception 
 some soul of rarer discernment, was by and by the 
 commonplace of belief; what had been fresh in 
 Christian thought had become the familiar maxim 
 of every Christian teacher. Practical problems came 
 to be solved; questions of interpretation came to 
 be settled. By degrees experience took the place 
 which at first only spiritual intuition could fill. The 
 Church was being builded together for an habitation 
 of God through the Spirit ; it was growing to be a 
 homogeneous fellowship with a common thought and 
 a common understanding of itself and its calling. 
 It offered itself with increasing conductivity to the 
 inflow of the Spirit of Christ. An electric current 
 flashes and sparkles only where the continuity of the 
 conductor is imperfect ; as that improves, the current 
 flows silent and invisible, but flows more strongly. It 
 is this which happens as the Church grows in grace 
 and in the knowledge of Christ Jesus : it assimilates 
 the prophetic : it draws charisma from the surface 
 into its vital habit. As the Church becomes the 
 more perfect vehicle of the Spirit, manifestation of 
 the Spirit tends, not to cease, but to change form from 
 the marvellous to the ethical and serviceable. In 
 that way the evidence of the Church's supernatural 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 203 
 
 character assumes permanent shape. St. Paul recog- 
 nises this when in the Pastoral Epistles he recurs 
 again and again with delighted recognition to the 
 " wholesomeness " of Christian teaching and of its 
 results.^ This is the principal theme of the Epistle to 
 Diognetus, and is the demonstration of Christianity 
 which its writer has to offer. There is no need that 
 we should speak of withdrawal of gift or of cessation 
 of prophecy ; what we see in the history of the 
 Church's life is neither of these things — it is a deve- 
 loping capacity to contain and to express the spirit 
 in congruously spiritual ways. " The prophetic 
 spirit must continue in the whole Church " : the more 
 it is the energy of the Church as a whole, the less will 
 it be distinguishable as the exceptional possession of 
 any one member of the Church. The prophetic gift 
 diffused in the Church is, in a sense, the antithesis of 
 the prophet as an individual. The more complete 
 the diffusion of the gift, the nearer the approach in 
 that relation to the Christian ideal. 
 
 Prophecy can neither cease nor can it be super- 
 seded by institutional ministry. True, the Church 
 no longer speaks of it in the language of the earlier 
 chapters of the Book of Acts ; a change of phrase 
 began to show itself at a very early point. One may 
 doubt if it was usual to recognise individuals as pecu- 
 liarly prophets for any long time after the earliest 
 time of all. In his later writings, as has been pointed 
 out, St. Paul has nothing to say of prophets, St. Peter 
 has nothing, St. John speaks only to warn against 
 
 1 2 Tim. i. 13; iv. 3; Tit. 1. 9, 13; ii. 1, 2, 8. See Bishop 
 P aget, The Sanity of Saintliness. 
 
204 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 false prophecy. Prophets play no part in the Chris- 
 tian world of Clement or of Ignatius. Justin and 
 Irenaeus speak of the prophetic gift as a survival 
 whose existence needs to be asserted. It is partly, 
 no doubt, 43ecause, as has been said, the prophetic 
 spirit, once strange and notable, had come to be 
 recognised as resident " in the whole Church " and 
 is no longer phenomenal : it is also because the name 
 and claim of the prophet had been discredited by 
 professionalism, and was finally discredited by the 
 attempt of Montanism to base what may be ad- 
 mitted to have been in some aspects a real spiritual 
 reaction against accommodation to the world, upon 
 a revival of teratic prophecy in some of its least 
 admirable features. Prophecy, however, has not 
 ceased. It continues to be what it has always been 
 — the utterance of the burden of the Christian heart 
 as the Christian man conceives himself to be shown 
 the mind of God or to have received light upon truth ; 
 who therefore offers his teaching or his interpretation 
 or his warning or his exhortation : " and the rest 
 judge." It is now, as it always was, unofficial, just as 
 much and just as little " a ministry "as in the first 
 century. The Spirit of God and the spirit of error 
 no doubt still both find voice, and many antichrists 
 go out; we have the same tests by which to know 
 them and the same responsibility to discern. 
 
 The theory of a twofold mmistry, charismatic and 
 institutional, is impracticable: (1) because it sets 
 up a distinction which cannot exist in a body which 
 is by nature wholly charismatic. To propose 
 charisma as constituting ministry is — since char- 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 206 
 
 isma is admittedly universal to Christians — either a 
 commonplace (which one may suspect it of being), 
 or it is a denial of the existence of ministry as dis- 
 tinguished from the flock ministered to. A dis- 
 tinction cannot be based upon what is universal. 
 The position that there is and should be no ministry 
 (no " one-man ministry ") is quite well understood 
 and is respectably supported ; it can be stated and 
 defended more compactly than in the form of a theory 
 of charismatic ministry ; if the original order of the 
 Church accorded with the position described by that 
 theory, we may as well face the fact and the infer- 
 ences. Further, it is (2) impracticable, because by 
 its nature charisma cannot be the possession of a 
 class, and is incapable of being made the differentia 
 of an order — such a claim depresses the Christian 
 flock in a manner which is inconsistent with the 
 radical ideas of Christianity, and introduces into the 
 spiritual life an intolerable dichotomy. Distinctions 
 based on institution have not that effect; they are 
 compatible with the homogeneity of the fellowship 
 and with recognition of the identically supernatural 
 life of the whole Body, in which all members, what- 
 ever their relative status, are equally honourable, 
 since the only honour of any is to be of Christ's Body 
 in whatever function, and since each can but fill his 
 own place which he has received of God and not of 
 man. This is not contradicted by the view that 
 charisma attends, as well as precedes and qualifies 
 for, institutional office — a view which we find in- 
 volved in St. Paul's allusion to the grace which was 
 in [Timothy by the imposition of hands, or in 
 
206 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 Irenaeus' attribution of the charisma veritatis to 
 the office of chief pastors, and which is the general 
 conviction expressed in the Church's ordinals. God 
 sends no man to warfare at his own charges and 
 withholds from none the grace which shall be suffi- 
 cient for his responsibility.^ 
 
 Two things we shall fail to find among the Chris- 
 tian origins : (1) An order of ministry which acts in 
 virtue of charisma, without mission institutionally 
 mediated ; or (2) any order of ministry which is in- 
 dependent of charisma, which is appointed without 
 regard to charisma, or is limited to functions which 
 do not demand charisma for their exercise. The 
 theory of Twofold Ministry requires to find both of 
 these, and without them falls. 
 
 At these Christian origins we do perceive a two- 
 foldness ; we perceive, that is to say, the presence 
 there of that which is still with us, and also the 
 presence of that which is no longer with us. But 
 the distinction is not between an institutional which 
 persists and a charismatic which has evanesced ; the 
 charismatic cannot pass — the spiritual order of the 
 Church's life cannot become mundane or sink into 
 the merely natural. The distinction is between 
 the Apostolate proper which is functus officio, and 
 the organised life of the Church which continues. 
 The Apostolate, while of and within the Church, and 
 
 ^ " That the laying on of hands was regarded as conferring 
 the charisma necessary to the office is obvious from the passages 
 in Timothy, and it is improbable that these express only a later 
 idea. The laying on of hands was thus certainly sacramental.'* 
 Harnack, Constitution and Law of the Church, p. 26. 
 
MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 207 
 
 while impressing permanently its character upon 
 the Church, represents in one aspect the transcend- 
 ency of Christ over the Church. The Apostles 
 occupy a relation to Christ which is necessarily 
 unique, inasmuch as they constitute the link be- 
 tween the historical Incarnation and the Church 
 which proceeds from the Incarnation and extends 
 it. It is quite true that Apostles as such have and 
 can have no successors. What our Scottish theolo- 
 gians ^ have asserted for subsequent and subsist- 
 ing ministry is that it has succeeded to as much of 
 the apostolic commission as in its nature is trans- 
 missible. The differentia of apostleship from 
 other ministry is obviously not transmissible. The 
 Apostolate was the hand of Christ to launch upon 
 its voyage the Ship of the Church. Its office was 
 to do that which is done cbia^,'^ once for all, deliver- 
 ing the deposit of faith and order. This is its unique- 
 ness in character and function as a Ministry and the 
 root of Ministry ; and hence the twofoldness which 
 in the first stage of the Church's life is plain enough. 
 It is not an antinomy of the charismatic and the 
 institutional; the Apostolate is both charismatic 
 and institutional, and the Church as founded upon 
 the Apostolate is both charismatic and institutional. 
 Principal Lindsay is acutely right when he indicates ^ 
 the analogy of this twofoldness to that which we see 
 in the Foreign Mission Field, between the " Mission 
 to the heathen " and the " Native Church " in which 
 
 1 E. gr., Principal Hill, Lectures, vi. ii. 2; and in his View of 
 the Constitution of the Church of Scotland. 
 
 2 Jude, 3, 5. ^ Church and Ministry, p. 41, etc. 
 
208 MINISTRY IN THE CHURCH 
 
 it results. That is not a distinction between the 
 charismatic and the institutional : — the " Mission " 
 brings with it institution as well as grace : the 
 "Native Church" is equally charismatic with the 
 Mission which has called it into being. The mis- 
 sionary stage of its existence passes, but its charis- 
 matic and institutional life alike continue. 
 
 The words charismatic and prophetic define the 
 whole environment within which the apostolic 
 activity proceeded and the whole material which 
 the Apostolate organised. One will think more 
 accurately if the Apostolate be conceived of as the 
 institutional force within the Church's charismatic 
 mass, than if the Apostolate is regarded as a charis- 
 matic force at work within the Church as a natural 
 society. Neither view is adequate ; but it is true that 
 the Church is a charismatic plasm, and that the 
 Apostolate was the regulative centre from which 
 the Church received a rule of faith and a definite 
 discipline. 
 
 Look beyond the moment of the presence of the 
 Apostolate in the Church — the twofoldness has dis- 
 appeared. It is no longer in the picture; not in 
 Clement's picture of Church life, not in that of 
 Ignatius or of Justin or of Irenaeus. The Apostles 
 have passed away ; there remain those things which 
 to-day we know : the Flock of God, the Ministry of 
 Christ, and the Grace of the Holy Ghost — that " gift 
 of Prophecy which must continue in the whole 
 Church until the coming of the Lord." 
 
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