Bicknell on Articles XXIII, XXXV, XXXVI: Of Ministering in the Congregation; Of the Homilies; Of Consecration of Bishops and Ministers

§ 4. A temporary use of the Church’s authority in discipline is seen in the Homilies. They were a product of the needs of the age. At the time of the Reformation all teaching was disorganized. Learned or capable preachers were few, and of those few a large part were hot-headed and violent. The government wished to sup- press all teaching that was inconvenient or might lead to disorder. Hence preachers were licensed, and no unlicensed preacher might deliver a sermon. To take the place of sermons ‘ Homilies’ were composed by well-known leaders, to be placed in the hands of the clergy for reading in church. This plan was first dis- cussed in 1542. It was first put into practice in 1547 when the First Book of Homilies was produced and commanded by the authority of the King to be read every Sunday at High Mass (cp. the rubric after the Nicene Creed). Under Mary a new set of Homilies was proposed, but never carried out. Under Elizabeth the First Book was reprinted and a Second Book added to it. Our Article was amended in 1563 so as to include both sets. In 1571 the last Homily was added in view of the Northern Rebellion of 1569. As was natural, they were unpopular among many of the clergy, both Papistical and Puritan. Hence they read them unintelligibly. This is forbidden by the Article.

The Article only claims for them a vague and temporary authority. Happily we are not bound to accept every statement in them. They do not stand on a level with the Prayer-Book or the Articles. They came into existence for a special emergency which has now passed away.

from the 10th of the 13 Articles of 1538, the attempted compromise between Anglicans and Lutherans. This in turn was partly based on the Confession of Augsburg. Thus the history of the Article accounts for its vagueness. Both Lutherans and Anglicans wished to oppose Anabaptists, who held that an internal call to the ministry dispensed a man from the need of any external authorization whatever—a view that could only lead to ecclesiastical anarchy. Both parties agreed on the need of some external call, but any further agreement about the nature of the authority that could confer ordination, whether episcopal or presbyterian, could only be attained by vagueness. Even so, the

language of the Article has been strengthened : ‘legitime ’ was substituted for ‘rite’ and ‘et missus’ added after ‘ vocatus.’ The words ‘ cooptati et adsciti’ are also an addition. But its colourless tone and weakness in positive statement are corrected by the language of Article XXXVI and the preface to the ordinal. We must study all these together to learn the mind of the Church of England.

validity of our Ordinal against (i) the Puritans, who regarded it as con- taining things ‘superstitious or ungodly.’ They objected not only to episcopacy, but to the formula ‘Receive the Holy Ghost’; (ii) the Papists, who regarded orders conferred with the English Ordinal as invalid for various reasons, among which one was that it did not ‘ contain all things necessary to such consecration and ordering.’

$1. The Christian ministry—The Church, like any other society in the world, needs some kind of organization. ‘ God is not a God of confusion ’ (1 Cor. 14°%). From her very nature she requires officers to perform certain functions on her behalf and as centres round which she may gather. A purely human society as a matter of course elects, appoints, and if need be dismisses its own officers. They owe their authority entirely to the will of the society. But the Church is not a purely human society. All would agree that her mission and authority rest not upon the will of man but on the will of God. Hence all Christians would be at one in asserting that for the call and appointment of her ministry, she is in some sense dependent on God. The question still remains, what consti- tutes a valid call and appointment. The Church of England insists upon :

(a) The inward call to the individual. This is not mentioned explicitly in the Articles, because all, including Anabaptists, agreed upon its necessity. In the ordering of Deacons the first question begins: ‘Do you trust that you are inwardly moved by the Holy Ghost to take upon you this Office and Ministration ? ’ The whole point of the Article is that, taken by itself, it is insufficient. If the individual is to be made the sole judge of his call, the Church would be placed at the mercy of any man who felt himself so called, whatever his life and teaching might be. The New Testament makes it quite clear that the judgment of the individual must in this as in all things be tested and con- firmed by the judgment of the community (cp. e.g. the quali- fications demanded in 1 Tim. 311° and Tit. 1*° and the test implied in 1 Cor. 12%3, 1 Jn. 4’).

(6) The inward call, therefore, needs to be supplemented by the outward call of the Church. Practically all organized Christian bodies would agree that ‘ Jt 1s not lawful for any man to take upon him the office of public preaching or ministering the Sacraments wm the congregation, before he be lawfully called and sent to execute the same.’ So in the ordering of Priests the candi- dates are asked : ‘ Do you think in your heart that you be truly called, according to the will of our Lord Jesus Christ and the order of this Church of England?’ The meaning of ‘sent’ may be explained as a reference to Jn. 2074, but more probably it is to be explained in the light of the Ordination Service, as

the commission to perform the duties of the office in a particular sphere of work. The authority is given to minister ‘ where thou shalt be lawfully appointed thereunto.’ Common-sense makes it evident that the officers of any society must not only possess authority from the society but also be given a sphere of work by the society.

(c) The real question of dispute is concealed in the words: * Those we ought to judge lawfully called and sent, which be chosen and called to this work by men who have public authority given unto them in the congregation to call and send Ministers into the Lord’s wmeyard.’ Who have this public authority and whence was it given to them? Art. 36 and the Ordinal make it quite clear that the Church of England means by these bishops. The inward call by God and the outward call of the Christian com- munity are calls to seek ordination by a bishop, not to do without it. The word ‘cooptati’ implies that ministers must be ‘chosen ’ by those who are themselves ministers. In practice the Church of England requires episcopal ordination for all who are to minister in its churches. Those who have received such in, e.g. the Church of Rome, are not reordained on joining the English Church. The ministers of nonconformist bodies who have not received episcopal ordination must receive it before - they are allowed to minister. From the Reformation down to to-day episcopal ordination has been required. Cases may be found in times of disorder and confusion, when the Church’s discipline was disorganized, in which a minister not episcopally ordained held a benefice, but such an act was utterly irregular and in defiance of the clear will of the Church. The question, therefore, remains, What ground has the Church of England for insisting upon ordination by a bishop, as a condition of a valid appointment to its ministry ? We must beware of putting the question in the form: Is the ministry from above or from below ? All who recognize the Church’s share in the appoint- ment of ministers must agree that in one sense it comes from below. All again who recognize the need of a call from God, must agree that in another sense it comes from above. The question is what, if anything, does ordination by a bishop add to the inward call by God and the outward call of the Church ? Is it true that in any sense it conveys a commission from Christ given in the first instance to the Apostles and handed down from

them through those who have in turn received authority to transmit it ?

§ 2. In answering this question we may begin by drawing a distinction between, first, ‘ apostolic succession’ considered as a — series of historical facts, and secondly, the various interpretations put upon these facts by the Church. As always, life came first and theology second: the Church acted first and thought afterwards. Under the guidance of the Holy Spirit the Church instinctively put forth certain orders of ministry to perform certain duties for the whole Body, just as a living organism puts forth organs for the discharge of certain functions necessary to its life. Later on men came to reflect not only on what had been done but on the manner in which it had been done. They saw that almost unconsciously the Church had acted on certain principles: these they began to examine and draw out, in order that they might discern al] that they implied and the light that they threw upon the life of the whole body.

What then are the facts ?

(a) The early Church lived in expectation of the immediate return of Christ. Hence she had no mind to make any detailed arrangements for her future organization. Our Lord had pro- vided His Church with a ministry and His teaching made clear that this ministry would continue until His return (Lk. 124%, Mt. 281%2°), Whether other ministers besides the Twelve would be needed, remained to be seen. The New Testament insists upon the deliberate call and choice of the Twelve Apostles by Christ Himself (Mk. 314, etc.). They were appointed to be with Him, and He imparted special teaching to them. Above all, they were to be the witnesses of the resurrection. The Mission of the Seventy attests the existence of a wider circle of disciples, entrusted with ministerial work, but there is no indication that they were appointed as a permanent body. The Twelve alone, it would seem, were present at the institution of the Eucharist (Lk. 22144n¢ 28-30 Mk, 141720), Tt has been keenly disputed whether St. John represents the promise of the Spirit and the great commission as given to the Twelve alone or to the whole Church (Jn. 207728), The question is not of primary importance, as in any case they were given to a Church which Christ Himself had already provided with a ministry, through which the powers bestowed should normally be exercised. Taken

THE MINISTRY OF THE CHURCH $409

by itself St. John’s narrative leaves the question open.* But the story of Acts 2 seems to make it clear that only the Twelve received in the first instance the special outpouring of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. This explains the filling up of the number of the Twelve by the election of Matthias compared with the failure to do so on the death of James.t The title ‘ Apostle’ is applied in the New Testament to others besides the Twelve, e.g. Barnabas and Paul (Acts 1414), and apparently to James, the Lord’s brother (Gal. 11°), and perhaps others. Of these only St. Paul seems to be on a level with the Twelve (Gal. 1! and 279, 2 Cor. 115). We must distinguish between the Apostles of Christ, those personally sent forth by Him, namely, the Twelve, and St. Paul and the ‘apostles of the Churches’ (2 Cor. 87, Phil. 2”), that is, men sent forth by some local Church to a particular work. St. Paul was counted an apostle in both senses (cp. Acts 137°), but Barnabas only in the second and inferior sense.

Pressure of circumstances compelled the Church to develop a ministry. The earliest indication of this is the appointment of the Seven (Acts 616). In order to meet an urgent need, certain functions are delegated to them. They are elected by the Church at large (vv. 3245), but the Apostles ordain them (v. *). The extent of their commission is not clear, but the conduct of Philip at Samaria shows that it possessed quite definite limits. He is able to preach. He can take the decisive step of baptizing Samaritans into the new Israel, but he has no authority to lay on hands, and is compelled for that purpose to send to Jerusalem for Apostles (Acts 8!*1”). The precise relation of these ‘Seven’ to the order of deacons is obscure. They are never called didkovor, though the word dakoveiv is used in connexion with them.

The origin of the order of presbyters is nowhere described. It has been suggested that they were a deliberate imitation of the Jewish presbyters. More probably they were a purely Christian institution spontaneously created to meet a need of the Church. The name in itself is quite vague and may mean no more than ‘elder men’ (e.g. 1 Pet. 5°, 1 Tim. 5%).

• Op. also v. 7 which shows that they all were Galileans. This excludes at once the idea that the Spirii visibly came on the whole Church.

More important than the name are the duties that they were commissioned to perform. Dr. Hamilton holds that they were primarily ordained to break bread at the Eucharist. For such a function no remarkable spiritual or intellectual gifts would be required, but rather a good character and practical holiness of life. But if this is so, they almost immediately began to perform other duties as well, such as pastoral work, teaching and ruling (Acts 2028, 1 Pet. 51,1 Tim. 51”). The order seems to be universal (Acts 15¢ Jerusalem, 201” Ephesus, Tit. 15 ‘in every city of Crete,’ cp. James 5%, etc.). When we read in Acts 143, ‘ When they had appointed for them elders in every church… they com- mended them to the Lord,’ from what we know of St. Luke’s method we may be fairly certain that he is giving a typical instance of St. Paul’s practice on his missionary journeys. All the evidence that we possess goes to show that they were ordained either by Apostles or those sent by Apostles with authority to ordain (1 Tim. 5%, Tit. 15). We also hear of éricxo7a or bishops. The more probable view is that in Scripture this is simply another title for the same office, describing the general super- vision that it carried with it. This is the natural interpretation of, e.g. Acts 20. Inv. 1!” the presbyters of the Church are called, in v. ° St. Paul speaks of them as ‘ bishops,’ without the slightest indication that he is not addressing them all. So, too, in Tit. 159, after telling Titus that he had been left in Crete to appoint elders, St. Paul goes on to describe the kind of man fit to be appointed as ‘the bishop.’ In Phil. 11 ‘ bishops’ and ‘ deacons’ only are mentioned, when we should expect a mention of presbyters. A fairrcase, however, can be made against the identification. If they are not one and the same, ‘ presbyter ’ was probably simply a title of honour rather than an office, and ‘bishops’ were appointed out of them. In that case we must translate Acts 1478 as ‘ they ordained presbyters (or elder men) in every church ’ (to be bishops, understood)—a doubtful use of yetporovety. It is worth noting that ‘ deacons ’ are always mentioned in conjunction with ‘ bishops ’ and not with ‘ presbyters.’ The probable explan- ation that at first deacons existed to help the presbyters in those rather vague and indefinite duties which came under the heading of ‘ overseership.’ f But in any case we need to remember that * See e.g. Vincent on Phil 11. + On the whole question see Hamilton, vol. ii. App. ii.

the important question is not of names, such as ‘ bishop’ and ‘ presbyter,’ but of the authority which lay behind the names. It is quite conceivable that in the earliest days ‘ bishop ’ was an alternative title for ‘ presbyter ’ and later on was used to desig- nate a wider and distinct office and authority. In our own Church, for instance, the titles of ‘vicar’ and ‘curate’ have, as it were, changed places. The curate was originally the ‘man in charge,’ the vicar his substitute (vcarius).

But in the earliest days of the Church the possession of peculiar spiritual gifts by individuals made them far more conspicuous and important than the local ministry. We find what is called a ‘charismatic’ ministry. The clearest instance is the ‘ pro- phets,’ men endowed with special gifts of vision and of declaring God’s will (Acts 1128, 13, etc.). They owed the gifts not to any human appointment, but to a special and direct endowment of the Holy Spirit. In 1 Cor. 12?8 and Eph. 41! they seem to be regarded as directly called by Christ, and in virtue of this call their authority was not limited to any one place. Hence the most that the Church could do was to regulate the use of their gift. In order to prevent imposture they needed to be recognized by the com- munity as truly inspired by God (1 Jn. 4! ff., 1 Cor. 1213). So, too, evangelists and teachers seem to have been marked out by the manifestation of peculiar spiritual gifts for their work (Eph. 4”, 1 Cor. 1278, Ro. 12° ff.). The relation of this charismatic ministry to the local ministry naturally varied. They moved on different planes. There was no reason why a man should not belong to both. The possession of special gifts might well mark out a man as a suitable man to be appointed presbyter or deacon or ‘an apostle of the Church.’ They would assist him in many parts of his work. On the other hand their presence was not essential.

Accordingly, the picture that Scripture gives us of the apostolic age is as follows. We see a number of local Churches possessing presbyters who ordinarily preside at the Eucharist, and also, it would seem, deacons. But behind all the life of the local Churches stands the Apostolic order. However much self- government they possessed, it was all exercised under the visita- tion and supervision of the Apostles (cp. 1 Cor. 474, Acts 15%, 3 Jn. 1, etc.). The case of the Church at Corinth shows that there at least very little organization even of small details was attempted by the local Church without St. Paul’s advice and

A12 THE THIRTY-NINE ARTICLES

authority (cp. 1 Cor. 7-8, 11? ff. 2™¢ %4 etc.). Further, from time to time they would be visited by delegates from other Churches, by prophets and other gifted men, whose coming would eclipse for the time the importance of the local ministry. Later on we find apostolic delegates like St. Timothy and St. Titus specially sent with authority to guard the faith, to ordain and to exercise discipline. Thus Scripture shows us a threefold ministry of Apostles, presbyter-bishops and deacons, and side by side with them a travelling charismatic ministry. We have no right to expect absolute uniformity. In the freshness of the outburst of spiritual life that began at Pentecost, extraordinary gifts were displayed that did not permanently endure. The Church did not organize itself on any carefully prepared plan: rather under the guidance of the Apostles it evolved necessary officers to discharge practical duties. Passages such as 1 Thess. 51 and 1 Cor. 1278 3° suggest that at first there was no great uniformity in titles and that offices may have existed which did not endure.

Outside Scripture we turn to what evidence we possess. Unfortunately the evidence for the period just after the Apostles is of the scantiest. In the West the earliest piece of evidence is the Epistle of St. Clement, written about 96 a.pD., perhaps during the lifetime of St. John. St. Clement wrote in the name of the Church of Rome in reply to a request from the Church of Corinth for advice. Disturbances had broken out there about the deposition of certain presbyters. In his reply he makes clear that he knows of two kinds of presbyters and two kinds only : first, those appointed by the Apostles themselves; secondly, those appointed by érepor eAAdyimor avdpes, to whom the Apostles had given authority to appoint. The Corinthians had attempted to depose some of these presbyters and add a third kind: namely, those appointed by themselves. This action he regarded as sinful because the deposed presbyters ‘ were from the Apostles, the Apostles were from Christ and Christ was from God.’ It was a breach of Church order, and that order was based on the will of God. Further, it seems quite clear that ‘ Presbyter ’ and ‘ Episcopus ’ are still used as titles of the same office. He can write in c. xliv, ‘ It will be no light sin, if we thrust out those who have offered the gifts of the bishop’s office (ra dopa Tijs émisko7ys) unblameably and holily. Blessed are those pres- byters who have gone before … for they have no fear lest any

one should remove them from their appointed places.’ * On the other hand, we find an analogy drawn between the Christian ministers and the ‘high priest,’ ‘the priest’ and ‘the Levite ’ which may imply something like the later threefold ministry, or may only imply that the presbyters had a chairman. The position of St. Clement himself is not absolutely clear. At this date there may or may not have been a single ‘ Bishop ’ of Rome. At any rate he writes in the name of the Church as a whole, not in his own.

In the Hast the letters of Ignatius (115 a.p.) give us a con- sistent picture of Church organization in Asia. The bishop has become as distinct from the presbyter as in later days. He is compared to Christ or God and the presbyters to the Apostles, an analogy probably suggested by his presiding at the Eucharist. ‘Let no man do aught of things pertaining to the Church, apart from the Bishop. Let that be held a valid Eucharist which is under the Bishop or one to whom he shall have committed it.’ Such is his invariable tone. No attempt is made to defend or explain the authority of the bishop. But everywhere insistence is laid on the practical duty of submission to him. He is the one centre of unity.

The Didache, a fragmentary document of uncertain date and place and of disputable value, is perhaps to be placed at the close of the first century and probably represents life in some obscure Church in an out-of-the-way part of Syria. In any case it lies off the main stream of development. We find mention of bishops, clearly presbyter-bishops, and deacons, as the local ministry. The chief place is still held by travelling apostles and prophets of a decadent type, who need to be carefully tested and watched (cc. 11-13) and may perhaps settle down permanently as teachers.

By the time of writers like Irenaeus and Tertullian (180 a.p.) we find the regular threefold ministry. Bishops have taken the place of apostles, but are located in one place. Presbyters are as distinct from them as from deacons. Further, no recollection seems to be left of a time when it was otherwise. The charis- matic ministry has practically disappeared. Its authority and influence have passed to the local ministry. The exact process

by which this later threefold ministry arose is a problem that at present is insoluble. How did the ‘ monarchical episcopate […] When we have explained how the supreme powers of the general ministry were made to devolve on an individual who belonged to the local ministry, we have explained the origin of episcopacy.’ *

The only certain point is that there is no trace whatever of any struggle in the early Church by which episcopacy came into being. If presbyterianism had ever been established under apostolic authority, it would hardly have yielded up its power without a contest. History shows that presbyterianism is a very strong, stable and stubborn form of government. Clement of Alexandria and Tertullian both affirm and Irenaeus implies that the local episcopate was set up in Asia by St. John himself. There is no reason to doubt this statement. It fits in admirably with the evidence of Ignatius. In the West it is very probable that the process was more gradual. There is some evidence that both at Rome and Alexandria the power to ordain was held not by any single individual but conjointly by a college of presbyter-bishops. If so, then it became gradually reserved for the chairman, and the time came when presbyters were ordained with limited powers.

On the whole question see : Lightfoot’s Excursus in his Commentary in Philippians, with the criticism in Moberly’s Ministerial Priesthood.

(b) Such, then, are the main facts. In face of dangers from within, the Church was compelled to reflect upon the meaning of her own action. She found in the apostolic ministry a safeguard against the perils that threatened her life.

(i) As we saw, Clement of Rome found in the orderly succes- sion from the Apostles a pledge of unity. It was in accordance with the will of God. The breach of it was rebellion against duly constituted authority, and therefore against God. The particular danger of the day, as shown in the letters of Ignatius, was that the Church might break up, and especially break up into separate and rival gatherings for the Eucharist. Against this the one ministry formed the protection.

f Clement, Quis dives salvetur, 42; Tertullian, Adv. Marc. iv. 5; Irenaeus, Adv. Haer. iii. 3. 4.

(ii) To Irenaeus the chief significance of the apostolic descent was that it guaranteed the truth and purity of the Church’s doctrine. ‘We should hearken to those Presbyters, who are in the Church ; those who have their succession from the apostles, as we have pointed out; who with their succession in the epis- copate received a sure gift of truth (charisma veritatis), at the good pleasure of the Father: but the rest, who withdraw from the primitive succession and gather in any place whatever, we must hold in suspicion’ (Adv. Haer. iv. 26, cp. iii. 2). The danger to the Church at this time was that the revelation in Christ should be lost amid the confusion of strange Gnostic teachings and similar heresies. The succession provided a test of the apostolicity of the doctrine.

(1) In the time of Cyprian the unity of the Church was threatened by the secession of definite organized schismatical bodies. These were not all heretical in teaching. In the case of some of them the dispute was rather over questions of dis- cipline. The Church seemed about to dissolve into a multitude of jarring sects. Under these circumstances Cyprian found in the historic episcopate the foundation of Church unity. ‘The Episcopate is one, each part of which is held by each one for the whole,’ * 7.e. all bishops are independent and equal. Hach possesses in himself the whole power of the episcopate, which is derived by descent from the commission of Christ given to the Apostles. Those who separate from the bishop, separate from the Church, and so place themselves outside the sphere of God’s promises. Schismatical ministrations, such as baptism or absolution, are invalid, since they have not upon them the stamp of the authority of the Church, of which the bishop is the visible symbol. Such was the teaching of Cyprian.

Cp. Sparrow Simpson, The Catholic Conception of the Church, c. 10.

(c) Our claim in the Church of England to-day is that we possess the historic ministry of the Catholic Church, coming down in historical descent from the Apostles. We lay stress upon it for several reasons.

(i) Regarded externally it is a visible and concrete link with the Church of the past and with the historic life of Christ on

earth. It isa pledge that there has been no breach of continuity in the Church’s life. Whatever authority Christ willed to give to His Church we possess.

(ii) It is the ministry not of a local Church but of the whole Catholic Church. Ideally all the ministrations of the Church are not the acts of any one part by itself but of the whole body of Christ. For instance, every true Eucharist is a Eucharist not just of the few Christians gathered within the walls of a building, but of the whole Church, of all the faithful living and departed. Hence the minister must possess authority to act not simply as minister of one part of the Church but as the minister of the whole. The root idea of absolution is that of readmission to the fellow- ship of the Body of Christ; hence, one who bestows it must possess the authority of the whole Body. So in all his ministry and teaching the minister exercises his functions, not in virtue of any private and personal gift, not even as-the representative of any local body of Christians, but as the instrument of the whole Body of Christ. It is not the minister as such who bap- tizes or ordains or blesses or absolves or celebrates the Eucharist, but the whole Church through him and Christ through the Church. Apostolic succession secures this Catholic as opposed to individual or local authority of the minister. The historic ministry is the ministry of the whole Church and not of any part of it.

(iii) As following from this we believe that the succession is the guarantee of valid ministrations. Whatever gifts God may bestow outside it, we are assured that His grace is to be found within it. On the side of doctrine it is a pledge of Catholicity. It assures us that we remain in the fellowship of apostolic teaching and lose nothing of the fulness of the apostolic Gospel.

Two cautions, however, are needed.

(a) The question of apostolic succession and that of episcopacy are quite distinct. Historically, no doubt, the historic succession settled down into the form of Church government known as “Monarchical Episcopate,’ in which a single bishop alone has authority to ordain. But there is reason for believing that at one time in certain Churches the authority to ordain was given not to a single bishop but to a college of presbyter-bishops or even possibly in some cases to a presbyter-bishop acting singly. This is no breach of principle. It is by no means essential that functions should always and everywhere be distributed in the

same way. For instance, in the West to-day only a bishop has authority to confirm. In the Hast the priest confirms with oil blessed by the bishop for the purpose. The only necessary point is that no minister should go outside the limits of the authority entrusted to him. Conversely, the largest body of Methodists in America have decided that the episcopal form of government is the most desirable. Accordingly, they have appointed chief ministers who are styled ‘bishops.’ But these ‘bishops’ have no connexion with the historic ministry. They possess authority to act only for their own community.

(8) The doctrine of apostolic succession has often been degraded by being presented in a very inadequate and mechanical form. It must not be regarded as a bare transmission of certain quasi- magical powers from one individual to another. Neither the minister who ordains nor the minister ordained bestows or receives any power in an individual capacity. We must never separate ordination from the life of the Church as a whole. ‘The gift of ministerial grace is not a simple matter of trans- mission, but rather is a gift of God at each ordination granted to the Church for its nominees through its authorized agents.’

(d) This view may be seen more clearly by contrasting it with the view taken as a whole by Nonconformists. Their view of the ministry is based upon two great assumptions.

(i) Any group of Christians, or at least any ‘ organized’ body of Christians, possesses and has always possessed the inherent right to elect and ordain ministers to perform certain functions on behalf of the community.

(ii) The authority of bishops themselves arose originally in this way. No doubt in the earliest days there was a travelling ministry of apostles, prophets, evangelists, etc., who did not derive their authority by delegation from the community. But in course of time these came to an end. Their functions were gradually taken over by the local ministry of presbyter-bishops and deacons. In time one of the presbyter-bishops, perhaps as a result of being chairman or correspondent for the local Church, perhaps in order to secure greater efficiency, came to be elevated above the rest and to be regarded as ‘ the bishop.’ But in origin bishop and presbyter are the same office. The duty of ordaining came in practice to be restricted to the bishop as a general rule, but there is no evidence that this was always so. Accordingly,

2D

bishops are no more than glorified presbyters: their authority rests in the last resort solely upon the choice of the community. ~ Apostolic succession means no more than that, as the Apostles and the charismatic ministry died off, the local ministry stepped into the vacant place.

The consequences of this view are plain. If each community of Christians possesses the inherent right of electing and ordaining ministers, then all such ministers are equal. What the community did once, the community can do again at any time. Noncon- formist ministers who avowedly derive their orders from the laying-on of hands of men who represent their particular body, possess precisely the same validity as those ministers who have received episcopal ordination. For the authority of the bishops themselves, if we trace it back far enough, is derived from the same source. The sole and ultimate authority is to be found equally distributed in all Christians. The need of common action and common worship demands some kind of ministry, just as the need of government in England demands the election of representatives in Parliament. But the authority of the mini- sters, like the authority of members of Parliament, is wholly dependent on those whom they represent. Accordingly, the refusal of the Church of England to treat ministers who have not received episcopal ordination on an equality with those who have received it, is arbitrary and indefensible.

Two main lines of argument are adduced for the nonconformist view: first, historical; secondly, practical. The historical arguments can be summed up thus.

(a) Scripture and the earliest writings, especially the Didache, are entirely silent on the need or the existence of apostolic suc- cession. The growth of the ministry can be traced, and it is due to purely human organization.

(6) We can point to certain definite instances which contra- dict the whole theory of apostolic succession. The Dzdache shows us prophets, who were not ordained, celebrating the Eucharist. The people are bidden to elect bishops and deacons to celebrate when the prophets are not there. Further, the Canons of Hippolytus (a.p. 220) direct that the bishop, after election by the people, shall be consecrated by ‘ one of the bishops and presbyters.’ Also, in the same canons a confessor who has endured torture is to be enrolled as a presbyter without ordina-

tion. The bishop is to pray over him, but omit the petition for the Holy Spirit. His conduct has shown that he has already received the Spirit. Further, a confessor is treated as possessing by the direct gift of the Spirit the power of absolution. Again, Jerome tells us that at Alexandria down to the third century * the priests always elected one of their own number, placed him in a higher degree and called him bishop: just as if our army should make an emperor, or deacons elect one of themselves and call him archdeacon.’ So, too, he tells us that churches at first were governed by ‘the common council of priests,’ but for the sake of unity one was elected and set over the others. Hence the bishop is greater than the priest by ‘ custom ’ not the ‘ Lord’s arrangement.’

(y) We can never be sure that the succession has not been

‘broken at some point, as we have not evidence of each and every ordination.

(6) The whole idea of apostolic succession is to be connected with the development that began in the third century by which sacerdotalism invaded the Church. Bishops and _presbyters became regarded as ‘ sacerdotes,’ no longer the representatives of the congregation, but mediators between them and God.

To these arguments we may reply as follows :

(a) The argument from silence is always precarious, especially when there are very few witnesses to be silent. Behind all documents is the continuous life and activity of the Church. Such silence as there is may well be explained by the fact that the principle of succession was unquestioned. It is not men- tioned because there was no need for mention. It emerges into prominence as soon as attention is drawn to its importance by the needs of the Church. Further, we have very clear evidence of the ordination of presbyters either by apostles or apostolic delegates. In fact, we cannot poit to any that we know not to have been so ordained. The one thing that seems beyond dispute is that in apostolic days the people did not ordain their own ministers. They elected them, in some cases, at least, but such election was a call to be ordained by the proper people (Acts 63246 1423 Tit. 15). The nonconformist view of the early Church always ignores the apostolic background.

(C) No undisputed instance can be adduced of ordination by men who were off the line of apostolic descent. The evidence of

the Didache is very precarious. Its date and value are disputed. Even if genuine it shows us life in a Christian community off the main stream of Christian life. The people are bidden to elect (yeypvTovety) bishops and deacons. This may well have been with a view to ordination by some competent authority. Nor, again, is it absolutely certain that prophets did celebrate the Eucharist. The language of the Didache may rather refer to the offering of thanksgiving after the Eucharist.* In any case, the Didache is only a fragment : it is quite possible that the portion we have lost would give us far fuller information than we now possess.t The evidence of the Canons of Hippolytus does not go very far. The phrase ‘wnus ex episcopis et presbyteris’ is very obscure. It is clear that the canons confine ordination to a bishop. As to the treatment of confessors, at most it repre- sents a temporary exception to the regular Church usage. If such were appointed bishops, they had to be duly ordained. No one would wish to doubt that there had been certain changes in the external form of the ministry. Even if we accept Jerome’s statement, all that it shows is that in some places at one time the: power of ordination was given to a college of presbyters. This may have been so in other places for a time. But because some presbyters once possessed authority to ordain, it does not follow that this authority is inherent in the office of presbyter always and everywhere. That would be to confuse names with the authority that lies behind names. It is one thing to possess authority to celebrate the Eucharist or bless or absolve, as the Church’s representative : quite another thing to be able to bestow this authority on another person to act in the name of the Church. So soon as the monarchical episcopate became established, and ordination was restricted to ‘the bishops,’ presbyters would be ordained with diminished powers, such as they possess to-day. Nonconformists seem unable to realize that even if presbyters and bishop were at one time identical, that does not prove that every presbyter to-day is, as it were, a potential bishop,

{ The Didache is usually assigned to the end of the first century. But there are some indications that it is much later and has a Montanist origin. If so, its abnormality becomes even more apparent. Further, it has been suggested that it dates from late in the second century and represents an imaginary reconstruction of life in the first century (Journal of Theological Studies, April, 1912). If so, its value as evidence is nil.

nor does it in the least destroy the meaning of apostolic succession. *

(vy) From the nature of the case we could not have evidence of every ordination. But if we believe that the ministry of the Church developed under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, we must believe also that God was able to preserve its validity. As soon as the Church became conscious of the significance of her acts, all steps would be taken to ensure valid ordinations. The main stream of the Church’s practice is clear. From quite early days it has been the custom for a bishop to be consecrated by at least three bishops, though one would suffice. Any irregularity would thus soon be rectified.

(0) In reply to the charge of ‘ sacerdotalism’ we must plead that there is a true and a false sacerdotalism. Indisputably the whole Church is a kingdom of priests. But certain of the priestly functions of the Church are performed through duly constituted organs. The priesthood of the whole body is realized through its representatives. Therefore they can rightly be called ‘ priests ’ in a special sense. As priests they act not as substitutes for but as representatives cf the whole body. It is a ‘ ministerial priest- hood.’ As priests they do not possess any magical powers inherent in their own individual persons, rather they possess authority to perform certain priestly acts in the name of the whole Church. The Church realizes her priesthood in and through them. The English word ‘priest’ is etymologically only an abbreviation of presbyter. But it has come to be the equivalent not only of ‘ presbyter’ but of ‘ sacerdos.’ Christian ministers are not called ‘sacerdotes’ or ‘epecs’ in the New Testament or the earliest writings, to avoid confusion with the Jewish and pagan priesthood. But sacerdotal language is used in connexion with their duties (cp. Heb. 131°, Rom. 1516). So the Didache speaks of the Eucharist as @vcia and the prophets as apyxiepeis. Clement of Rome uses even stronger language. As the danger of confusion passed away the title came to be used

• A claim has been made on behalf of the Wesleyan Methodists that they possess the historic ministry, since their orders ultimately go back to John Wesley, a priest of the Church of England. But in ordaining ministers John Wesley went outside the commission that he had received. Even if priest and bishop were at one time identical they had long ceased to be so in his day. He could act for no one but himself The English Ordinal with which he had been ordained makes quite clear what were the limits of his authority.

of Christian ministers. It was seen that all the truth embodied in the sacrificing priesthood of the Jews and heathen was fulfilled in the Christian ministry. A priest may be defined as one who represents God to man and man to God. The only priest in the full and perfect sense of priesthood is Jesus Christ. The Mosaic priesthood was partial and preparatory. Jews and pagans never attained to the true ideal of priesthood. That was revealed in all its fulness for the first time in Christ. Hence Christian priests are not the same as Jewish priests. This does not prove that they are not truly priests, for that would be to interpret the higher by the lower. Rather in their measure they share the priesthood of Christ. At the Reformation the Church of England deliberately retained the title ‘ priest,’ though in mediae- val times its meaning had been perverted, because it contained a real truth. Christ is the perfect priest. The Church is His body. The organ of a priestly body cannot be less than priestly.

Cp. Moberly, Ministerial Priesthood, c. 7.

The second or practical line of argument takes the form of the assertion that Christian bodies who repudiate any idea of apostolic succession show at least as much vitality as those who maintain it. This is specially seen in the mission field.

We may reply that all bodies live and work in the power of the truths that they hold. These Protestant bodies stand for definite truths. They owe their power to the positive truth to which they bear faithful witness. The same applies to the good works of Unitarians and Agnostics. The test of visible spiritual results as applied by Protestant Nonconformists may, if they are not careful, prove too much. In any case we cannot measure real spiritual advance by outward results. The true measure of the life of a Christian body can only be fully known by those who live in it. Further, Scripture shows that God’s gifts have often been concealed by man’s sin and that quite genuine author- ity may become obscured through the faithlessness and indolence of those who hold it. In a world of sin the outward and the inward do not always correspond. But when we turn from the consideration of Christian bodies taken individually to the Church as a whole, there can be no possible doubt of the evils of disunion. One great cause of the divisions and subdivisions of Christendom has been the neglect to hold fast the historic

ministry and the truth for which it stands. We see a competition between a number of sects for adherents, with a consequent lowering of the standard required for membership. We see the energies of Christians expended not in a united effort against the common foe, but in mutual wrangling and conflict. The separate gifts that are all needed in combination for the extension of the Kingdom of Christ are too often found parted among the various Christian bodies. This weakness and failure is a proof of the evils of disunion. In face of it we need to be not only destructive, but constructive. Ifthe principle of the historic ministry, as standing for the ministry of the whole Church, is denied, what can be sub- stituted for it as a centre of unity ? No doubt from the nature of the case the truth of apostolic succession, as a fact of history, can ’ never be decisively proved or disproved so as to convince all opponents. But its moral and spiritual significance must surely be apparent to all. The bodies that have parted with the historic ministry have split and are still splitting into smaller fragmenis. The one possible centre of reunion is the historic ministry, which em- bodies an authority wider than that of any local or partial Church.

How, then, does the Church of England regard Nonconformist ministrations ? Stress should be laid on the positive rather than on the negative side. We are bound to hold fast to our ministry to secure the validity of our own ministrations. But the true antithesis to ‘ valid’ in such cases is not ‘invalid’ but rather ‘precarious.’ We are convinced that Nonconformist rites are irregular : they have not on them the stamp of approval of the whole Church. But we have no wish to dogmatize on their position in the sight of God or to deny that He employs them as means of grace. God is not limited to His ordinances, but we are. We believe that the maintenance of the succession is God’s will for us and a real means towards the reunion of Christendom. Those who repudiate it we leave to God’s judg- ment. There is abundant evidence that here as elsewhere God uses what is not wholly in accordance with His will. We do not deny or wish others to deny any spiritual experience that they have gained. But we believe that to loosen our hold on the historical ministry in the hope of attaining a rapid and partial unity would be to postpone any hope of a complete and lasting unity. Apostolic succession represents the intellectual justifica- tion of a practical necessity.

For Nonconformist view Cp. Lindsay, The Church and the Ministry in the Karly Centuries. Criticized by Lowrie, The Organisation of the Church. Cp. also Briggs, Church Unity, cc. iv. and v. In defence of Apostolic succession : Hamilton, People of God, vol. ii. Gore, The Church and the Ministry. Orders and Unity. On meaning of Priesthood : Moberly, Ministerial Priesthood.

(Since the above was written a most important book has appeared, Hssays on the Early History of the Church and Ministry, edited by Dr. Swete. See especially the Essay by Mr. C. H. Turner. )

§3. The validity of our orders has constantly been denied by theologians of the Church of Rome on various grounds. The earliest and simplest line of attack was to assert that the line of - succession had been broken. An absurd story commonly known as the ‘ Nag’s Head fable’ was fabricated.* This alleged that Archbishop Parker was not duly consecrated, but underwent a mock ceremony at the Nag’s Head Tavern in Cheapside. This has long been abandoned by serious Roman controversialists, though traces of it still linger among the ignorant. A second attempt was made to show that Bishop Barlow, who was the principal consecrator of Parker, was himself never rightly con- secrated. This objection too has failed. Three other bishops took part in the consecration, and we are told all laid their hands on his head and said the words. The position of Barlow did not really, therefore, affect the validity of the act. But there is no reason whatever to doubt Barlow’s own consecration. It may also be observed that even if the English Church had lost her orders in the time of Elizabeth, she would have recovered them later through Laud. At the consecration of Laud there met not only the English but also the Irish and Italian lines of succession. All the bishops who survived in 1660 had been consecrated by Laud. As we shall see in the latest Papal pronouncement on our orders, the historical arguments are all tacitly dropped.

For the historical arguments see : Brightman, C.H.S. Lectures, vol. i. pp. 139-149 and 158-174, or

Gore, R.C. Claims, ec. ix., or Wakeman, History of the Church of England, pp. 324-328. * «Tt is so absurd on the face of it that it has led to the suspicion of Catholic

theologians not being sincere in the objections they make to Anglican orders ’ (Estcourt, quoted by Brightman, C.H.S. Lectures, vol. i. p. 147).

A second line of attack has been to argue that our orders are invalid owing to either ‘ insufficiency of form’ or ‘ lack of inten- tion.’ These two arguments are closely connected, but ought to be kept distinct.

(a) As to ‘insufficiency of form.’ The Ordinal used in the consecration of Archbishop Parker was that of Edward VI, to which our Article refers. It has been maintained that the form of consecration and of ordination contained in it is invalid, on the ground that in the words that accompany the laying on of hands there is no specification of the order that is intended to be conferred. In the Ordinal, until it was revised in 1661, during the laying on of hands the archbishop was directed to say ‘Take the Holy Ghost and remember that thou stir up the grace of God which is in thee by the imposition of hands, etc.’ In the revision of 1661 the words were expanded into their present form ‘ Receive the Holy Ghost, for the office and work of a Bishop in the Church of God, now committed unto thee by the Imposition of our hands ; In the Name of the Father and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen. And remember, etc.’ It has been argued that the earlier form was insufficient because the particular order was not speci- fied, and, indeed, that this insufficiency was felt by the Church of England is proved by the subsequent emendation. This argument is not very strong. The very quotation from 2 Tim. 1° is sufficient to show that the office to which the words refer is the same as that to which St. Timothy was himself consecrated by St. Paul, namely, the Episcopate. Nor is there any real doubt throughout the service what is taking place. Further, the Latin Pontifical is equally vague in its language, ‘ Receive the Holy Ghost,’ the office for which the Holy Ghost is given being deter- mined by the context. So, too, the form in the Ordinal of Edward VI for the ordination of priests ran originally, ‘ Receive the Holy Ghost : whose sins thou dost forgive, etc.’ In 1661 the words ‘for the Office and Work of a Priest in the Church of God, now committed unto thee by the imposition of our hands’ were inserted. Here, too, the quotation from Jn. 208, ‘ Whose sins thou dost forgive, etc.,’ fixes the meaning. The insertions of 1661 were probably made in order to rule out the Presbyterian idea that bishop and priest were the same office. They must be viewed in the light of contemporary Church history.

A further objection now proved to be unsound must be

mentioned. In the Western rite for the ordination of priests there had been introduced a ceremony known as the ‘ porrectio instru- mentorum.’ The bishop presented the candidates for ordination with a paten and chalice, saying, ‘ Receive authority to offer sacrifice to God and to celebrate Masses as well for the living as the dead.’ This was deliberately omitted in the second Prayer- Book of Edward VI. It was argued, therefore, that this omission rendered the ‘form’ invalid. In the seventeenth century a school of theologians had come to hold that this particular cere- mony, with the words that accompany it, was the actual matter and form of ordination. In the fifteenth century Pope Eugenius IV, in his letter to the Armenians which was appended to the decrees of the Council of Florence, had definitely committed himself to this view. Other controversialists were content to maintain that only certain powers of the priesthood were con- veyed through this ceremony. But in the seventeenth century, owing to the researches of the Roman Catholic antiquarian Morinus, it was established bevond all doubt that the ceremony had not existed during the first thousand years of the Church’s life. It was purely Western and Roman. If, then, it was essential for a valid ordination the Church had possessed no valid orders for a thousand years. The objection therefore, in its old form, fell to the ground.

(6) The opponents of Anglican Orders have therefore fallen back on the charge of ‘lack of intention.’ * This is the argument of the Papal Bull ‘ Apostolicae Curae ’ issued in 1896, condemning our orders as nulland void. The Pope maintains that the Ordinal of Edward VI and our present Ordinal are not so much absolutely and in themselves inadequate, but that the changes made in them at the Reformation are evidence of a change of intention on the part of the Church. The deliberate omission of any mention of the sacrificing power of the priesthood and of the ‘porrectio instrumentorum,’ which was the visible sign of the conferring of that power, show that the Church of England does not intend to ordain a ‘sacrificing priesthood.’ Her offices betray a defective idea of the priesthood, and therefore true priests cannot be made by them.f

• Nothing is more damaging to the Roman case than the constant shifting of argument to which they have been driven.

} This Bull is an official condemnation of Anglican Orders, confirming the

In reply to this charge it has been pointed out that any explicit mention of the sacrificial function of the priesthood is entirely absent from several forms that Rome acknowledges to be valid, including not only the Coptic rite but the ancient Roman rite. But this hardly meets the objection. It is not at all the same thing never to have had any explicit mention of the sacrificing power of the priesthood, as it is to have cut it out after such mention has once been inserted. In order to defend the action of the Church of England we must go back to first principles. Here, as elsewhere, the Church of England desired to return to antiquity. She appealed against one-sided and_ perverted mediaeval ideas to Scripture and primitive tradition. In the later Middle Ages the function of offering the Eucharistic sacri- fice had assumed such undue prominence in the popular idea of the priesthood, that there was serious danger of forgetting the ministry of the Word and the pastoral work that belong essen- tially to the office. The Reformers rightly desired to recall men to a truer, fuller and better-proportioned view of the ministry. Accordingly, in the Ordinal the comparatively late addition of the ‘porrectio instrumentorum’ and the singling out of the sacrificial function of the priesthood were omitted. This did not mean that the Church of England in any sense intended to institute, as it were, a new order. The preface to the Ordinal, composed in 1550 and continued in 1552, makes it as clear as human language is able to make it, that she intended to continue those orders which had been in the Church from the days of the Apostles, namely Bishops, Priests and Deacons, in the same sense as they had always existed.* When we turn to Scripture we find no stress Jaid upon the authority given

previous practice of the Church of Rome in refusing to recognize them. Dr. Briggs, however, was assured by Pius X that this decision of his predecessor was not infallible. See Briggs, Church Unity, p. 121.

*<Tt is evident unto all men diligently reading Holy Scripture and ancient Authors, that from the Apostles’ time there have been these orders of Ministers in Christ’s Church ; Bishops, Priests, and Deacons… And therefore to the intent that these Orders may be continued and reverently used and esteemed, in the Church of England ; no man shall be accounted or taken to be a lawful Bishop, Priest, or Deacon in the Church of England or suffered to execute any of tne said Functions, except he be called, tried, examined, and admitted thereunto, according to the Form hereafter following, or hath had formerly Episcopal Consecration or Ordination.’

to ministers to celebrate the Eucharist. It is preposterous to suppose that our Lord chose or ordained the Apostles chiefly or primarily to offer the Eucharistic sacrifice. In St. Paul’s address to the presbyter-bishops of Ephesus, the stress is laid on the faithful preaching of the Word and the care of the flock (Acts 207881), Jn the Pastoral Epistles, in the choice of pres- byters the emphasis is laid on the possession of qualities of character which are needed for pastoral supervision and teaching (1 Tim. 3°”, cp. 51%, Tit. 17%). So St. Peter places in the fore- front of the duty of presbyters the general oversight of the flock (1 Pet. 544). In such passages as these there is no explicit mention of the Eucharist. No one can doubt that it was the centre of Christian worship on every Lord’s Day, nor that any one of the presbyter-bishops had authority, if need be, to preside. But when we compare the New Testament picture of the pres- byters with the modern Roman idea of the priest, we feel the centre of gravity has shifted. So, too, in the early Church, the power to celebrate the Eucharist is not the predominant mark of the presbyter.* It is not isolated from his other functions. It is not singled out for special mention in primitive ordinals. It was only during the Middle Ages and as the result of a one- sided view of the sacrifice of the Eucharist that an equally one-sided view of the office of the priesthood came to be held. At the Reformation the Church of Engiand of set purpose returned to the primitive conception of the ministry.

Again, it is untrue to say that the Church of England denies the Eucharistic sacrifice. She only repudiates any form of corrupt teaching that makes it in any sense a repetition of the sacrifice once for all offered on Calvary. In her service the Church of England makes it abundantly clear that her intention is to confer the orders which our Lord instituted and the Apostles conferred. Her purpose is shown by her use of the language of the New Testament throughout the Ordinal. She means her orders to be those of the New Testament. As such she confers upon her priests authority to ‘minister the Holy Sacraments.’ This includes the celebration of the Eucharist. Here again her

• As we have said, the English word priest by derivation simply means ‘presbyter.’ But it has acquired the meaning of ‘sacerdos.’ The Christian presbyter in virtue of his office is a ‘priest.’ Priesthood is one of his functions.

intention is that the Eucharist shall be all that the Lord intended it to be. The sacrifice of the Eucharist is not something additional ; it is the Eucharist itself in one of its chief aspects. Whatever it means, it is included in our Lord’s words of institu- tion. Hence, in conferring authority to minister the Sacraments, - she confers authority to offer the Eucharistic sacrifice. Indeed, she cannot do otherwise. Even if the Church of England had denied the Eucharistic sacrifice, that would not render her orders invalid. For it is agreed, even by Romanists, that heresy does not render sacraments invalid. But she has not done any- thing of the kind. It is perfectly true that our Ordinal does not make explicit mention of * the sacrifice of the Body and Blood of Christ,’ because it is unnecessary. The full meaning of the Eucharist depends on the Lord’s command, not on our theology. Inasmuch as our priests receive authority to celebrate it, they receive authority to fulfil all that it means.

So, then, our real quarrel with the Church of Rome is at bottom about the meaning of priesthood and of the Eucharistic sacrifice.* We contend that Roman teaching on both is so out of propertion as to be almost untrue. If the Church of Rome chooses to say that we do not intend to make priests exactly in her sense of the word, we are not concerned to deny it. We are content to make priests in accordance with the ministry of the New Testa- ment and the Primitive Church.

The Roman arguments rest upon two great assumptions. First, that Rome is at all times infallible, and therefore her teaching at any time about the meaning of priesthood must be accepted without question. Secondly, that Rome has a divine right to implicit and universal obedience, and therefore any change in the form of service without her consent shows a con- tumacious spirit. Neither of these assumptions can be granted, and without them the whole argument collapses.

For the intention of the Church of England see : Brightman, C.H.S. Lectures, vol. i. pp. 175-end. On the Bull ‘ Apostolicae Curae ’ : Puller, The Bull Apostolicae Curae and the Edwardine Ordinal.

C.H.S. publications, Nos. XIX. and XX. Moberly, Ministerial Priesthood, c. 7 and Appendix.

• See Chapman’s Reply to Bishop Gore, ¢. ix. esp. $1. He allows that we have orders in the sense in which we claim them.

§ 4. The real centre of our controversy with Rome has always been our repudiation of the Papal jurisdiction. Article XX XVII only repeats the declaration made by Convocation in 1534. ‘The Pope of Rome hath no greater jurisdiction conferred on him by God in Holy Scripture, in this realm of England, than any other foreign bishop.’ The questions at issue are partly historical, partly doctrinal.

(a) In Scripture the only Church that holds a pre-eminence is the Church of Jerusalem. There presided James, the Lord’s brother: there the first council was held. Jerusalem was the scene of our Lord’s death and the birthplace of the Christian Church, from whence the Apostles and others had gone forth. Its pre-eminence as the centre of Christian organization was natural. But in a.p. 70 the Church of Jerusalem was scattered by the destruction of the city. It was not until 66 years later that the new town of Aelia Capitolina was built on the site. The Church there was purely Gentile and never recovered its former position. }

Meanwhile the predominantly Gentile churches had come spontaneously to group themselves round certain centres. These were selected according to two cross-principles, partly as having been founded by Apostles, partly as being the capitals of districts and provinces, and therefore the natural centres of organization. In the West, Rome was the single apostolic see and also the capital of the Empire : hence it attained a special pre-eminence. In the Kast, Alexandria and Antioch, which were also apostolic sees, and respectively the second and third cities of the empire, attained a like pre-eminence. By the time of the Council of Nicaea (325) their privileges could be recognized as ‘ancient customs.’ * Eighteen years later, at the Council of Sardica, a proposal was carried that bishops who had been condemned by provincial

• The sixth canon of Nicaea runs: ‘ Let the ancient customs prevail, namely, those in Egypt, Libya and Pentapolis, that the Bishop of Alexandria have authority over all these, since this is customary for the Bishop of Rome also. Likewise both in Antioch and the other provinces, the privileges (apecBeta) be secured to the churches.’ The canon is silent about any jurisdiction of Rome over the whole Church. The nature of the authority belonging to the three Churches is the same, even if Rome is quoted as a precedent. Ata later time it was found necessary to insert a spurious clause claiming that Rome always had the primacy. Exactly how far her jurisdiction at this time extended is doubtful, certainly not over allthe West. (Bright, Canons, p. 20 fi. ; Puller, The Primitive Saints and the See of Rome, pp. 138-139.)

councils might appeal to Rome, and the Pope might enjoin a new trial.* The council was purely Western: its decrees were never accepted in the Hast. Indeed, there is no evidence that this canon was ever put into practice. Its main importance is that by accident or design the Church of Rome later on quoted the canons of Sardica as Nicene, and even after the error had been pointed out by the Church of Africa, continued to claim for them the ecumenical authority of Nicaea. Under their false title they proved exceedingly useful.

The grounds on which Rome enjoyed a privileged position were made clear at the Council of Constantinople in 381. The recognized order of precedence, resting on Imperial status, Rome, Alexandria, Antioch was disturbed by the foundation of Con- stantinople to be the new capital of the Empire. In the third canon it was decreed ‘that the Bishop of Constantinople have the precedence of honour after the Bishop of Rome, because it is new Rome.’ This canon was ratified at Chalcedon, in spite of the protest of the Roman delegates.

These two canons are quite incompatible with any recognition of modern Papal claims. They assert that the precedency accorded to Rome by general consent rested not on divine but on human appointment and depended on her Imperial position.

• The decree was introduced very tentatively by Hosius. ‘If it please you.’ It was recognized as a new departure, not the confirmation of an ancient custom. The power of appeal was limited to bishops, and the object of the canon was to put a stop to the growing custom of appeals from church courts to the Emperor. In any case the Pope himself did not try the case. He could only order it to be reheard. ‘Lhe judges were to be bishops of a neigh- bouring province, or, if the accused specially desired it and the Pope consented, the Pope might send priestly delegates to act as assessors. The whole scheme shows no consciousness of any inherent power of the Bishop of Rome to be the final court of appeal.

+‘ We following in all things the determination of the holy Fathers and acknowledging the canon just read’ (i.e. the third of Constantinople) ‘…do ourselves also have the same determination and decision concerning the privi- leges of the most holy church of Constantinople, new Rome. For the Fathers have naturally assigned its privileges to the see of the elder Rome, because that city is imperial. And being moved by the same consideration, the 150 most religious bishops’ (7.e. of the Council of Constantinople) ‘awarded the same privileges to the most holy see of the new Rome, judging with good reason that the city which was honoured with the sovereignty and senate and enjoyed the same privileges as the elder imperial Rome, should also in things ecclesiastical be magnified like her, holding the second place after her.’ (See Puller, op. cit. pp. 12-13; Bright, op. cit. pp. 106 ff, and 219 fi.)

So much so that when the new Rome was founded it was reason- able to grant her similar privileges. There is no mention of Rome’s apostolic foundation. The primacy is given to the Church rather than the bishop.*

This view is supported by a famous passage of Irenaeus. As against the Gnostics he appeals to apostolic tradition. This is to be discovered by the consentient witness of Churches that possess the succession of bishops from the Apostles. To save time he appeals especially to the Church of Rome in the West. ‘For to this Church on account of its more influential pre-emin- ence, it is necessary that every church should resort, that is the faithful who are from all quarters: and in this church the tradi- tion which comes down from the apostles has always been pre- served by those who are from all quarters.’ + These points are clear. Irenaeus appeals to the witness of the Roman Church as a whole, not to the infallible authority of its bishop. The value of this witness depended not simply on the inherent dignity of the Church, but on its central position. All roads Jed to Rome, and it became, as it were, a clearing-house of Christian tradition. The preservation there of the true apostolic tradition depended not simply on the Church itself, but on the constant stream of visitors from outside. The passage witnesses against any idea that supreme authority was inherent in the Roman see as such. Irenaeus then proceeds to appeal to the witness of the famous apostolic churches of the East, Smyrna and Ephesus.{

t Adv. Haer. iii. c. 3, §2. ‘Ad hance enim ecclesiam propter potentiorem principalitatem necesse est omnem convenire ecclesiam, hoc est eos qui sunt undique fideles, in qua semper ab his, qui sunt undique, conservata est ea quae est ab apostolis traditio. ‘Coavenire ad’ cannot mean ‘agree with.’ Such a translation is doubtful Latin and makes nonsense of the context. If all Churches must agree with Rome, all that would be required against the Gnostic would be the utterance of Rome. The appeal to other Churches would be superfluous. ‘ Necesse est ’ means ‘ it is the inevitable result of Rome’s central position.’ Unhappily the Greek original of the whole passage is wanting.

{ On the passage see Puller, op. cit. pp. 19-35. For an excellent statement see Tyrrell, Mediaevalism, c. v.

During the third century, however, the Church of Rome came to put forward a very different explanation of her primacy. She claimed that the bishop of Rome was the inheritor of the special authority given to St. Peter by our Lord. The earliest surviving evidence of this claim is in the letter written by Fir- milian, bishop of Caesarea, to Cyprian, criticizing a letter of Pope Stephen, who made extensive claims in the name of St. Peter.* Neither Firmilian nor Cyprian recognized his authority. But henceforward the See of Rome was prepared to put forward such claims to universal authority based on the succession from St. Peter and in later days backed by the canons of Sardica misquoted as Nicene.

The Church of Rome eventually succeeded in making good her claim to supremacy, at least over the West. But her success was not achieved in the first instance by convincing the con- science of the Church that she had inherited a divinely bestowed authority. It was secured by the legislative action of the State and a series of well-timed forgeries. About 370 the Emperor Valentinian I granted to the Pope certain rights to hear appeals in his own court and to call upon the civil power to compel submission to his authority. In 382 a council at-Rome under Pope Damasus petitioned Gratian to enforce this law. Gratian granted a new constitution, assigning to the See of Rome juris- diction over the western part of the Roman Empire. In effect it created a patriarchate of Rome. This new jurisdiction was resisted in Gaul and Africa. More than one African council passed canons forbidding any appeal beyond the seas, 2.¢. to Rome. In Gaul the opposition of Hilary of Arles to Pope Leo I provoked the intervention of the Emperor Valentinian III, who bestowed upon the see of Rome not only judicial but legis- lative authority. The Popes were not unwilling to make use of the coercive powers given them by the State. They cloaked

• This letter is printed among St. Cyprian’s, No. 75, see esp. § 18: ‘ Herein I am justly indignant at such open and manifest folly in Stephen, that he who so boasts of the seat of his episcopate and contends that he holds the succession from Peter, on whom the foundations of the Church were laid, introduces many other rocks and buildeth anew many churches, in that by his authority he maintains baptism among them.’ ‘Stephen who proclaims that he occupies by succession the chair of Peter.’ The argument is not affected by the fact that the Western Church came to agree with Stephen that heretical baptism is valid, rather than with Firmilian and Cyprian, who maintained that it was not, The point at issue is the repudiation of the jurisdiction of Rome,

2E

434. THE THIRTY-NINE ARTICLES

their action by appeals to the authority of St. Peter or the Sar- dican canons: but their real strength lay in the support of the State. So by a gradual process the primacy of Rome, which had been first a primacy of honour due largely to accidental and secular causes, was transformed into a monarchy. Certainly by the time of Leo the Great we can discern the germ of the modern Papacy. The Papal theory which began as the opinion of a school within the Church, came in time to dominate the Western Church and was exalted into a dogma. No doubt there was need of a strong central authority, and the Papacy met that need. The development was not due merely to the ambition of Rome. But the fact that Rome succeeded does not prove the truth of the arguments on which she based her claim to succeed.*

Special mention must be made of the effects of what are known as the ‘Forged Decretals.’ About 850 an unknown writer in Gaul, usually styled the ‘ Pseudo-Isidore,’ composed what pro- fessed to be a collection of decrees issued by Bishops of Rome, together with letters from famous ecclesiastics and acts of coun- cils. It contained a certain amount of genuine material, but the bulk was deliberate forgery. His primary object was to strengthen bishops against the discipline of local councils and metropolitans. In his documents the authority of the Pope is exalted so as to make him in effect the only authority who can really deal with bishops. A Pope at a distance had fewer terrors than a lesser authority near at hand. These decretals appeared to show that the earliest Bishops of Rome had claimed the most extensive powers. The Western Church was deluded by these forgeries, and their effect was enormous. The principles laid down in them revolutionized the constitution of the Church. The compilers of the canon law drew largely upon the ‘ Forged Decretals.’ The Church was persuaded that the Pope was, accord- ing to the will of Christ, absolute monarch of the whole Church and the fountain of all canon law, endowed with supreme judicial and legislative authority. That the decretals are spurious is acknowledged to-day even by the Church of Rome. But she still upholds and has even developed that conception of the Papacy which they were so largely instrumental in moulding and enforcing upon the Church.

• For a very fair statement of early Church history from a Roman standpoint, see Duchesne, Harly History of the Christian Church.

In the case of England, the Church as a whole was neither more nor less Papal than elsewhere. In Saxon times Rome interfered very little with her independence. The case of Wilfred shows that a Papal decree could be opposed successfully. After the Conquest England was inevitably drawn closer to the rest of Europe. There was a tendency for the Church to become increasingly subject to the Pope, to accept the theory that in some sense her bishops derived their authority from him. She could not be exempt from the influences of the time. The Papal power was at its highest in England during the miserable reign of Henry III. The scandalous schism in the Papacy itself, when rival Popes divided the allegiance of the Church, shook its position. There was a reaction towards a more primitive con- ception of episcopal and synodical government, in which England took her part. The Council of Constance (1414) clearly declared the Pope subordinate to a general council. But the conciliar movement failed to reform the Church. Its failure left the Papacy the stronger. But the need of reform became again urgent. The unspeakable moral corruption of the Roman court called for more drastic action. When the Church of England in 1534 repudiated the authority of the Pope, she reasserted an independence that belonged to her by inherent right.

Cp. Our Place in Christendom, Lects. II.-V. esp. Lect. IV. Sparrow Simpson, The Catholic Conception of the Church, cc. 13-19.

The Council of Trent increased the power of the Papacy. At the close the council voted that they should ask confirmation from the Pope for all that they had decreed. Only one bishop opposed the suggestion. The Pope was declared supreme even over councils.* The development of the Papal power at the expense of the Church took a new start from Trent. The bishops were placed under stricter control. Finally, in 1870, at the Vatican Council, a belief in the infallibility of the Pope was made “de fide.’ In the decree ‘ Pastor Aeternus’ it was asserted (1) that the Bishop of Rome has by divine right full and universal jurisdiction; (ii) that he is infallible when he speaks ex cathedra, %.e. when ‘ performing his office of pastor and doctor

• This declaration was so framed as to exclude certain occasions on which a Pope had undoubtedly given erroneous decisions to local churches, e.g. the instructions of Pope Eugenius to the Armenians.

of all Christians, in virtue of his apostolic authority, he defines a doctrine concerning faith or morals to be held by the universal church.’ *

(b) We may now examine the arguments by which this con- centration of all authority, ecclesiastical and doctrinal, into the person of the Bishop of Rome, is defended. The chief arguments may be summarized thus. Our Lord gave the primacy to St. Peter. He came to Rome and was Bishop of Rome and deposited the primacy in the See of Rome. Hence, since the Bishop of Rome as the inheritor of his authority is the visible head of the Church, to break off communion with him is to place oneself outside the Catholic Church. It is admitted that there has been a certain development in the formulating of the doctrine of infallibility, but it is argued that it is a legitimate develop- ment, on a line with the development of teaching, say, about the Holy Trinity.

What evidence is there that our Lord granted any supremacy to St. Peter? The chief texts adduced are Mt. 161819, ‘ Thou art Peter, and on this rock I will build my church.’ Lk. 2232, ‘When once thou hast turned again, stablish thy brethren.’ Jn. 211517, ‘Feed my sheep.’ At first sight these passages are certainly not very convincing. They do not exclude the granting of a supremacy, but they do not obviously imply it. St. Peter had been the first in time to grasp the truth of our Lord’s Messiah- ship. As such he was the first member of the new Israel (éxxAycia) which was to be based on personal adhesion to Christ. ‘ This rock ’ is not St. Peter the individual, but St. Peter as being the first to confess Christ. The authority to ‘bind’ and ‘loose’ given to him was later extended to all the Apostles (Mt. 18’8). If St. Peter was the first stone of the foundation, others were soon added to it (ep. Rev. 214 and Eph. 27°). The second passage, Lk. 22%, contains a special prayer for St. Peter, because of his special danger. There is no mention of a gift of leadership for all time. He is to strengthen his brethren by his recovery as he weakened them by his fall. So, too, n Jn. 211” our Lord’s solemn threefold repetition of the command is the public restoration of St. Peter to his apostolic position, forfeited by his threefold denial. It confers no mission beyond that

• As late, however, as 1682 the Gallican Declarations limited the Papal power by the assent of the Church.

given to the Apostles as a body (cp. Jn. 20723, Mt. 2819 Acts 18).

This interpretation of these passages is in the fullest accord with the whole evidence of the New Testament. The other Apostles up to the last appear totally unaware that the primacy has already been promised to St. Peter (Mk. 10° ff., Lk. 224 etc.). In the Acts his conduct is not accepted without question and he is obliged to defend himself before the Church (Acts 112). The Apostles as a body send him on a mission (84). At the Council of Jerusalem his speech did not close the discussion. St. James presided, summed up, and gave the decision (¢yw «pivw, 151-2), St. Peter’s name is not mentioned in the final settlement (vv. “2ff.). HenceforwardSt. Peter drops out of the story and initiates nothing. Again, in Gal. 2” we find St. Paul rebuking him openly. So, too, in his First Epistle St. Peter’s language does not hint at any special privileges bestowed upon himself (cp. e.g. 51). In short we do not find St. Peter recognized as the divinely appointed head of the Church. His authority is not invoked as final where on the Roman theory we should have expected it to be invoked. We do not deny that St. Peter was the spokesman of the apostolic band and their leader—for evil as well as good. In the beginning of the Church’s life he plays a prominent part, as we should expect. But all this falls immeasurably short of the Roman contention of a supremacy conferred on him. He is always ‘primus inter pares.’ There is no hint that he is any- thing that the other Apostles are not. Passages such as 1 Cor. 1278 and Eph. 4” are silent on any order of ministry higher than the apostolate.

Again, in interpreting the meaning of passages of Scripture we can rightly appeal for guidance to tradition. Tradition is almost universally unfavourable to the Roman interpretation of Scrip- ture. In patristic commentaries of the first six centuries on Mt. 1618 there is no fixed interpretation. This lack of unanimity proves that no special importance was as yet attached to the passage. So, too, with the other passages. There is no hint that they attest the bestowal of a supremacy vital to the con- stitution of the Church.

Lastly, even if we were prepared to yield to the contention that Scripture affords evidence of a primacy over the whole Church bestowed by our Lord on St. Peter, no text can be quoted

that even faintly suggests that our Lord also bestowed authority on St. Peter to transmit his primacy to others or that St. Peter ever intended todo so. St. Peter’s privileged position, whatever it was, died with him. For evidence of Scripture see : Puller, op. cit. Lect. ITI. Salmon, Infallibility, Lect. XVIII.

On the Roman side ; Wilhelm and Scannell, vol. ii. p. 303 ff.

That St. Peter visited Rome is most probable. It rests upon quite ancient tradition. ‘Babylon’ in 1 Pet. 5% is probably Rome (cp. Rev. 148). But there is no real evidence that he formded the Church at Rome. It would seem that it grew up no one knows how by the confluence of individual Christians from other Churches.* In the earliest allusions St. Peter and St. Paul are recognized as joint and equal founders of the Roman Church.f This suggests that St. Peter was the founder only in the same limited sense as St. Paul. There is little reason to doubt that both Apostles were martyred there. But this is a very different thing from saying that St. Peter was first diocesan Bishop of Rome. The title is an anachronism. St. Paul was as much Bishop of Rome as St. Peter, and other Churches could claim to possess the episcopal succession from St. Peter as truly as Rome. The Church of Antioch might be styled, with equal accuracy, the See of Peter. But the whole idea of the Apostles as diocesan bishops presupposes a later development of Church organization.t Irenaeus distinctly teaches that Linus was the first ‘bishop’ of Rome and received his episcopal authority

• The belief in St. Peter’s 25 years’ episcopate at Rome rests on compara- tively late evidence. If there is no evidence that ‘another place’ in Acts 1227 is not Rome, there is no evidence thet it is. In Acts 15 St. Peter seems estab- lished at Jerusalem (cp. Gal. 118 and 2%). If he went to Rome to escape from Herod, he went because it was the safest place of concealment. Rom. 15?° is ambiguous. St. Paul’s desire ‘not to build on another’s foundation’ may be taken either as a reason for visiting Rome, since no Apostle had been there, or it may be an excuse for the delay in visiting Rome, since an Apostle

had been there, and so the other regions had to be covered first. (Cp. S. and H., Romans, pp. xxv. ff.)

} H.g. Iren. Haer. iii. 3, §§ 2-3.

t ‘If we call an Apostle bishop, because he exercised episcopal—nay more than episcopal—power, we must also hold that in apostolic times, one bishop might hold several sees, and one see have, at the same time, more bishops than one’ (Salmon, op. cit. p. 358).

from St. Peter and St. Paul during their lifetime.* The exact order of the early bishops of Rome is somewhat obscure, but no writers for the first two centuries or more speak of St. Peter as first bishop. The story of his episcopate is probably derived from Ebionite literature composed in the name of Clement of Rome in order to vilify St. Paul. It possesses no evidential value, but it helped to shape the traditions of the early Church. All the genuine literature that we possess of the subapostolic age goes to show that the importance of the Bishop of Rome was merged in that of his Church. Ignatius sends his greeting not to the bishop, but to the Church at Rome. Clement writes his one genuine epistle not in his own name but in that of the Church. In short, all evidence goes to show that St. Peter was not in the technical sense Bishop of Rome and did not bequeath any unique authority to that see.

Once again, there are certain facts in ancient Church history that are entirely inconsistent with the modern Roman theory of the Pope’s infallibility and supremacy of jurisdiction. At the close of the second century Pope Victor excommunicated the Quarto-deciman Churches of Asia. His excommunication was disregarded. Even the other bishops of the West rebuked him. In the fourth century Pope Stephen excommunicated Cyprian and the Oriental Churches who agreed with him for refusing to recognize heretical baptism. Cyprian and Firmilian in reply asserted their episcopal independence, and posterity approved. Further, Meletius, Bishop of Antioch, who presided over the Council of Constantinople, was not recognized by Rome, who supported his rival Paulinus. During the council he died and was canonized. His name is to be found in the Roman Calendar to-day. But on the modern Roman theory, since he died out of communion with Rome, he died outside the Church altogether. Other equally important facts could be quoted, but these instances are sufficient to show that the early Church as a whole knew nothing of Papal supremacy.

No doubt passages can be quoted on the other side. Bishops who desired the support of Rome employed flattering language that fell short of strict theological accuracy, not more flattering perhaps than that which they applied to the Emperor. There was, as we have seen, a universal respect paid to Rome as the

• Haer. ili. 3, § 3.

leading Church. Further, there is among the Fathers what may be called a Papal school who tended to exalt the prerogatives of the Bishop of Rome; but their opinion was at best the opinion of a party and was rejected by the greater part of the Church.* If it came to triumph in the West, the triumph was due not to the deliberate acceptance of the Papal claims by the reason and conscience of the Church, but partly to external circumstances and partly to calculated ambition backed by force and fraud. The Hast continued to bear witness to the primitive truth.

To sum up, the contention of the English Church is this. If the claims of the Pope to be the infallible head of the Church and the source of all ecclesiastical jurisdiction are well founded, then a right belief in them is an essential part of the Christian faith. We have the right, therefore, to expect to find clear proof of this in Scripture and primitive tradition. That is just what we do not find. On the other hand, there are facts of many different kinds that show that the early Church knew nothing of any such belief. We cannot suppose that God would have left His Church without as clear evidence for the supremacy of St. Peter’s successors as for, e.g. the doctrine of the Trinity. The only possible line of argument in defence of the Roman position is that of development.t| We are not concerned to deny that the Papacy is a development or that in the providence of God it played a most useful part in conserving the unity and discipline of the Church during times of general confusion when a strong central authority was required. But we may still ask whether the modern Papacy is a legitimate development, and are bound to test it, as we test other developments of Christianity, such as, for instance, the Salvation Army, by the rule of Scripture and tradition and the light of reason. The Roman and Catholic

• We may doubt whether this is really compatible with the Papal Bull that declares the infallibility of the Pope a tradition received from the beginning of the Christian faith. But see Dom Chapman, c. vi. § A.

theories of unity are incompatible. On the Roman view the

Notes

• On the one side, see Westcott, Commentary on St. John, and on the other side Gore, Church and Ministry, pp. 228 ff., and Hamilton, The People of God, vol: ii. Appendix i.
• Cp. Hamilton, vol. ii, p. 126 ff., or Sparrow Simpson, The Catholic Con- ception of the Church, c. 7.
• C. H. Turner, in the Cambridge Mediaeval History, vol. i. p. 145.
• In solidum (=for the whole) is a legal term. When two parties borrowed jn common a sum of money, each was responsible in solidwm, i.e. for the whole- See Bigg, Origins, p. 383.
• See Hamilton, vol. ii. Appendix 4.
• No doubt St. Leo refused to accept the canon and the West as a whole rejected it. But in practice the East accepted it and obeyed it. Constanti- nople retained her rank and Rome had to recognize the existing facts. At the Quinisext Council (681) aJl the canons of Chalcedon were confirmed. In any case, the canon is clear evidence of the mind of the Church. (Cp. Salmon, Infallibility, pp. 421-423.)
• Among these we might place Cyprian. He certainly regarded the Roman see as a symbol of Church unity and used very high language about it. But his conduct towards Stephen interprets his meaning. He certainly did not hold that the authority of each bishop is mediated by that of the Bishop of Rome. His view was that the episcopate is one and shared by each bishop, like a property held in common. It is usually supposed that Cyprian’s writings were afterwards interpolated to support the Roman view. (Cp. Puller, p. 49 ff., or Benson, Cyprian, c. iv. See, however, J.Th.S. vol. v. p. 432, where Dom Chapman’s arguments against this are reviewed.)