Note 164 — Chapter III

Footnote 164:

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"Corpus sumus," says Tertullian at a time when this description had already become an anachronism, "de conscientia religionis et disciplinæ unitate et spei foedere." (Apol. 39: cf. Ep. Petri ad Jacob. I.: εις θεος, εις νομος, μια ελπις). The description was applicable to the earlier period, when there was no such thing as a federation with political forms, but when the consciousness of belonging to a community and of forming a brotherhood (αδελφοτης) was all the more deeply felt: See, above all, 1 Clem ad Corinth., the Didache (9-15), Aristides, Apol 15: "and when they have become Christians, they call them (the slaves) brethren without hesitation ... for they do not call them brethren according to the flesh, but according to the spirit and in God;" cf. also the statements on brotherhood in Tertullian and Minucius Felix (also Lucian). We have in 1 Clem. I. 2, the delineation of a perfect Christian Church. The Epistles of Ignatius are specially instructive as to the independence of each individual community: 1 Clem. and Didache, as to the obligation to assist stranger communities by counsel and action, and to support the travelling brethren. As every Christian is a παροικος so every community is a παροικουσα την πολιν but it is under obligation to give an example to the world, and must watch that "the name be not blasphemed." The importance of the social element in the oldest Christian communities, has been very justly brought into prominence in the latest works on the subject (Renan, Heinrici, Hatch). The historian of dogma must also emphasise it, and put the fluid notions of the faith in contrast with the definite consciousness of moral tasks. See 1 Clem. 47-50; Polyc. Ep. 3; Didache 1 ff.; Ignat. ad Eph. 14, on αγαπη as the main requirement Love demands that everyone "ζητει το κοινωφελες πασιν και μη το 'εαυτου" (1 Clem. 48. 6, with parallels; Didache 16. 3; Barn. 4. 10; Ignatius).