The Other Six Days: C2 - Emergence of the Clergy

The Other Six Days

Part One - A People Without 'Laity and Clergy': Chapter 2 - Reinventing Laity and Clergy

Emergence of Clergy

Stevens identifies three influences that led to the emergence of clergy in the church:

1. Imitation of the secular structures of the Greek-Roman world not unlike the professional-lay distinctions in the modern world.
2. The transference of the Old Testament priesthood model to the leadership of the church
3. Popular piety which elevated the Lord’s Supper to a mystery which required priestly administration. (39)

Stevens gives a brief recount of how the idea of clergy began to emerge in the thinking of the early church fathers. Heresies and doctrinal confusion in the last third of the first century put pressure on the Christian leaders to find some way to keep order. That led to increasing institutionalism. Old Testament and Greco-Roman structures were their primary frame of reference and models from these cultures began to permeate the Church’s thinking. These developments were combined with an increasingly mystical interpretation of the Lord’s Supper, which required someone of mystical qualifications to preside over the event.

Cyprian, writing around 250 AD, wrote a model for church order which was explicitly based on the civil orders of the rulers of Carthage. Characteristics of Cyrian’s church order were:

• He makes a distinction between the ordo of bishops and the laity.
• He sacralizes the priesthood according to the Old Testament model of the sacrificial priesthood.
• He establishes a monolithic episcopate which is the same for all of Africa.
• He links ministry to sacrifice, again in the image of the temple priesthood.
• He shapes the church as a clearly defined institution of salvation.
• He models the bishops in the image of Roman senators, thus excluding women.
• He consolidates the ruling powers and bishops through numerous episcopal conclaves. (41-42)

The conversion of Constantine and Christianization of the Empire just a few decades later in the fourth century merely solidified the transition that had been happening for the previous two centuries.

Stevens then highlights some of the major developments that transpired in the period from the fourth century to the sixteenth century.

• The Bishop of Rome came to be regarded as the head of the Church on earth.
• The language of worship ceased to be the language of the people.
• The clergy dressed differently and were prepared for ministry in the enculturating seminary.
• Ordination became an absolute act so that congregations were no longer needed for the celebration of eucharist.
• Clergy became celibate and thus distant from the normal experiences of the laity.
• The cup was removed from the laity in the eucharist.

The Reformation came in the sixteenth century but it failed to fully recover the “priesthood of all believers.” Some of the factors involved were:

• “The Reformation was more concerned about soteriology (salvation) than ecclesiology. …”
• “The preacher replaced the priest. The sermon became the central act of Protestant worship (the Protestant ‘Christ-event’).” Much as the priest presided over the ‘Christ-event’ of the eucharist.
• “Inadequate structures of renewal.” Stevens notes that even denominations with radical reformation roots “… have now ‘gravitated’ to the pre-Reformation clergy-lay distinction.”
• “The seminary system was eventually adopted. …thus guaranteeing [pastors’] enculturation in a clerical culture.”
• “Kingdom ministry has been almost totally eclipsed by church ministry. Ministry is viewed as advancing the church rather than the Kingdom. The letters are the primary guide; the gospels have been eclipsed.”
• “Ordination is still retained almost universally for the full-time supported church worker; no adequate recognition of lay ministries in society exists….”
• “An adequate lay spirituality had hardly ever been taught and promoted. …Protestant spirituality has mostly focused either on charismatic and ‘mystical’ experiences or the deeper life of outstanding Christian leaders, rather than exploring the holiness of the ordinary Christian in the totality of his or her life…”

I realize there are lots of lists in the post but through these lists I think we can see the impulses that have taken us away from the vision of the Church in the New Testament.

Is Stevens on track here? Are there aspects that trouble you that are not mentioned?

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Comments

[dlw]

good stuff.

in the "Story of Christian Theology" by Roger Olson he describes how the increase in hierarchy during the 2nd and 3rd ctry of Xty was "necessary" to avoid chaos and becoming a folk religion. I beg to differ and believe that it was because of the greater hierarchy in Xty that Xty was susceptible to becoming Constantinized in the 4th ctry.

dlw

[Michael Kruse]

It seems to me that as the movement expanded there would clearly need to be some organizational connectionalism. Unfortunately, it appears to me, that in the face of crisis they fell back on the only to organizational models they had been exposed to: OT and Greco-Roman structures. I think God had something new in mind for us to enter.

I think you are right. In a sense the Church structure began to become more and more like the empire which made it easy for the empire to embrace and co-opt it.

[Sam Carr]

Michael, isn't there a sense that we can see the trend towards hierarchies laid out in the NT period itself along with the trend to keep women in less then leadership positions?

Of course the 2nd and 3rd Cs consolidated, elaborated and established the control and command structures - very often as a necessary means to controlling heresies, but if the basic ideas are there in the NT itself, are we actually not calling for a return to a more biblical way but are instead trying to plow a new furrow?

[Michael Kruse]

Sam, I guess I would need to unpack what you mean by "trend toward hierarchies" and "plow a new furrow."

I don't see hierarchy developing in the NT in the direction of clergy/laity. I see a seemingly ad hoc structure forming in the NT. Elders are selected by the community in some places and appointed in others. Deacons in one locale and not another. Interchangeability of "titles" and seemingly overlapping responsibilities. It is my take that we frequently read back on to some of the "titles" in the NT (like pastor or elder) from our context much more than is actually there. It is basically that the more mature should lead and bring the less mature to maturity.

I would say that there is no biblical model of church governance. I think structure and governance has to flow out of mission and that there may be man legitimate ways of organizing for mission. The experience of the early centuries was one attempt to organize for mission that IMO was corrupted by cultural influences and then those structures were made sacred and unalterable. I largely question the idea that there is one biblical way.

How do you see this?

[Sam Carr]

I do agree with you as far as our tendency to read back into scripture what is not there. On the other hand, looking at the evidence, starting with a 'leadership' already being in place i.e. the apostles and within this group a sort of big 3 + 1 (Peter, James, John + Paul) 'calling the shots', so to speak. Then we have Paul in the pastorals with both Titus and Timothy basically asking them to do something like micromanagement. In various epistles we have Paul specifically addressing particular persons who appear to be de facto leaders and through whom Paul both passes instructions and expects that His messengers will be obeyed.

I agree that this does not amount to anything like what the church has done with it but there does seem to be some movement towards a structure of authority.

[Michael Kruse]

Thanks Sam. Good observations. What Stevens will get at more specifically later in the book is that nature of authority and leadership.

Authority is not a bad thing. There are different types of authorit. It is instructive to me how nearly everytime I get into discussions about what Stevens is writing, the anxiety level over authority and power goes through the roof. (Though not here ... yet. :) ) Stevens' concern is not about authority and power. It is about the nature of ministry. Yet I find that a great many can't even hear what he is saying about ministry because they are so anxious about power issues. On several occassions when getting into these issues I have been told "You have a problem with authority" and then tuned out. I think mission and ministry have to be appreciated before we can begin to talk about authority and leadership.

Elton Trueblood used to describe the role of a pastor as a player-coach. I have found few other metaphors that sum it up much better.

[RonMcK]

I am away behind in reading this good stuff. I think the difference with Paul was that has authority came from relationship with the people he was addressing and not from appointment to a position.

Apostles exercise authority "looking back".