HIERARCHY
330
HIERARCHY
us an insight into the beginnings of Christianity. Be-
lief is impossible if one has not heard a preacher of the
Faith, and preaching requires the sending of the
preacher.
(d) Thessalonians. — In I Thess., ii, 7 (I Cor., ix, 7-16 and II Thess., iii, 7-9) ; I Thess., iv, 1 ; II Thess., ii, 12-14 (cf. 2-4), Paul exhorts the Thessalonians to hold the traditions which they have learned, whether by word or by his epistle ; cf. also iii, 6. If one of the faithful does not obey Paul's epistle, they shall not keep company with him and shall admonish him (iii, 14 and 15).
(e) Supplementary notes from the Acts of the Apostles. — Acts, ii, 42 (The community perseveres in the doctrine of the Apostles). Acts, xv, 6-31 (The Apostles and the presbyters of Jerusalem issue an authoritative encyclical concerning the observance of the law). Acts, xvi, 4 extends it to Asia Minor.
(.5) The rights of the Communities. — The fu-st group of our documents contains fifteen texts from which may be drawn conclusions with regard to certain community rights. These texts may be divided into eight classes. The first contains information on elections of an official character held by the communi- ties; the second, on elections of a private character; the third, on judicial proceedings; the fourth, on private courts of arbitration; the fifth, on the opinions of the faithful with regard to the Apostles; the sixth, on collections taken up in the communities; the seventh, on credentials granted in the name of the community; the eighth, on the acknowledgnient of superiors by the community. In order to view the matter in the proper critical light, one must keep in mind that from the very beginning the concept Ecclc- sia expressed not only the local particular Church, but also the universal Church as a whole, in as much as it is superior to the individual communities antl operates in them as their vital principle. This is now admitted by Protestant scholars of the first rank. Even when Ecclesia was used in the sense of local Church it did not, in the earliest Christian literature, designate the com- munity as opposed to the Apostles or any other supe- riors, but it meant the organized community Such is the obvious meaning of the term in all the writings of the New Testament. In only two passages which, moreover, belong to the quite exceptional fifteenth chapter of the Acts, the Ecclesia is placed side by side with the Apostles and presbyters: The Apostles of the Gentiles are received by the Church (of Jerusalem) and by the Twelve and the presbyters (xv, 4); the Apostles and presbyters together with the entire Church of Jerusalem elect the envoys for Antioch. Acts, xiv, 22 says Paul appointed presbyters in e\'ery Church (kolt iKii\ria-lav) of Asia Minor.
Elsewhere, however, St. Paul's conception of the Church prevails; the Church, both in its ideal form and in its concrete realization, is always the body of Christ and consequently an organic, articulated whole. It is in the Epistle to "the Ephesians that we find for the first time the notion of this ideal Church, i. e., of the universal Church taken as an individual unit (Ephes., i, 22; iii, 10, 21; v. 23, 24, 25, 27, 29, 32; .so too Col., i, IS, 24; Hebr., xii, 23 sq.). This is (he meaning of Matt., xvi, IS: "I will build my church". Some- thing like a transition to this meaning is found in I Cor., xii, 28: "God indeed hath set some in the church; first apo.stles, etc." One plainly feels how- ever that behind these words there still lurks the idea that in every individual Church (i. e. community) the various charismata are operative. Something similar may be observed in I Cor., x, 32 with the difference, however, that here the actual particular Church is still more clearly to l)e seen. On the other hand in the three passages where Paul speaks of hitn- self as the former persecutor of the Church, he may possibly have in mind the communitv of Jerusalem (Gal. i, 13; I Cor., xv, 9; Phil., iii, 10). In Acts, xi,
26 the word 'E/c/cXTjcrfa seems also to have a signification
intermediate between that of the particular concrete
Church and that of the ideal universal Church. There
remain eighty-four texts in which the word Ecclesia
occurs. In no single one of them does the expression
signify the community or the congregation taken in a
distinctly democratic sense, by which emphasis would
be laid on the self-government of the faithful. It is
therefore not admissible to consider the actions of the
Ecclesia as a mere outcome of democratic rights, thus
arbitrarily excluding both the unitary operation of the
organism as a whole and the graded activity of the
individual members and different organs of adminis-
tration. St. Paul certainly ascribes all rights and
powers to the Ecclesia as the ideal whole, through
whose vivifying action they are imparted to the local
Churches, the proximate sources whence the individ-
ual administrative organs derive their vital prerog-
atives. But all this is po.ssible only because the
Church is the body of Christ and thus in vital union
with the giver of life, Jesus Christ.
This early Christian view of the Church has nothing in common with the idea of a purely himian, demo- cratic authority and supremacy of the community. In our own days as well, it is of course the only correct conception of the Christian Church; it is the Catholic idea of the Church. Even towards the end of the second century the use of terms had already begim to undergo a change. This is perhaps to be regretted. Instead of speaking of the activity, the efficiency, and the sacrificial office of the Church of God, it gradually became cu.-;tomary to lay stress on the acting organs, i. e., to ascribe these functions to the bishop or presby- ter. This brought out more clearly the element of jurisdiction and defined more sharply the grades of authority. As long as the Church in general was conceived as the subject of all activity, the functions of the individual organs remained undefined nor could any clear distinction be drawn between their respective attributions. While the.se were more plainly marked off in the later development, the depth and imity of thought was impaired by the obscuring of the idea that the Church is the mystical body of Christ. St. Paul never derived all the rights and powers of the Churches founded by him from the plenitude of his .\postolic power. He never forgot that the Church of God was primarilj a creation of God, and therefore the subject of rights founded in her very nature. But these rights and powers which come from God have nothing in common with com- munity rights. By community rights we understand, of course, only those rights which were proper to actu- ally existing, complete communities. In most of the Protestant works on this subject we find these latter rights confounded with those that belong to the Church as an organism, as the body of Christ. Har- nack, in his latest treatise on the inner constitution of the Church (Realencyklop. fiir Protest. Theol. und Kirche, cd. 3, XX, 1908, 508-546; cf. especially 519 sq.) has attempted to remove this confusion, but only with partial success.
In the next series of texts we cannot, of course, insert those in which St. Paul, as for instance in Gal., iv, 17, e.xhorts the Christians to admonish one another, to warn, to correct the sinners. This is a dut.y imposed by the I^ord's command; and the right to fulfil that duty is included in the right to administer fraternal correction; it is not a community right. The first group of texts deals with electoral proceedings of an official character, (a) The entire assembly of the faithful takes part in the election of Matthias (.\cts, i, 2.3-26), after two candidates had been proposed. Peter opens the proceedings; but no information is given about the right of presentation and the manner of casting the lot. (b) The seven assistants of the Apostles are chosen by the whole community in accordance with the injunction of the Twelve (tok t6
