Apparently the bounds to which the post-modern Christian will go to cherry pick what they like is endless. While the average post-modern finds the church fathers authoritative in many aspects, they cringe when they actually learn what the church fathers actually believe, especially when it comes to the idea of the supernatural world and life before creation. I ask my post-modern friends, if you think that the church fathers are the context of the scripture where is the Pastor of Hermas in your bible?
Among the early Christians, the idea of a preexistent church appears explicitly in the hugely influential text The Pastor of Hermas. Harnack describes the development as a segue from Jewish antecedents:
"If the world was created for the sake of the people of Israel, and the Apocalyptists expressly taught that, then it follows that in the thought of God, Israel is older than the world. The idea of pre-existence of the people of Israel follows from this. We can still see this process of thought very plainly in the Shepherd of Hermas, who expressly declares that the world was created for the sake of the Church. In consequence of this, he maintains that the Church was very old, and was created before the foundation of the world. Harnack, History of Dogma, 1:324."
The second century text was considered scripture by many of the earliest Christians and was EVEN BOUND WITH THE NEW TESTAMENT IN SOME CODICES!!! The text has the account of five visions, interspersed with several parables and commandments given to the former slave Hermas. In it we find the most emphatic ancient expression of the preexistent church. Appearing in a vision, a beautiful lady addresses the shepherd with this preface: "Hear the words which I am going to speak to you. God, who dwells in the heavens, and made out of nothing the things that exist, ... multiplied and increased them on account of His Holy Church.: That the church here referred to has its roots in the pre-mortal world is explicitly stated soon after. Hermas mis-takes a different female figure for a sibyl, but a messenger of the revelation quickly corrects him: "It is the Church." Hermas asks, "When then is she an old woman?" and is told, "Because . . . she was created first of all. On account of this she is old. And for her sake the world was made." Pastor of Hermas, I.1.1, 2.4, tans. F. Crombie (ANF 2:9,12).
The allusion is to none other than Ephesians 4:11-13, which describes the purpose of the church which Christ instituted, with its apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers, as nothing less than "the building up of the body of Christ," till the saints all come to "maturity, to the measure of the full stature of Christ." Indeed, the intertextual allusion seems confirmed by Hermas' subsequent vision of the construction of a tower, with stones representing "apostles, bishops, teachers, and deacons,: and a summary explanation of God's dispensation of mercy and righteousness intended to make the shepherd "righteous and holy." Pastor of Hermas, I.3.5.,9 (ANF 2:14, 16). This is in direct opposition to the Platonic idea of pre-existence. Plato thought that mere life itself resulted in moral betterment, but Christian thought the church results in moral betterment. The established church is the particular medium envisioned for the amelioration of the human spirit.
That the Shepherd (or Pastor) of Hemas has these views is weighty. Iraneus, one of the earliest church fathers, was instrumental in deciding New Testament Canon. He endorsed the four Gospels, Acts, Revelation, and all of the epistles except Philemon, 2 Peter, 3 John, and Jude. BUT, he considered 1 Clement and Pastor of Hermas as scripture. See note to Iraneus, Against Heresies IV.20.2 (ANF 1:488).
Tertullian also considered the Pastor of Hermas as scripture. Origen and and Clement referenced it.
The Author of Pastor of Hermas admonishes their audience to "do the will of God our Father, we shall be of the first church, the spiritual one, that was created before the sun and the moon." Seeming to recognize that it might surprise readers, the author adds "the books and apostles say that the church not only exists now, but has done so from the beginning, For she was spiritual as our Jesus also was." "The So-Called Second Letter of Clement" XIV.1-2, in The Apostolic Fathers, trans. Edgard J. Goodspeed (New York: Harper, 1950), 91.
The analogy of the pre-existence of Christ may also carry beyond the community to the collective, to those individuals who make it up. If we are in Christ, we also pre-exist. "This flesh", the author 2 Clement writes, is the "counterpart and copy of the spirit." In other words, the body and soul are not of two natures, but the body is the copy of the spiritual nature. This is different than Platonic thought. Jewish conceptions of a covenant or soul that precede birth existed before Plato and they influenced the Jewish Christian writers. This are summed up in three uniquely Jewish ideas
(1) the idea of promise and fulfillment suggests that the future is all already in God's mind
(2)the material presence of God's Name foreshadows the idea of pre-existent hypostases
(3) the vision of the prophets (Jeremiah) imply the existence of a heavenly world "which contains pre-existent things"
R.G. Hamerton-Kelly, Pre-Existence, Wisdom, and the Son of Man: A Study of the Idea of Pre-Existence in the New Testament (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1973; repr. Eugene, Ore.: Wipf and Stock, 200), 16.
Gerals Bostock, "The Sources of Origen's Doctrine of Pre-Existence," in Origeniana Quarta, Die Referate des 4. Internationalen Origenskongresses, ed. Lothar Lies (Innsbruck: Tyrolia, 1987), 261.
So what is gonna be post-moderns? Are you gonna put Pastor of Hermas in your bible?
Among the early Christians, the idea of a preexistent church appears explicitly in the hugely influential text The Pastor of Hermas. Harnack describes the development as a segue from Jewish antecedents:
"If the world was created for the sake of the people of Israel, and the Apocalyptists expressly taught that, then it follows that in the thought of God, Israel is older than the world. The idea of pre-existence of the people of Israel follows from this. We can still see this process of thought very plainly in the Shepherd of Hermas, who expressly declares that the world was created for the sake of the Church. In consequence of this, he maintains that the Church was very old, and was created before the foundation of the world. Harnack, History of Dogma, 1:324."
The second century text was considered scripture by many of the earliest Christians and was EVEN BOUND WITH THE NEW TESTAMENT IN SOME CODICES!!! The text has the account of five visions, interspersed with several parables and commandments given to the former slave Hermas. In it we find the most emphatic ancient expression of the preexistent church. Appearing in a vision, a beautiful lady addresses the shepherd with this preface: "Hear the words which I am going to speak to you. God, who dwells in the heavens, and made out of nothing the things that exist, ... multiplied and increased them on account of His Holy Church.: That the church here referred to has its roots in the pre-mortal world is explicitly stated soon after. Hermas mis-takes a different female figure for a sibyl, but a messenger of the revelation quickly corrects him: "It is the Church." Hermas asks, "When then is she an old woman?" and is told, "Because . . . she was created first of all. On account of this she is old. And for her sake the world was made." Pastor of Hermas, I.1.1, 2.4, tans. F. Crombie (ANF 2:9,12).
The allusion is to none other than Ephesians 4:11-13, which describes the purpose of the church which Christ instituted, with its apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers, as nothing less than "the building up of the body of Christ," till the saints all come to "maturity, to the measure of the full stature of Christ." Indeed, the intertextual allusion seems confirmed by Hermas' subsequent vision of the construction of a tower, with stones representing "apostles, bishops, teachers, and deacons,: and a summary explanation of God's dispensation of mercy and righteousness intended to make the shepherd "righteous and holy." Pastor of Hermas, I.3.5.,9 (ANF 2:14, 16). This is in direct opposition to the Platonic idea of pre-existence. Plato thought that mere life itself resulted in moral betterment, but Christian thought the church results in moral betterment. The established church is the particular medium envisioned for the amelioration of the human spirit.
That the Shepherd (or Pastor) of Hemas has these views is weighty. Iraneus, one of the earliest church fathers, was instrumental in deciding New Testament Canon. He endorsed the four Gospels, Acts, Revelation, and all of the epistles except Philemon, 2 Peter, 3 John, and Jude. BUT, he considered 1 Clement and Pastor of Hermas as scripture. See note to Iraneus, Against Heresies IV.20.2 (ANF 1:488).
Tertullian also considered the Pastor of Hermas as scripture. Origen and and Clement referenced it.
The Author of Pastor of Hermas admonishes their audience to "do the will of God our Father, we shall be of the first church, the spiritual one, that was created before the sun and the moon." Seeming to recognize that it might surprise readers, the author adds "the books and apostles say that the church not only exists now, but has done so from the beginning, For she was spiritual as our Jesus also was." "The So-Called Second Letter of Clement" XIV.1-2, in The Apostolic Fathers, trans. Edgard J. Goodspeed (New York: Harper, 1950), 91.
The analogy of the pre-existence of Christ may also carry beyond the community to the collective, to those individuals who make it up. If we are in Christ, we also pre-exist. "This flesh", the author 2 Clement writes, is the "counterpart and copy of the spirit." In other words, the body and soul are not of two natures, but the body is the copy of the spiritual nature. This is different than Platonic thought. Jewish conceptions of a covenant or soul that precede birth existed before Plato and they influenced the Jewish Christian writers. This are summed up in three uniquely Jewish ideas
(1) the idea of promise and fulfillment suggests that the future is all already in God's mind
(2)the material presence of God's Name foreshadows the idea of pre-existent hypostases
(3) the vision of the prophets (Jeremiah) imply the existence of a heavenly world "which contains pre-existent things"
R.G. Hamerton-Kelly, Pre-Existence, Wisdom, and the Son of Man: A Study of the Idea of Pre-Existence in the New Testament (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1973; repr. Eugene, Ore.: Wipf and Stock, 200), 16.
Gerals Bostock, "The Sources of Origen's Doctrine of Pre-Existence," in Origeniana Quarta, Die Referate des 4. Internationalen Origenskongresses, ed. Lothar Lies (Innsbruck: Tyrolia, 1987), 261.
So what is gonna be post-moderns? Are you gonna put Pastor of Hermas in your bible?