First Epistle of Clement

The First Epistle of Clement (Ancient Greek: Κλήμεντος πρὸς Κορινθίους, translit. Klēmentos pros Korinthious, lit. 'Clement to Corinthians') is a letter addressed to the Christians in the city of Corinth. The letter was composed at some time between AD 70 and AD 140, mostly likely c 96. It ranks with Didache as one of the earliest—if not the earliest—of extant Christian documents outside the canonical New Testament. As the name suggests, a Second Epistle of Clement is known, but this is a later work by a different author. Neither 1 nor 2 Clement are part of the canonical New Testament, but they are part of the Apostolic Fathers collection.

The letter is a response to events in Corinth, where the congregation had deposed certain elders (presbyters). The author called on the congregation to repent, to restore the elders to their position, and to obey their superiors. He said that the Apostles had appointed the church leadership and directed them on how to perpetuate the ministry.

Although the work is traditionally attributed to Pope Clement, it is anonymous, and there is no evidence that Rome had a bishop in the monarchical sense at the time. The letter appears to have been written by a single church leader in Rome. In Corinth, the letter was read aloud from time to time. This practice spread to other churches, and Christians translated the Greek work into Latin, Syriac, and other languages. Some early Christians even treated the work like scripture. The work was lost for centuries, but since the 1600s various copies or fragments have been found and studied. It has provided valuable evidence about the structure of the early church.

Authorship and date

Although traditionally attributed to Clement of Rome,[1] the letter does not include Clement's name, and is anonymous, though scholars generally consider it to be genuine.[2] While Clement is traditionally identified as a pope, there is no evidence for monarchical bishops in Rome at such an early date.[2] The epistle is addressed as “the Church of God which sojourneth in Rome to the Church of God which sojourneth in Corinth.” Its stylistic coherence suggests a single author.[3]

Scholars have proposed a range of dates, but most limit the possibilities to the last three decades of the 1st century,[4][5] and no later than AD 140.[6] The common time given for the epistle’s composition is at the end of the reign of Domitian (c AD 96).[2][7] The phrase "sudden and repeated misfortunes and hindrances which have befallen us" (1:1) is taken as a reference to persecutions under Domitian. The Epistle to the Hebrews' call for leadership from the church in Rome has been thought to have been influential.[8] Some scholars believe 1 Clement was written around the same time as the Book of Revelation (c. AD 95 – 97).[9]

Content

The letter was occasioned by a dispute in Corinth, which had led to the removal from office of several presbyters. Since none of the presbyters were charged with moral offences, 1 Clement charges that their removal was high-handed and unjustifiable. The letter was extremely lengthy—it was twice as long as the Epistle to the Hebrews—and includes many references to the Old Testament, of which he demonstrates a knowledge. Clement repeatedly refers to the Old Testament as Scripture.[10]

1 Clement offers valuable evidence into the state of the ministry in the early church. He calls on the Corinthians to repent and to reinstate the leaders that they had deposed. He explains that the Apostles had appointed ”bishops and deacons”, that they had given instructions on how to perpetuate the ministry, and that Christians were to obey their superiors. The author uses the terms ”bishops” and ”elders” (presbyters) interchangeably.[2]

New Testament references include admonition to “Take up the epistle of the blessed Paul the Apostle” (xlvii. 1) which was written to this Corinthian audience; a reference which seems to imply written documents available at both Rome and Corinth. 1 Clement also alludes to the first epistle of Paul to the Corinthians; and may allude to Paul's epistles to the Romans, Galatians, Ephesians, and Philippians, numerous phrases from the Epistle to the Hebrews, and possible material from Acts, James, and I Peter. In several instances, the author asks his readers to “remember” the words of Jesus, although they do not attribute these sayings to a specific written account. These New Testament allusions are employed as authoritative sources which strengthen the letter's arguments to the Corinthian church. Despite Bruce Metzger's claim that Clement never explicitly refers to them as “Scripture,”[10] Clement 56 provides a quote which he refers to as "the holy word;" this quote is found in Hebrews 12:6.[11]

Additionally, 1 Clement expressly references the martyrdom of Paul and very strongly implies the martyrdom of Peter (sections 5:4 to 6:1).[12]

1 Clement was written at a time when some Christians were keenly aware that Jesus had not returned as they had expected. Like 2 Peter, this epistle criticizes those who doubt their faith because of the delay of the Second Coming.[13]

Canonical rank

The epistle was publicly read from time to time at Corinth, and by the 4th century this usage had spread to other churches. It was included in the 5th century Codex Alexandrinus, which contained the entire Old and New Testaments.[14] It was included with the Gospel of John in the fragmentary early Greek and Akhmimic Coptic papyrus designated Papyrus 6. First Clement is listed as canonical in "Canon 85" of the Canons of the Apostles, suggesting that First Clement had canonical rank in at least some regions of early Christendom.

Sources

Though known from antiquity, the first document to contain the Epistle of Clement and to be studied by Western scholars was found in 1628, having been included with an ancient Greek Bible given by the Patriarch of Constantinople Cyril I to King Charles I of England.[15] The first complete copy of 1 Clement was rediscovered in 1873, some four hundred years after the Fall of Constantinople, when Philotheos Bryennios found it in the Greek Codex Hierosolymitanus, written in 1056. This work, written in Greek, was translated into at least three languages in ancient times: a Latin translation from the 2nd or 3rd century was found in an 11th-century manuscript in the seminary library of Namur, Belgium, and published by Germain Morin in 1894; a Syriac manuscript, now at Cambridge University, was found by Robert Lubbock Bensly in 1876, and translated by him into English in 1899; and a Coptic translation has survived in two papyrus copies, one published by C. Schmidt in 1908 and the other by F. Rösch in 1910.[16][17]

The Namur Latin translation reveals its early date in several ways. Its early date is attested to by not being combined with the pseudepigraphic later Second Epistle of Clement, as all the other translations are found, and by showing no knowledge of the church terminology that became current later—for example, translating Greek presbyteroi as seniores rather than transliterating to presbyteri.

See also

References

  1. ↑ Jurgens, W A, ed. (1970), The Faith of the Early Fathers: A Source-book of Theological and Historical Passages from the Christian Writings of the Pre-Nicene and Nicene Eras, Liturgical Press, p. 6, ISBN 978-0-8146-0432-8, retrieved 18 April 2013
  2. 1 2 3 4 "Clement of Rome, St." Cross, F. L. (ed.), The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church, (New York: Oxford University Press, 2005).
  3. ↑ Holmes, Michael (1 November 2007), Apostolic Fathers, The: Greek Texts and English Translations, Baker Academic, p. 34, ISBN 978-0-8010-3468-8, retrieved 18 April 2013
  4. ↑ Holmes, Michael (1 November 2007), Apostolic Fathers, The: Greek Texts and English Translations, Baker Academic, p. 35, ISBN 978-0-8010-3468-8, retrieved 18 April 2013
  5. ↑ Herron, Thomas (2008). Clement and the Early Church of Rome: On the Dating of Clement’s First Epistle to the Corinthians. Steubenville, OH: Emmaus Road. p. 47. In the context of 1 Clement’s strategy to win over the Corinthians to a renewed sense of order in their community, any reference to a Temple which stood in ruins would simply make no sense . . . It is easier to believe that 1 Clement wrote while the Temple still stood, i.e. in circa A.D. 70.
  6. ↑ L.L. Welborn, "The preface to 1 Clement: the rhetorical situation and the traditional date," in Breytenbach and Welborn, p. 201
  7. ↑ Harris p. 363
  8. ↑ Edgar J. Goodspeed, "First Clement Called Forth by Hebrew" Journal of Biblical Literature 30.2 (1911:157–60).
  9. ↑ W.C. van Unnik, "Studies on the so-called First Epistle of Clement. The literary genre," in Cilliers Breytenbach and Laurence L. Welborn, Encounters with Hellenism: Studies on the First Letter of Clement, Leiden & Boston: Brill, 2004, p. 118. ISBN 9004125264.
  10. 1 2 Bruce M. Metzger, Canon of the New Testament (Oxford University Press) 1987:42–43.
  11. ↑ 1 Clement 56
  12. ↑ McDowell, Sean (2015). The Fate of the Apostles. London and New York: Routledge. pp. 55–114.
  13. ↑ Harris, Stephen L., Understanding the Bible. Palo Alto: Mayfield. 1985. p. 363
  14. ↑ Aland, Kurt; Aland, Barbara (1995). The Text of the New Testament: An Introduction to the Critical Editions and to the Theory and Practice of Modern Textual Criticism. Erroll F. Rhodes (trans.). Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company. pp. 107, 109. ISBN 978-0-8028-4098-1.
  15. ↑ Staniforth, Maxwell. Early Christian writings: the Apostolic Fathers. Harmondsworth, Penguin, 1968. p. 14. ISBN 0-14-044197-2.
  16. ↑ A second manuscript containing a Syriac version of 1 Clement is mentioned in Sailors, Timothy B. "Bryn Mawr Classical Review: Review of The Apostolic Fathers: Greek Texts and English Translations". Retrieved 13 January 2017.
  17. ↑ JB Lightfoot and JR Harmer, ed. (1891), The Apostolic Fathers: Revised Greek Texts with Introductions and English Translations, Baker Books, 1988 reprint, p. 4, retrieved 21 April 2016
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