Old Fogies, Definitions, and Game Plan

Ok, so the next Apostolic Father we're going to tackle is Clement of Rome, but before we get any further we need to cover some basic vocabulary.

Apostolic Father-- Those men who had direct contact with the Apostles and/or Jesus. We're talking about the 1st, 2nd, and a lil of the 3rd generation Christians. Most of these date around the late first, early second century. This is before Constantine, and back in the good ole days with lions and tigers and,.. coloseums.

Church Father-- Those men who had contact with the Apostolic Fathers and on into the fifth century. These are the great theologians and old-time C.S. Lewis's who developed major Christian beliefs and theologies. Commonly called Doctors of the Church by Catholics.

Common List of Apostolic Fathers (the ones I am studying) as taken from http://www.theopedia.com/Apostolic_Fathers

-Clement of Rome, the third successor to Peter as Bishop of Rome, "had seen the blessed Apostles (Peter and Paul) and had been conversant with them" (Irenaeus, Adversus Haereses, III, iii, 3).

-Ignatius of Antioch was the second successor of Peter in the See of Antioch (Eusebius, Hist. Eccl., III, 36) and during his life in the center of Christian activity he may have met with others of the Apostolic band. An accepted tradition, substantiated by the similarity of Ignatius's thought with the ideas of the Johannine writings, declares that he was a disciple of the Apostle John.

-Polycarp was "instructed by Apostles" (Irenaeus, op. cit., III, iii, 4) and had been a disciple of John (Eusebius, op. cit., III, 36; V, 20) whose contemporary he was for nearly twenty years. He later trained Irenaeus as a disciple, thus giving Irenaeus' teachings great reliability and authority.

-The Didache, also known as The Teaching of the Lord to the Gentiles by the Twelve Apostles, or The Teaching of the (Twelve) Apostles is basically a handbook or manual of Christian ethical instruction and church order (Holmes, Dictionary of the Later New Testament & Its Developments, p. 301).

-The Epistle of Barnabas is an early second century document concerned with showing that Christians are the true heirs of God's covenant. Its author remains anonymous.

-The Shepherd of Hermas was a popular document in the second and third centuries. It's significance rests in that it sheds light on the Christian situation at Rome in the mid-second century. The author(s) is unknown.

List of Writings: (red are ones I have read, blue are ones I plan on reading)

-The Epistle to Diognetus (this one is hard to date and might also be of a later date)

-The First Epistle of Clement

-The Second Epistle of Clement (not actually written by Clement, but still a very early writing)

-The Didache

-The Epistle of Barnabas

-Seven short Epistles of Ignatius (the longer forms of these Epistles, and those beyond the seven, are widely considered later emendations and forgeries)

-The Epistle of Polycarp -- reading this one right now!!

-The Epistle about Polycarp's Martyrdom

-The Shepard of Hermas

-The fragments from the writings of Papias, which have survived as quotations by later writers

-One short fragment from a writing by Quadratus of Athens