The Apostolic Fathers
Thomas Allen
[Reference Note: As this article relies primarily on First Three Centuries by Alvan Lamson, page numbers enclosed in parentheses are to Lamson’s book. References to other works are enclosed in parentheses with the work’s title or the author’s name listed in “References” at the end of this article.]
Be careful that you don’t let anyone rob you through his philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the elements of the world, and not after Christ. – Colossians 2:8The Trinity Doctrine developed over centuries. This article traces that development to the Nicene Creed, which was the first important component of the Trinity Doctrine, from the Apostolic Fathers through the Arian controversy.
In this article, “Trinity Doctrine” means the Trinity Doctrine as expressed in the Athanasian Creed. “Doctrine of the Trinity” means the orthodox concept of or teaching about the Trinity at that time.
Being simple and apparently ignorant people, the Apostolic Fathers, Christian writers of the first and early second centuries, believed what the Bible said about the Father and the Son. They had no indication that it contained the Trinity Doctrine, especially like the one of today.
From Justin Martyr and Philo, the philosophy of the Platonists was applied to the Scriptures. Applying Platonic philosophy to the Scriptures was the first major contribution of the Trinity Doctrine. By applying Platonic philosophy to the Scriptures, Justin discovered that “Logos” no longer meant the spoken word. Using metaphysics, he changed Logos to mean reason — God’s reason. This reason, Logos, became a second God, the pre-existing Son. Thus, the Logos-doctrine entered Christianity. However, the Son had not yet become eternal; he had a beginning. Nor had he become the equal of God the Father; he was still subordinate.
The Fathers between Justin and Clement of Alexander brought into Christianity the thought of a Trinity and advanced the notion of the eternal existence of the Logos, the Son.
Origen advanced the unity of the Father and the Son, i.e., the Son was in the Father instead of with the Father. Thus, the Father and the Son were becoming one. Also, he advanced the notion that the Son had both a divine and human nature, that is, Christ possessed a rational human soul, which had been denied since Justin developed the Logos-doctrine. Further, some interpret his works as hinting at the Son having existed from eternity. However, he maintained that the Father was superior to the pre-existing Son and that the Father and the Son were two different substances.
Between Origen and Arius, the unity of the Father and the Son was becoming more pronounced, although the Son remained distinct from and subordinate to the Father.
When Alexander, the Bishop of Alexandria, began teaching more oneness of the Father and Son, Arius accused him of Sabellianism — thus, began the Arian controversy. Although Arius thought that he was defending the doctrine of the Trinity as it existed then, Alexander and others disagreed. Arius had stripped the Trinity of its Platonic metaphysics. The Arian controversy peaked with the Council of Nicaea, which issued the Nicene Creed. Among other things, the creed declared the Father and the Son to be one substance.
Some Fathers discussed below were sainted; some were condemned as heretics. By the standard of the Trinity Doctrine, all were heretics with the possible exception of Dionysius of Rome and Alexander of Alexandria. Strictly speaking, nearly all of them were also unitarians.
Nearly all, if not all, the ante-Nicene Fathers were Early Unitarians. Early Unitarians were strict monotheists. They believed that there is but one God who is infinite, eternal, omnipresent, omnipotent, and omniscient — that is the Father. They believed that the Son is not eternal and, therefore, has a beginning and is subordinate to the Father. However, some considered the Son to be of the same substance or essence as the Father; that is, they believed in a common nature, but not numerical unity. Still, others considered him to be of a different substance or essence. In any event, nearly all believed that the Father and Son are two distinct and independent beings. Moreover, they disagreed whether the son is pre-existing. Also, if he became deified, they disagreed about when he became deified: before creation, at conception, with his baptism, or at his resurrection. Many of these Early Unitarians considered the Logos to be God’s reason that became the Son or incarnated in the Son. Thus, the Son was an attribute of God — His reason. None believed that the Holy Spirit is a person in the modern Trinitarian sense; most thought of it as an attribute of God. (For arguments why anyone who does not accept the Trinity Doctrine is not a Trinitarian, but is a Unitarian, see Alford.) Until the about 200 years ago, most unitarians believed in a Trinity of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, but it was not the Trinity of the Trinity Doctrine of three co-equal, co-eternal Gods being one God — neither the Son nor the Holy Spirit were Deities. Lacking such belief, they are disqualified from being Trinitarians. Early Unitarians should not be confused with Modern Unitarians or Modern Unitarianism (also known as Universal Unitarianism and Rational Unitarianism) as represented by the Unitarian Universal Association. Modern Unitarianism came into being about 200 years ago. Initially, Modern Unitarians began acting like Montanists — receiving divine revelations that superseded the Scriptures. Soon they no longer needed the Scriptures. Before long they became like Jewish rabbis with God conferring with them. Now they no longer recognize God because they have traded theology for ideology. Modern Unitarians are much closer to the liberal Protestants and modernist Catholics than any of them are to most of the ante-Nicene Fathers. Like many liberal and modernist clergy and members of other denominations, Modern Unitarians are mostly ideologues, scientismists, secular humanists, agnostics, and naturalists. (Modern Unitarians should not be confused with today’s traditional Unitarians, who agree with various brands of orthodoxy on most theological issues except the Trinity Doctrine and the natural immortality of the soul. Traditional Unitarians adhere closely to the Christology of Clement of Rome and Polycarp.)
A heretic is anyone who disagrees with the doctrine of another that is esteemed so highly that it has become dogma — especially if the other is much more powerful than the dissenter. Today, the greatest heresy in Christendom is Protestantism — at least from the Catholic perspective. Conversely, for many Protestants, the greatest heresy is Catholicism — even to the point of the Catholic Church or the Pope being the anti-Christ of Revelation. Moreover, what is orthodoxy in one era can be heresy in another. (For example, in the early decades of the church, people who taught that man’s soul is innately immortal were heretics. Today, people who teach that man’s soul is not innately immortal are heretics.)
The Apostolic Fathers
Clement of Rome (d. 99) was a disciple of Peter and later Bishop of Rome (88-99) and is considered the first Apostolic Father. He was the author of two letters: the First Epistle of Clement and the Second Epistle of Clement, which many consider spurious. One ancient collection of canonical Scriptures included his First Epistle.
According to Clement, prayer was to be addressed only to God the Father and not to Christ, the Son. “God ‘sends;’ Jesus is ‘sent.’ ‘The Apostles preached to us from our Lord Jesus Christ; Jesus Christ from God. Christ therefore was sent from God, the Apostles from Christ; both being fitly done according to the will of God” (p. 5). Clement declared, “‘God has made our Lord Jesus Christ the first-fruits, raising him from the dead’” (p. 5). Thus, the Father made or created the son; therefore, the Son was not eternal as the Trinity Doctrine proclaims. Clement called Christ the “‘sceptre of the majesty of God,’ language which implies instrumentality, not identity or equality of person. The term God is not once applied to him” (p. 6). Clement clearly distinguished Christ from the one and only God (the Father). He writes of the Father as “‘the true and only God’ ‘the great Artificer and Sovereign Ruler of all’ [‘]the All-seeing God and Ruler of Spirits, and Lord of all flesh, who chose our Lord Jesus Christ’” (p. 6). No where in his epistle did Clement teach the supreme divinity of Christ. He taught that Christ was subordinate to the Father and was not his equal as the Trinity Doctrine declares. In summary, Clement declared that God is “the fountain of all power and blessing, and Jesus Christ as his Son, sent by Him to be the Saviour of men. The Father is above all; His glory and majesty are underived; the Son derives from Him his power and dignity, his offices and dominion” (p. 9).
Hermas (wrote 115 – 140) wrote the Shepherd of Hermas, which was written possibly in the late first century, but more likely in the early to mid second century and which some Apostolic Fathers considered canonical scripture. He is believed to have been the brother Pius, Bishop of Rome. He wrote three books that made up the Shepherd of Hermas: Visions, Commands, and Similitudes.
According to Hermas, God (the Father) “is the Supreme and Infinite One, the sole independent Creator and Governor of the universe, who alone is Eternal” (p. 13). Thus, the Son was not an eternal being. Moreover, Hermas gave the highest titles and epithets to God and never to the Son. The Son was subject to and received all from the father. Therefore, he was subordinate to God the Father and was not his equal. God created the Holy Spirit. Thus, the Holy Spirit was not eternal, but was created. Some critics identify “Holy Spirit” as Christ in the Shepherd of Hermas. If true, then Christ, the Son, is created and not eternal. However, Hermas did believe in the pre-existence of the Son.
Polycarp (69 – 155), Bishop of Smyrna, was the author of the Epistle of Polycarp to the Philippians, which was probably written around 110 – 140. The Fathers believed that Polycarp was a disciple of the Apostle John.
In his epistle, Polycarp proclaimed “the supremacy of the Father, and the subordination of the Son” (p. 20). He wrote, “‘Him who raised up our Lord Jesus Christ from the dead, and gave him glory and a throne at His right hand; to whom all things in heaven and on earth are made subject, whom every living creature shall worship’ not, however, as supreme” (p. 20). To Polycarp, Christ is the high priest “but not God himself” (p. 21). He did not conceive of “Jesus Christ as equal with God, or as one with Him, except in will and purpose. . . . The Father is separated from the Son by a broad and distinct line; one as supreme, the other as subordinate; one as giving, the other as receiving; the Father granting to the Son a ‘throne at His right hand’” (p. 21). Polycarp had “no metaphysics, no confusion or obscurity, [and] no hair splitting distinctions” (p. 21).
Barnabas (d. 131) may have been the Barnabas who was a companion of Paul, but most critics reject this Barnabas as the author of the Epistle of Barnabas. Many Fathers considered this epistle to be canonical. Most likely, this epistle was written about the middle of the second century. However, some believe that it was written in the latter part of the first century or the first quarter of the second century.
Barnabas believed in the pre-existence of the Son, who was “‘God’s instrument in the creation’” (p. 23). However, contrary to the Trinity Doctrine, Barnabas maintained the supremacy of the Father throughout his epistle. He avoided confounding the Son with the Father and never made the Son the equal of the Father. His epistle is void of the Logos-doctrine.
None of the writings of the Apostolic Fathers, of whom the above four are considered, contained the Logos-doctrine. “The absence of all traces of the [Logos-]doctrine in these writings can be explained only on the supposition that the authors ‘did not,’ in the words of Souverain, ‘find it in the Christian religion, nor in the Jewish; and, not having studied in the school of Plato, they could not import it from that school into the Church of Christ.’”(pp. 24-25). For the Apostolic Fathers, “‘[e]very such application of the idea of the Logos was foreign to their minds’” (p. 25). Thus, the Logos-doctrine grew out of Greek speculation and metaphysics, and not out of the Scriptures. Therefore, the foundation of the Trinity Doctrine is Greek speculation and metaphysics — primarily from Plato.
References
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Copyright © 2017 by Thomas Coley Allen.
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