Ælfric: The Nativity of John the Baptist

Ælfric: The Nativity of John the Baptist

Ælfric. (2024). The Nativity of John the Baptist in The Old English Catholic Homilies: The First Series (pp. 429-445). (R. M. Luizza, Trans.) Cambridge, MA: Dumbarton Oaks Medieval Library (Harvard University Press).

Note: Ælfric of Eynsham was an English abbot who lived circa AD 955 – circa AD 1010. These dates are shortly before the somewhat-arbitrary date we assign the Great Schism of 1054 and Ælfric himself is not considered a saint of the Orthodox Church (or for that matter of the Roman Catholic Church), so one ought not read him uncritically. Nevertheless, Ælfric’s stated goal is to “translate” the full tradition of the Fathers “for the edification… of simple people who know only this language [Old English],” which points to his chief value for us, which is the presentation of the Faith in the English context that many of us consider our own heritage.

The Didache

The Didache

The Teaching of the Lord to the Gentiles by the Twelve Apostles, or The Teaching of the (Twelve) Apostles, as it was known in ancient times, or simply The Didache (“The Teaching”), as it is usually known today, is one of the most fascinating yet perplexing documents to emerge from the early church. Although the title was known from references to it by ancient writers (some of whom apparently used it as scripture [E.g., Clement of Alexandria, Origen, and Didymus the Blind]), no copy was known to exist until 1873, when Philotheos Bryennios discovered a manuscript that contained, among other things, the full text of The Didache, which he published in 1883. Since then it has been the focus of scholarly attention to an extent quite out of proportion to its modest length. Yet for all that attention such basic information as who wrote it and where and when it was written remain as much a mystery as when it was first discovered.

Three sections are evident in this anonymous document: (a) 1.1-6.2, which offers teaching about the “Two Ways” of life and death; (b) 6.3-15.4, comprised of instructions dealing with church practice and order; and (c) 16.1-8, a brief apocalyptic section.

The Two Ways material appears to have been intended, in light of 7.1, as a summary of basic instruction about the Christian life to be taught to those who were preparing for baptism and church membership. The “way of life” (1.2-4.14), which opens with the love command and the Golden Rule, is comprised almost entirely of dos and don'ts, while the “way of death” (5.1-2) is a description of evil actions and persons.

The second part of the document consists of instructions about food (63), baptism (7.1-4), fasting (7.4-8.1), prayer (8.2-3), the Eucharist (9.1-10.7), and assorted practical issues related to various ministries and positions of leadership (11.1-15.4). In addition to providing the earliest evidence of a mode of baptism other than immersion, it records the oldest known Christian eucharistic prayers and a form of the Lord's Prayer quite similar to that found in the Gospel of Matthew. There is a concern to differentiate Christian practice from Jewish piety (cf. 8.1-2) and to prevent abuses of the church's hospitality (11.3-6).

The document closes with an apocalyptic section (perhaps incomplete) that has much in common with the so-called Synoptic Apocalypse found in Mark 13, Matthew 24-25, and Luke 24.

~excerpt from The Apostolic Fathers in English, 3rd edition. Edited by Michael W. Holmes.