In short, it seems to me that 1 Clement relies far more heavily on Roman and Greek cultural elements. He relies heavily on the Roman military as a model for church authority structure – but he is a “wanna-be”, he does not seem to have actual authority. His concept of “grace” as I’ve written, is borrowed more heavily from the Hellenistic understanding than the New Testament understanding. And in an effort to bring in elements from Judaism, he contradicts the writer of Hebrews.
* * *
I’ve read through the comments here, especially respecting “evidence” in the second and third centuries. I’d like to share some of what I’ve found about “Clement of Rome”, who probably stood at the beginning of the second century (and 30-40 years after the deaths of Peter and Paul).
Starting off here, I feel safe to say that while 1 Clement quotes extensively from the Septuagint (25% of the letter is comprised of OT citations), he is far more heavily influenced by the Hellenistic and Roman cultures, than he was by the New Testament (and by extension, the Apostles).
As a supposed “pope”, he carries quite a bit of weight for Roman Catholics. In his 2001 Catechism “The Catholic Way,” Bishop Donald Wuerl referred to him as “Pope St. Clement of Rome” (pg. 22). Adrian Fortescue, in “The Early Papacy,” said that “Clement [as a “pope”], in his letter, commands the Corinthians to return to the obedience of their lawful hierarchy. He does not advise; he commands. He commands with an authority, one would almost say with an arbitrary tone, that has not been exceeded by any modern pope” (pg. 66). In fact, the Denzinger work, “The Sources of Catholic Dogma” (1957), leading off the section “Documents of the Roman Pontiffs and of the Councils,” begins with the following selections from the letter 1 Clement:
41 (1) BECAUSE of the sudden calamities that have followed one another in turn and because of the adverse circumstances which have befallen us, we think, brethren, that we have returned too late to those matters which are being inquired into among you, beloved, and to the impious and detestable sedition . . . which a few rash and presumptuous men have aroused to such a degree of insolence that your honorable and illustrious name . . . is very much reviled. . . . In order to remind you of your duty, we write. . . . (57) You, therefore, who have laid the foundations of this insurrection, be subject in obedience to the priests and receive correction unto repentance. . . . (59) But if some will not submit to them, let them learn what He [Christ] has spoken through us, that they will involve themselves in great sin and danger; we, however, shall be innocent of this transgression. . . . (63) Indeed you will give joy and gladness to us, if having become obedient to what we have written through the Holy Spirit, you will cut out the unlawful application of your zeal according to the exhortation which we have made in this epistle concerning peace and union.
It’s almost as if Clement, as an early pope, had the same “power to command” as did Pius IX or XII. It would be hard to exaggerate the importance that Roman Catholics attribute to “Clement of Rome.” Yet, the views expressed above are superficial and they exhibit a measure of “wishful thinking.” In recent years, we have learned a few things about him that do not cohere at all with the figure that Roman Catholicism has described.
The Style is not one of “command”, but of “persuasion”
Rather than being a letter that “commands,” Michael Holmes, in his “The Apostolic Fathers” (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2007), notes that:
in 58.2 the readers are asked to “accept our advice” (Greek: symboule), indicating that the document was intended as a “symbouleutic” (or “deliberative”) letter, a category widely discussed by ancient rhetoricians and to which 1 Clement closely conforms (36).
Caragounis, in the Donfried & Richardson volume “Judaism and Christianity in First-Century Rome”, (notes that “two passages give a characterization of this letter: in 58:2 the author describes it as a symboule, while in 63.2 he describes it as enteudzis peri eirenes kai homonoias (“an appeal for peace and harmony”).”
What’s significant about the form of the letter is that it “is frequently used in the technical sense of a petition to the king” (268). Further along, in comparing 1 Clement to Paul’s letter to the Romans, Caragounis says:
there is thus an immense difference between Paul and the author of 1 Clementin the way they envisage their respective relationships to the churches they address. Paul writes in his own name and with the authority of an apostle. The author of 1 Clement writes in the name of the Roman church. In fact, the unpretentious designation of “The church of God which sojourns in Rome” writing to “The church of God which sojourns in Corinth” indicates the total equality between the two churches. This is in line with the constant use of the first person plural and the extreme tact the author exhibits in the earlier part of the letter to gradually assume a more authoritarian tone (271).
The authoritarian tone spoken of here, is not attributable to any actual authority that the Roman church may have with respect to the Corinthian church. Rather, this tone is due largely to “being the church of the capital”. 1 Clement recognized that it had “no formal right to demand” anything. And yet “the Roman church patterned its treatment of other churches on the model of the Roman empire” (277). Its method is not one of genuine authority. It is rather using tools of persuasion. Caragounis says: whatever position Clement occupies, whether a kind of “monarchical bishop” or not, his only function is as “the mouthpiece” of the church of Rome.
Caragounis concludes:
If Paul had counseled “submission” to the authorities on account of conscience (Romans 13:1-7), 1 Clement shows a harmonious relationship to the Roman imperium: Thus in 37:1 “the soldiers under our generals” are an example of obedience and order to be emulated by the Christians, while in the liturgical prayer God’s help is petitioned in order to “do the things that are good and pleasing before . . . our rulers” (60.2), “that we may be obedient . . . to our rulers and governers on earth” (60.4). It is thus obvious that for 1 Clement the glory, honor, and dominion of the empire are God-given (61.1-2) (Caragounis, “The Development of the Roman Church between Romans and 1 Clement,” in “Judaism and Christianity in First-Century Rome,” Karl P. Donfried and Peter Richardson, Eds., Grand Rapids, MI and Cambridge, U.K.: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, ©1998, pgs 274-277)..
Where Clement gets his sense of order
John Feullenbach, S.V.D., whose PhD dissertation on 1 Clement provided an encyclopedic overview of all the work on 1 Clement up to that date (1980), says that among Roman Catholic writers:
The development of office which is found in 1 Clement, in comparison to the variety [of offices] presented in the New Testament, is regarded as legitimate and apostolic …
It should be noted that, in speaking of “development”, a difference is being traced between “elders, overseers and deacons” as used in the New Testament” and how the same words are being used in 1 Clement. I’ve called it a bait and switch on “orders”. Fuellenbach says:
It is generally admitted that Clement’s office theory is not entirely based on apostolic tradition, but reveals elements taken from other sources…. The majority looks at them as a means of expression, as analogies, or as adaptations to the Hellenistic and Roman culture without questioning the apostolic foundation of the theory (145).
What are those other sources? Consider what has been said of the city of Rome, and the character of the empire in the first century:
Augustus Caesar as Pontifex Maximus
the Roman mindset
Roman Catholicism depends on the notion that the papacy was instituted by Christ. The 2006 “Compendium of the Catechism of the Catholic Church”, sponsored by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops and approved by Pope Benedict XVI himself, says:
182. What is the mission of the Pope?
The Pope, Bishop of Rome and the Successor of Saint Peter, is the perpetual, visible source and foundation of the unity of the Church. He is the vicar of Christ, the head of the College of Bishops and pastor of the universal Church over which he has by divine institution full, supreme, immediate, and universal power.
This accurately reflects the power given to Augustus Caesar, as described by Everett Ferguson “Backgrounds of Early Christianity,” Third Edition (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, © 1987, 1993, 2003, pgs 26-30):
in 23 B.C. Augustus was allowed to have proconsular power over the provinces without living there and without the title of proconsul. This was known as the imperium maius of the provincial army. Further, he received the right of interference in any province.
There is no notion of anything like the imperium maius in the New Testament, but look at 1 Clement:
So let us serve as soldiers, brothers, with all seriousness under his faultless orders. Let us consider the soldiers who serve under our commanders—how precisely, how readily, how obediently they execute orders. Not all are prefects or tribunes or centurions or captains of fifty and so forth, but each in his own rank executes the orders given by the emperor and the commanders…. (37:1-3)
Consider also:
For to the high priest the proper services have been given, and to the priests the proper office has been assigned, an upon the Levites the proper ministries have been imposed. The layman is bound by the layman’s rules. Let each of you, brother, give thanks to God with your own group, maintaining a good conscience, not overstepping the designated rule of his ministry, but acting with reverence. (40.5-41.1)
But consider Paul: There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus (Gal 3:28). And again, Peter:
you [laymen] yourselves like living stones are being built up as a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God's people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy. (1 Peter 2:5, 9-10)
Misunderstanding Pauline “Grace”
The word χάρις, or charis, or “grace”, has a very long history and a number of different shades of meaning. In T.F. Torrance’s work, “The Doctrine of Grace in the Apostolic Fathers”, Torrance is talking about is the usage of the word “grace” in 1 Clement. In his discussion, he distinguishes between two veins of usage:
1. χάρις in Classical and Hellenistic Greek usage, including Philo.
2. χάρις in Old Testament and New Testament usage.
Summarizing these, the first, Hellenistic usage (including Hellenistic usage and Philo) shows broadly how the concept was used in Greek thought. Philo of Alexandria was a Jewish philosopher, a contemporary of Christ’s, with a wide acquaintance with the works of Greek philosophy. Josephus (“Antiquities of the Jews”, xviii.8, § 1), called him “a man eminent on all accounts” and “one not unskillful in philosophy”. Just here, briefly, I’ll note that among other things, “grace” may be seen as a form of payment, and in Philo the concept even reaches to the point that (in Torrance’s words), “Perfectly sinless must be the man who wants to find grace with God”. TDNT echoes this notion: “Philo can say that χάρις is only for the righteous … One must be worthy of it, otherwise it vanishes”.
On the contrary, in the Biblical conception, both Old and New Testaments, the concept of grace involves “unsolicited and unaccountable love”. “God’s ‘lovingkindness’ is the fundamental relationship upon which the whole structure of Israelite society rested. Includes [the concepts of] mercy and forgiveness, but the true significance of the hesed of God, is that it is everlasting, determined, unshakeable”. “Though the mountains depart and the hills remove, God’s mercy remains true”. In the New Testament, grace is purely God’s initiative; it is God’s initiative in Christ; “in Christ the divine will has been perfectly fulfilled on our behalf”; it completely takes man by surprise (that is, no effort on man’s part is required to earn this initiative), and it is “the primary and constitutive act in which out of free love God has intervened to set our life on a wholly new basis”.
So, these are the two different definitions of grace: in the first, one must be deemed worthy of it before one receives it, and in some cases, one must be perfect before one can receive it; in the second, it is completely God’s initiative in Christ to give it freely, by surprise, and permanent.
Consider Clement’s introduction: “May grace and peace from almighty God through Jesus Christ be yours in abundance” The word is πληθυνθεἰη. Torrance notes, “To Clement’s Greek mind this word might imply the idea that one can have more or less of grace which, of course, on a Pauline doctrine, is impossible. One thinks here of the relation between χάρις and πλήρωμα in Gnostic literature.”
Consider Clement 7:4, 5, and 8:1 together:
Let us fix our eyes on the blood of Christ and understand how precious it is to his Father, because, being poured out for our salvation, it won for the whole world the grace of repentence. Let us review all the generations in turn, and learn that from generation to generation the Master has given an opportunity for repentance to those who desire to turn to him. … the ministers of the grace of God spoke about repentance through the Holy Spirit.
Contradicts Hebrews and 1 Peter understanding of “who” the Church is
Consider the following:
When he said above, “You have neither desired nor taken pleasure in sacrifices and offerings and burnt offerings and sin offerings” (these are offered according to the law), then he added, “Behold, I have come to do your will.” He does away with the [sacrifices and offerings and burnt offerings and sin offerings] in order to establish the second [Christ having come to do His will]. And by that will [and Christ having come to do His will] we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.
And every priest stands daily at his service [in the temple], offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. But when Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God, waiting from that time until his enemies should be made a footstool for his feet. For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified. (Hebrews 10:8-12).
But consider now Clement:
We ought to do, in order, everything that the Master commanded us to perform at the appointed times. Now he commanded the offerings and services to be performed diligently, and not to be done carelessly or in disorder, but at designated times and occasions. Both where and by whom he wants them to be performed, he himself has determined by his supreme will, so that all things, being done devoutly according to his good pleasure, may be acceptable to his will. Those, therefore, who make their offerings at the appointed times are acceptable and blessed, for those who follow the instructions of the Master cannot go wrong. For to the high priest the proper services have been given, and to the priests the proper office has been assigned, and upon the Levites the proper ministries have been imposed. The layman is bound by the layman’s rules. (1 Clement 40, Holmes translation).
Keep in mind that this is addressed to “the church of God that sojourns in Corinth, to those who are called and sanctified by the will of God through our Lord Jesus Christ”.
Several differences appear here. Compare Hebrews and Clement. Hebrews notes that, in the old times, “sacrifices and offerings and burnt offerings and sin offerings” do not please the Lord. [For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins, vs 4]. On the other hand, Clement wants “the offerings and services to be performed diligently” “for those who follow the instructions of the Master cannot go wrong”.
Also, compare Peter and Clement: Peter says, “you yourselves like living stones are being built up as a spiritual house”. On the other hand, Clement says “the layman is bound by the layman’s rules”.
I’ve written much more about Clement having adopted the Hellenistic concept of “grace” in the Joshua Lim thread at Called to Communion. Bryan has disagreed with it because the New Testament concept of “grace” in the New Testament, given by Torrance and TDNT, “begs the question” by not permitting “Tradition” to shape the definition.
I’ve posted a lot of information here, but the differences between 1 Clement (“Pope St. Clement”) and the New Testament are striking in many ways – and those differences can be traced to the Greek (pagan) and Roman culture of the day. This is not a “slam dunk”, but it is an honest start to look at the history of where “Roman” Catholicism comes from.
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