The Didache (Introduction & Excerpts in Bettenson's The Early Christian Fathers)

Bettenson introduces the Didache on page 5.

The Didache was not re-discovered until 1875, when a Greek Patriarch found a manuscript from 1056 that contained copies of several ancient writings, including the Didache (also known as "The Teaching of the Apostles").

It was published in 1883 and caused a stir.

Why? "...it seemed likely to turn upside-down the received ideas of the early history of the ministry."

Reasons to believe it dates from very early church:

--it appears to be written in a time when itinerant prophets had not yet been displaced by a settled permanent ministry (p.6)
--episcopacy not yet universal form of church government
--"bishop" and "presbyter" still seem to mean the same thing or nearly
--"agape" meal still joined with Eucharist
--liturgy and theology still in early stages

Some scholars argued it had been written as early as 60 AD, or at least no later than 100 AD. Current scholarship places it more in the later second century.

Place of origin not certain, but probably Syria.

Apostles and prophets seem so prominent in the Didache that, when it was first published, the document lent a lot of support to the theory of the strength of early "charismatic ministry" in the church (God calling people directly and giving them special gifts). Harnack based his theory of the early ministry of the church on the basis of the Didache, arguing (if I'm reading this correctly) for a strong distinction between charismatic and administrative ministry. He saw preaching as the charismatic ministry (and "universal") and administrative ministry coming under bishops/presbyters/deacons at local level. Didache, in this view, is a document that shows the church making the transition from more itinerant, charismatic ministry to more local, established adminsitrative ministry.

Bettenson spends a good chunk of a paragraph explaining all that, and then seems to dismiss it as having no real warrant either in Scripture or in the Didache. He makes some good points, especially noting that the NT doesn't seem to make a distinction between "charismatic" and "ordained" minstries (and that in fact, in places like 2 Tim. 1:6, seems to indicate that ordination conveys charisma).

I find myself fairly confused by the end of Bettenson's summary regarding what, then, is the full significance/importance of the Didache. Clearly it has been influential as various scholars/theologians seek to put together a sense of the development of early ministry in the church, and how that ministry was ordered. But some of their more widespread conclusions haven't been wise. So what is the significance of the Didache for our understanding? Still trying to unpack that.

The actual excerpts from the Didache, provided in Bettenson, can be found on pages 50-53 of the reader, and seem pretty straightforward. There does seem to be some tension within its instructions regarding how to treat traveling/itinerant prophets (and how to ascertain true from false prophets) which Guy (I think) treats in a more in-depth way. I'll try to get to that reading next.