Rhetoricians

And because he was God and is God, little in body and great in soul,

despised on earth and glorified in the heavens, scorned by men and magnified by the Father,

this is the Man who was sent by the Father to the world because he is God,

both Man upon earth and God in heaven, and he is God over all creation.

-          Melito of Sardis

A Patristic Treasury: Early Church Wisdom for Today, edited by James R. Payton, Jr.

The Trinity was not invented by Constantine.  While, obviously, there was debate on the idea that Jesus is also God both before and after Nicea, it isn’t like the Trinity was something born by fiat.

God

We know and cherish that being as God by whose Word all things were made and by whose Spirit all things are held in being.

-          Athenagoras

We acknowledge God, uncreated, eternal, invisible, impassable, incomprehensible, illimitable…by whom the universe has been created through His Word, set in order, and kept in being.

-          Athenagoras

I remember several years ago coming across this idea: that God sustained, not merely created.  If God was to turn His face from His creation, His creation would cease to exist.  There is no possibility of a clockmaker God.  Either HE IS (“I AM”) or we are the result of random atom smashing.

The appearance of God is ineffable and indescribable, and cannot be seen by the eyes of the flesh. 

-          Theophilus of Antioch

Creation

With regard to this six days’ work [of Creation], no one can give a worthy explanation and description of all its parts, even if that person had ten thousand tongues and ten thousand mouths and lived ten thousand years!

-          Theophilus of Antioch

As a thought experiment, I guess the debates about Creation – and, say, the first eleven chapters of Genesis – are OK.  But I don’t find any one interpretation as a hill worth dying on.

Even with all of our “modern” science, physics, math, etc., are we capable of understanding a step-by-step explanation of creation – whether one believes in a creating God or otherwise?  I imagine the most gifted physicists, biologists, chemists, engineers, etc., sitting and listening to this creation lecture; they would not understand it any better than would a two-year-old.

God told us the story in these first eleven chapters in a manner that would be meaningful to us.  Let’s just try to understand the meaning and not worry about proving the science or the history.

Ask what great thing is it if God made the world out of existent material? … But the power of God is manifested in this, that out of things that are not He makes whatever He pleases….

-          Theophilus of Antioch

Like I said, even if He explained it to us, step-by-step, would we understand it?

God did not create human beings for no purpose, for He is wise, and no work of wisdom is in vain; nor did He make them because He needed them, for He needs nothing.  To a Being who needs absolutely nothing, none of His creatures can offer anything He needs.

-          Athenagoras

If this isn’t humbling, I don’t know what is (well, the crucifixion also….)?

For God had made all things by His Word, and had reckoned them all mere by products of it; but He reckoned the creation of humanity the only work worthy of His own hands.

-          Theophilus of Antioch

Very often in these early Patristics, Jesus is referred to as “His Word,” “God’s Word,” or “the Word.”  When I read it this way, it opens a new understanding of the Trinity for me.  However, as I have mentioned before, I don’t want to write more on this: speaking wrongly about the Trinity and God is a risk I am not prepared to take.

Christ

For the model indeed existed, but then reality appeared.

For instead of the lamb there was a Son, and instead of a sheep a Man;

and in the Man Christ who has comprised all things.

-          Melito of Sardis

Teachers

I did not enjoy those who have a great deal to say, but those who teach the truth.

-          Papias

The Faithful

Among us you will find uneducated persons, artisans, and old women, who, if they are unable in words to prove the benefit of our doctrine, yet by their deeds exhibit the benefit arising from their persuasion of its truth: they do not rehearse speeches, but exhibit good works.

-          Athenagoras

For those of you who attend church regularly, you know such people.  They serve, they do.  They may not be able to discuss the finer points of any doctrine, but they understand Christian love.

God is seen by those who are enabled to see Him when they have the eyes of their soul opened…

-          Theophilus of Antioch

God makes the first step.  Always.

The Jerusalem below was precious, but it is worthless now because of the Jerusalem above.

The narrow inheritance was precious, but it is worthless now because of the widespread bounty.

-          Melito of Sardis

Sin

The tree of knowledge itself was good, and its fruit was good.  It was not the tree, as some think, but the disobedience, which had death in it.

-          Theophilus of Antioch

I recall coming across the idea that God intended that man would eventually be allowed to eat of this tree; man was just not mature enough yet to do so.  Or maybe first God wanted to see if man could be obedient before trusting man with more.  Or both.

In every soul sin made a mark, and those in whom he made it were bound to die.  So all flesh began to fall under sin, and every body under death, and every soul was driven out of its fleshly dwelling.

-          Melito of Sardis

We are all fallen.

Iniquities blind you in darkness, so that you cannot see God.

-          Theophilus of Antioch

Darkness: an absence of light.  Jesus is the light.

The Resurrection of the Dead

It is impossible for God not to know the nature of the bodies destined to rise, in their every part and particle….

-          Athenagoras

The completion of each individual body shows that His power is sufficient for the resurrection of these bodies as well.

-          Athenagoras

As God created us once from dust, He certainly could do so again.

The Church is Israel

The law was fulfilled when the gospel was elucidated,

And the people [of Israel] was made void when the church arose,

And the model was abolished when the Lord was revealed,

And today, things once precious have become worthless,

Since the really precious things have been revealed.

-          Melito of Sardis

To my understanding, the early Church – and the Church for many centuries thereafter – saw the relationship of God, Israel, and the Church just this way.  This view really only seemed to change, and this primarily in American evangelical circles, in the last one-hundred-plus years.

Biographies / Sources

Papias (c. 70 – c. 155) served as bishop of Hierapolis in Asia Minor.  He collected whatever personal recollections from anyone who had directly heard either the Lord Jesus Christ or any of His disciples.  These were published in a five-volume set, which, unfortunately, has not survived other than in fragments quoted by others.

Athenagoras lived in the latter half of the second century; beyond this, little is known of his life.  While only one ancient author mentions him, he did leave two striking apologies, demonstrating a significant rhetorical facility to capably defend Christianity.

Theophilus (? – 183) served as the sixth bishop of Antioch.  He was educated in the typical Hellenistic mode, knew literature and philosophy, and was well trained in rhetoric.

Melito (? – 190) served as the bishop of Sardis.  He wrote some apologetics, though none survive.  He was well-versed in the Old Testament, and understood it as predicting and culminating in Christ.