"Didache" As A Practical Enchiridion For Early Church Plants -- By: Michael J. Svigel

Journal: Bibliotheca Sacra
Volume: BSAC 174:693 (Jan 2017)
Article: "Didache" As A Practical Enchiridion For Early Church Plants
Author: Michael J. Svigel


Didache As A Practical Enchiridion For Early Church Plants

Michael J. Svigel

Michael J. Svigel is Chair and Professor of Theological Studies, Dallas Theological Seminary, Dallas, Texas.

Abstract

Since its rediscovery in the nineteenth century, scholars have suggested a number of explanations for the Didache’s date, genre(s), and original purpose(s). While scholarship is increasingly moving toward a first-century date for the Didache, no consensus has developed on how it functioned in its first-century ministry context. This article argues that the Didache functioned as a sort of “do-it-yourself” manual—a practical handbook for early church plants resulting from Antioch’s missionary efforts. Thus, the original end-users of the Didache were newly appointed leaders in newly established churches, making the Didache a vital background source for New Testament studies.

Years ago, as my father and I browsed the offerings of a rural flea market, we came upon a gadget-laden table featuring a metal object labeled with a handwritten note: “Tell me what it is, and it’s yours.” About the size of my forearm with a handle on one end and a blunt edge on the other, the mystery item looked like the mutant hybrid of a cattle prod and a handheld mixer. My father and I racked our brains trying to place the thing in some kind of practical context. What did it do? Was it a boring tool? Part of a larger machine? Was it used for cleaning? For measuring? For prying or poking? To this day we have no idea. Chances are the thing is still sitting on that seller’s table, rusting away, as hundreds of ignorant eyes and foolish fingers try in vain to place it in its original context.

So it is with the Didache. There it sits among the relics of early Christian literature, a seemingly misshapen, disproportionate pile of words—a patchwork of practical pieces with an original purpose just beyond our grasp.1 For about a century and a half scholars have tried to divine its original context—when it was written, where it was written, and for what reasons—in an attempt to determine what, precisely, it was trying to accomplish.2 If we could figure out how it was used, we would be able to identify it, and maybe, just maybe, we could give it a real name.

It is not as though scholarship has borne no fruit. It has. But it is mixed fruit. For example, with regard to date and provenance of the Didache, a current trend has been a willingness to date the present form of the work to the first century, perhaps as early ...

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