The Holy Spirit in the Apostolic Fathers -- By: W. Harold Mare

Journal: Grace Journal
Volume: GJ 13:2 (Spring 1972)
Article: The Holy Spirit in the Apostolic Fathers
Author: W. Harold Mare


The Holy Spirit in the Apostolic Fathers

W. Harold Mare

Professor of New Testament Language and Literature
Covenant Theological Seminary

The writings from the sub-Apostolic Church in the period just subsequent to the time of the New Testament, are important in enabling us to compare doctrines continued by the tradition of the church in the light of the Biblical teaching of the canonical Old and New Testaments. An important subject for comparison is the Holy Spirit as He is presented in the Apostolic Fathers. One recent author has commented in connection with one of the earliest Apostolic Fathers, Clement of Rome, in the First Epistle to the Corinthians that there are just passing references to the Holy Spirit and that “the doctrine of the Spirit is only inchoate” in this epistle just mentioned.1

Such a statement raises for us several questions regarding the doctrine of the Spirit not only as they might relate to 1 Clement but also to all of the writings of the Apostolic Fathers. Is it true that references in 1 Clement to the Holy Spirit are referred to only in “passing,” and are the references actually few and far between in the Apostolic Fathers as a whole? Is the terminology in reference to the Holy Spirit in the Apostolic Fathers similar to that of the Old and New Testaments, or both? Is the teaching about the Spirit in 1 Clement and elsewhere in the Fathers2 only inchoate and actually inconsequential, or do the doctrinal concepts suggested correspond to many of those set forth in both of the Testaments? What divergences, if any, from the Biblical doctrine of the Holy Spirit can be detected in the Fathers?

In this study of the Holy Spirit in the Apostolic Fathers the following works have been examined:3 The First Epistle of Clement to the Corinthians (dated between 75 and 110 A.D.); 2 Clement to the Corinthians4 (± 150 A.D.); The Epistles of Ignatius (98–117 A.D.); The Epistle of Polycarp to the Philippians (c. 110–115 A.D.); The Didache (2nd century A.D., possibly early 2nd century); The Epistle of Barnabas (the end of the 1st century or beginning of the second, A.D.); The Shepherd of Hermas (c. 120–150 A.D.); The Martyrdom of Polycarp (c. 156 A.D.); and The Epistle to Diognetus (of uncertain date, but possibly 2nd or 3rd century, A.D.).

Evaluation of the Number of References to the Holy Spirit in the Apostolic Fathers

In comparison with over 200 references to the Spirit in the New Testament5 the Fathers h...

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