The Apostolic Fathers

1. 1. Today we have access to some the writings left behind by a number of those who gave leadership to the church in the first few generations following the death of the apostles. These leaders are sometimes called the “Apostolic Fathers.” A number of these Apostolic Fathers either knew the apostles personally, or knew people who had some direction connection to them.
   2. For example, today we still have some of the writings of an early church father named Irenaeus, who lived in the second century AD. Irenaeus wrote a very important work called Against Heresies. In that work, he refuted many of the false teachings that were trying to creep into the church in his day. Irenaeus as a youth had been influenced by the teaching of another bishop named Polycarp (69-155AD). Polycarp was a bishop in a town called Smyrna in Asia Minor (modern day Turkey). What is significant is that Polycarp had been a direct disciple of the apostle John. Another example is Papias (AD60-130). “Irenaeus stated that Papias had heard the apostle John preach and also knew Polycarp.”
   3. The Lexham Bible Dictionary:

“Apostolic Fathers A collection of documents from Christian authors who lived shortly after the apostles. Typically dated between ad 80–220. Works included are First and Second Clement, the Ignatian Epistles, Polycarp’s Letter to the Philippians, the Martyrdom of Polycarp, the Letter of Barnabas, the Didache, Diognetus, and the Shepherd of Hermas. Some editions also include collections of the fragments of Papias and fragments from the Apology of Quadratus…. 

Reception

All of the writings of the Apostolic Fathers were early on regarded by the church as authentic and important. A few even were included in early Bibles: 1 Clement, 2 Clement, Shepherd of Hermas, and Epistle of Barnabas. The remaining writings in the Apostolic Fathers collection never made a canon list, but they were regularly used in the early church period….

Relevance to Biblical Studies

 Most of the Apostolic Fathers knew the apostles or were connected to them in some way. Polycarp is traditionally seen as a disciple of the apostle John. Clement, likely the second, third, or fourth bishop of Rome, has implicit connections with Peter and Paul (Jerome, Lives of Illustrious Men, 15). Hermas possibly knew Clement and thus was affiliated with the church of Rome.”

1. 1. The Premillennialism of the Early Church

“Early millennial teaching was characterized by an apocalyptic emphasis. In this view the future kingdom of God would be established through a series of dramatic, unusual events.…The apocalyptic worldview was very influential among the Jews in the period between the OT and the NT. Consequently the audiences to which Jesus preached were influenced by it. The early Christians also embraced this outlook.

The book of Revelation, composed during a period of persecution in the first century, used the Jewish apocalyptic interpretation to explain the Christian era. Daniel’s Son of Man was presented as Christ, numerological formulas were restated, and the dualistic world of good and evil was provided with a new set of characters. Despite these changes the essential apocalyptic message remained as the book taught the living hope of the immediate direct intervention of God to reverse history and to overcome evil with good. Such an outlook brought great comfort to believers who suffered from persecution by the forces of Imperial Rome. Expressed in a form that has been called historic premillennialism, this hope seems to have been the prevailing eschatology during the first three centuries of the Christian era, and is found in the works of Papias, Irenaeus, Justin Martyr, Tertullian, Hippolytus, Methodius, Commodianus, and Lactantius.

Several forces worked to undermine the millennialism of the early church. One of these was the association of the teaching with a radical group, the Montanists, who placed a great stress on a new third age of the Spirit which they believed was coming among their number in Asia Minor. Another influence which encouraged a change of eschatological views was the emphasis of Origen upon the manifestation of the kingdom within the soul of the believer rather than in the world. This resulted in a shift of attention away from the historical toward the spiritual or metaphysical. A final factor that led to a new millennial interpretation was the conversion of the Emperor Constantine the Great and the adoption of Christianity as the favored Imperial religion.” (bolding mine)

1. 1. A significant number of these early Christian writers/leaders taught the concept of the “Millennial Sabbath,” as part of an eschatological framework sometimes referred to as “Millenialism” or “Chiliasm.” This was the prevailing eschatological view in the church during the first three centuries after the first coming of Jesus. “Chiliasm” is simply a transliteration of a Greek word for “one thousand” (χίλιοι [chilioi]).

• “Those who ate were four thousand (Gk τετρακισχίλιοι [tetrakis chilioi] men)” (^ESVMt 15:38)

1. 1. According to the Millennial Sabbath teaching of the Apostolic Fathers, the seven-day week created by God was intended by God to be a prophetic picture of redemptive history. In 2 Peter 3:8, Peter says that “with the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day” (^NIV2 Pet. 3:8). The early church fathers taught that just as human beings toil, sweat, and labor for six days in a week before entering their rest on the seventh day, so human beings would labor, toil, and sweat under the curse of sin and death for six thousand years, and would then finally enter into the rest the Messiah’s kingdom on the seventh “Day,” that is, the Millennium – the “Day of the Lord.”
   2. Examples
      1. Clement of Rome (AD, 30-100) & Justin (AD, 110-165): “And the fact that it was not said of the seventh day equally with the other days, ‘And there was evening, and there was morning,’ is a distinct indication of the consummation which is to take place in it before it is finished, as the fathers declare, especially St. Clement, and Irenaeus, and Justin the martyr and philosopher.” (Justin, Frag. XV, Comments by Anastasius about Clement, Irenaeus, and Justin)
      2. Papias (AD.70-155): “Taking occasion from Papias of Hierapolis, the illustrious, a disciple of the apostle who leaned on the bosom of Christ, and Clemens, and Pantaenus of the Alexandrians, and the wise Ammonius, the ancient and first expositors [of Scripture], who agreed with each other, who understood the work of the six days as referring to Christ and the whole Church.” (Fragments of Papias, IX)
      3. Epistle of Barnabas (Late 1st Century – Note: This Barnabas is different Barnabas than the one in Acts): “And God made in six days the works of His hands, and made an end on the seventh day, and rested on it, and sanctified it.” Attend, my children, to the meaning of this expression, “He finished in six days.” This implieth that the Lord will finish all things in six thousand years, for a day is with Him a thousand years. And He Himself testifieth, saying, “Behold, today will be as a thousand years.” Therefore, my children, in six days, that is, in six thousand years, all things will be finished. “And He rested on the seventh day.” This meaneth: when His Son, coming [again], shall destroy the time of the wicked man, and judge the ungodly, and change the-sun, and the moon, and the stars, then shall He truly rest on the seventh day.” (Epistle of Barnabas, XV)
      4. Irenaeus: (AD. 120-202): “[He gives this] as a summing up of the whole of that apostasy which has taken place during six thousand years.* “For in as many days as this world was made, in so many thousand years shall it be concluded. And for this reason the Scripture says: “Thus the heaven and the earth were finished, and all their adornment. And God brought to a conclusion upon the sixth day the works that He had made; and God rested upon the seventh day from all His works.” This is an account of the things formerly created, as also it is a prophecy of what is to come. For the day of the Lord is as a thousand years; and in six days created things were completed: it is evident, therefore, that they will come to an end at the sixth thousand year.” … the whole apostasy of six thousand years, and unrighteousness, and wickedness, and false prophecy, and deception; for which things’ sake a cataclysm of fire shall also come [upon the earth].” (Irenaeus, Against Heresies V. XXVIII, 3)

“But when this Antichrist shall have devastated all things in this world, he will reign for three years and six months, and sit in the temple at Jerusalem; and then the Lord will come from heaven in the clouds, in the glory of the Father, sending this man and those who follow him into the lake of fire; but bringing in for the righteous the times of the kingdom, that is, the rest, the hallowed seventh day; and restoring to Abraham the promised inheritance , in which kingdom the Lord declared, that many coming from the east and from the west should sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.” (Irenaeus, Against Heresies Bk. V, ch. xxx )

“These are [to take place] in the times of the kingdom, that is, upon the seventh day, which has been sanctified, in which God rested from all the works which He created, which is the true Sabbath of the righteous, which they shall not be engaged in any earthly occupation; but shall have a table at hand prepared for them by God, supplying them with all sorts of dishes.” (Irenaeus, Against Heresies, Bk. V, xxxiii)

1. 1. 1. Commodianus: (AD. 240): “This has pleased Christ, that the dead should rise again, yea, with their bodies; and those, too, whom in this world the fire has burned [martyrs], when six thousand years are completed,…” (Instructions of Commodianus, LXXIX)
      2. Methodius: (AD. 260-312): “For a thousand years in Thy sight are but as yesterday: seeing that is past as a watch in the night.” For when a thousand years are reckoned as one day in the sight of God, and from the creation of the world to His rest is six days, so also to our time, six days are defined, as those say who are clever arithmeticians. Therefore, they say that an age of six thousand years extends from Adam to our time. For they say that the judgment will come on the seventh day, that is in the seventh thousand years.” (Extracts From The Work on Things Created.IX)
      3. Lactantius: (AD. 260-330): “Therefore let the philosophers, who enumerate thousands of ages from the beginning of the world, know that the six thousandth year is not yet completed, and that when this number is completed the consummation must take place, and the condition of human affairs be remodeled for the better … Therefore, since all the works of God were completed in six days, the world must continue in its present state through six ages, that is, six thousand years. … And again, since God, having finished His works, rested the seventh day and blessed it, at the end of the six thousandth year all wickedness must be abolished from the earth, and righteousness reign for a thousand years; and there must be tranquility and rest from the labors which the world now has long endured. … “For six thousand years have not yet been completed, and when this number shall be made up, then at length all evil will be taken away, that justice alone may reign.” (The Epitome of the Divine Institutes, Chapter 70)
      4. Victorinus: (AD. 300?): “And in Matthew we read, that it is written Isaiah also and the rest of his colleagues broke the Sabbath — that that true and just Sabbath should be observed in the seventh millenary of years. Wherefore to those seven days the Lord attributed to each a thousand years; for thus went the warning: ‚In Thine eyes, O Lord, a thousand years are as one day. ‛Therefore in the eyes of the Lord each thousand of years is ordained, for I find that the Lord’s eyes are seven. Wherefore, as I have narrated, that true Sabbath will be in the seventh millenary of years, when Christ with His elect shall reign” (Victorinus, On the Creation of the World)
   2. Where did they (John?) get this idea? Does it have any Biblical basis?

1. 1. “With the Lord a day is like a thousand years”

Then the Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to tend and keep it. ¹⁶And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat; ¹⁷but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.” (^NKJVGen. 2:15-17)

This is the written account of Adam’s line. When God created man, he made him in the likeness of God. He created them male and female and blessed them. And when they were created, he called them “man.” When Adam had lived 130 years, he had a son in his own likeness, in his own image; and he named him Seth. ⁴ After Seth was born, Adam lived 800 years and had other sons and daughters. Altogether, Adam lived 930 years, and then he died. (^NIVGen. 5:1-5)

You turn men back to dust, saying, “Return to dust, O sons of men.” For a thousand years in your sight are like a day that has just gone by, or like a watch in the night. (^NIVPs. 90:3-4)

But do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day. ⁹ The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance. (^NIV2 Pt 3:8-9).

1. 1. Hebrews 3-4 and Revelation 20 seem to presuppose this Millennial Sabbath framework

For if Joshua had given them rest, God would not have spoken later about another day. ⁹ There remains, then, a Sabbath-rest for the people of God (^NIVHeb 4:8-9).

Blessed and holy are those who have part in the first resurrection. The second death has no power over them, but they will be priests of God and of Christ and will reign with him for a thousand years. (^NIVRev 20:6).

1. 1. “The patristic church tried to calculate where they were on the Millennial calendar. However, the early fathers were working from the Septuagint (LXX), and chronology of the LXX is about 1450 years ahead of the Masoretic Text. Thus, Hippolytus believed that there were five hundred left to complete the 6,000 years before the arrival of the Messianic Kingdom.”
   2. If one bases a chronology strictly on the Biblical data available to us (inclusive reckoning), then there were 2000 years from the Fall of Adam and Eve to Abraham; 2000 years from Abraham to the First Coming of Jesus; and we are approaching 2000 years since the Messiah’s death, burial, resurrection, and ascension.
   3. Scholars debate the date of Jesus’ crucifixion. The two most favored dates are 30AD and 33AD.

“Three officials involved in the trial of Jesus were Caiaphas, the high priest (Mt 26:3, 57; Jn 11:49–53; 18:13–14) who began his office in AD 18 and was deposed at the Passover of AD 37; Pilate, prefect of Judea (Mt 27:2–26; Mk 15:1–15; Lk 23:1–25; Jn 18:28–19:16; Ac 3:13; 4:27; 13:28; 1 Tm 6:13) from AD 26 to 36; and Herod Antipas, tetrarch of Galilee and Perea (Lk 23:6–12) from 4 BC until AD 39. According to these dates, Christ’s crucifixion must have occurred between AD 26 and 36.”

“The chronological parameters for dating the death of Jesus are unusually wide. Vardaman dates it early (ad 21; ‘Chronology,’ 78), while Kokkinos dates it late (ad 36; “Crucifixion,” 133–63). The two most favored dates are ad 30 and 33.

1. 1. Because we don’t know with certainty the exact dates of Jesus’ death according to our modern calendar, we don’t know the exact year of Jesus’ return. Yet, if the Apostolic Fathers were correct, then the next 10-15 years are the most critical time the world has ever known. But wait a minute: Wasn’t that already the case anyway?

E. Coincidence?

For I will be like a lion to Ephraim, like a great lion to Judah. I will tear them to pieces and go away; I will carry them off, with no one to rescue them. Then I will go back to my place until they admit their guilt. And they will seek my face; in their misery they will earnestly seek me.” “Come, let us return to the Lord. He has torn us to pieces but he will heal us; he has injured us but he will bind up our wounds. After two days he will revive us; on the third day he will restore us, that we may live in his presence. (^NIVHos 5:14-6:2)

1. 1. If Irenaeus, as a representative of our ancient spiritual ancestors were sitting in our pews today, he would be shouting one message to the church every Sunday morning: “Wake up! The Day of the Lord is at hand!”