and experience till it becomes a foundation-stone on which the Church may rest. The rock then, of which Christ speaks, is the rock of human character confessing the divine claim. It is as men, as human characters, that the twelve Apostles are the twelve foundation-stones of the New Jerusalem. And, if the promise to St. Peter which follows must be interpreted of an official position which is to be given to him in the Church, we have here at starting an emphatic intimation that official dignity in the Church is meant to rest on a basis of moral fitness.1 But does Christ pass in His promise to St. Peter from words which concern his moral character to words which imply his spiritual office? He certainly does. He promises that He will give him 'the keys of the kingdom of heaven,' or of the Church, and this is in other words a promise to make him the official steward of the divine household. When Shebna was substituted for Eliakim in the treasurership or stewardship of the house of David, this was the word of the Lord: 2 I will call my servant Eliakim the son of Hilkiah: and I will clothe him with thy robe, and strengthen him with thy girdle, and I will commit thy government into his hand. . . . And the key of the house of David will I lay upon his shoulder; and he shall open, and none shall shut; and he shall shut, and none shall open.' It is promised, then, that St. Peter shall be made the steward of the divine household,3 and this carries with it an authority to 'bind' or 'loose,' that is to prohibit or permit-in a word, to give legislative decisions-with that heavenly sanction and

1 Christ, however, in choosing Judas, whom He knew from the first,' among the Twelve, showed that He distinguished between moral worth and spiritual authority, and this is also implied in His words about the Jewish authorities (St. Matt. xxiii. 2, 3): the scribes and the Pharisees sit in Moses' seat: all therefore whatsoever they bid you, that observe and do, but do not ye after their works.'

* Isai. xxii. 20-22; cf. Bp. Moberly Great Forty Days pp. 127-130.

3 Of course subordinately to Christ (Rev. iii. 7).

authority which is the proper endowment of the kingdom of heaven.1

representa.

Two questions may be raised with reference to as (a) the this promise. What, it may be asked first, is St. tive apostle, Peter's relation, in respect of this official position, to the other Apostles? The answer seems to be that the official position is here not given but promised, and that the commissions actually given after the resurrection, the commissions which are seen in action in the apostolic history, are given to the whole apostolic body, and acted upon by all alike with the same authority, though St. Peter is their leader. A question may be raised secondly as to St. and (6) adPeter's relation to the whole Christian community: officer of the for on another occasion, when Jesus Christ was speaking of the duty, under which His disciples might lie from time to time, of bringing one of their brethren under the censure of the Church, He attributes to the local church as a whole that authority to bind and loose-which in its application to individuals is of course a judicial authority

1 See Edersheim Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah ii. pp. 81-85. Binding or loosing referred simply to the prohibition or else permission of things or acts. It was one of the powers claimed by the Rabbis. But in relation to persons it implies a judicial, administrative power.

St. Cyprian's opinion in this sense has been already quoted: p. 154 n.1. It coincides with Origen's in the East (in Matt. xvi. 18, 19) and represents in fact the general mind of the early Church. So Theophylact (in loc.): 'They who have obtained the grace of the episcopate as Peter had (οἱ κατὰ Πέτρον τῆς ἐπισκοπικῆς ἀξιω· Bévras xáρitos) have authority to remit and bind. For though the "I will give thee' was spoken to Peter alone, yet the gift was given to all the Apostles. When? When He said "Whosesoever sins ye remit, they are remitted." For the "I will give" indicates a future time--the time, that is, after the resurrection.' Perhaps the strongest evidence of the truth of this view is the absence of any special claim made by, or for, St. Peter in the Acts or Epistles, especially in St. Peter's own first Epistle, where (v. 1, 2) his pastoral charge (St. John xxi. 15-17) is identified with that of the elders; and on the other hand St. Paul's strenuous claim to be, as an apostle, dependent on none but Christ and in no respect inferior to the others; see Gal. i. 11, 12, ii. 1-10. This of course admits of a primacy being assigned to St. Peter, so that of repì Пérpov can be the name for all of them, as in Ignatius ad Smyrn. 3 and the shorter conclusion' of St. Mark's Gospel (as given in the Greek MS. L and the Old Latin MS. k: printed, under the heading ăλλws, in Westcott and Hort's text). I deal briefly with this matter because this book is meant to be simply a vindication of the catholic idea of the ministry and not to go into questions which arise within the area where this finds acceptance. Tertullian's view of the meaning of the passage now in question, referred to on p. 191, is essentially the view of a Montanist.

ministrative

Church:

(2) the commission to the whole apostolic body after the resurrection,

to which He again declares the supernatural sanction to attach. The answer to this question has already been indicated when the general subject of the relation of the ministry to the Church was under discussion. The supernatural authority does inhere in the Church as a body, but the Church has (not by her own but by Christ's authority) executive officers, and it is through them that her judicial power is put into effect. Christ makes two promises: He promises judicial authority to the Church, and He promises to make St. Peter a steward, an administrative officer in the Church with special reference to this power; and these two promises are correlative, not contradictory.

(2) Christ's dealings in the last days of His ministry are wholly concentrated upon the twelve. With them alone He celebrates the Last Supper and institutes the memorial of His death, which He commits to them to be perpetuated in the Church; 2 to

1 St. Matt. xviii. 15-18. The declaration is still future, it is a promise. Afterwards follows the promise which attaches to the prayer of even two disciples (ver. 19), based on the fact that Christ's presence is with even so small a number as two or three if they are gathered together 'in His Name' (ver. 20: that is, in the knowledge of Him and in accordance with His will). This last declaration applies primarily to the promise which attaches to united prayer, for the two or three' refers back to the 'if two of you shall agree to ask.' It may however also refer to the promise of judicial authority, and would mean that this authority is not dependent on numbers, but can be enforced by even two or three in accordance with His will, if they can speak with the voice of the Church so that to disobey them would be to 'refuse to hear the Church.' Cf. among the Pirge Aboth of Dr. Taylor p. 60 f. [ed. 2 p. 46 f.]: 'When ten sit and are occupied in words of Thorah, the Skekinah is among them, for it is said, God standeth in the congregation of the mighty. . . . And whence [is it proved of] even three? Because it is said, . . . and hath founded his troop in the earth. And whence even two? Because it is said, Then they that feared the Lord spake often one to another.' Cf. note1: 'Every ten men that are assembled in the synagogue, the Shekinah is with them, for it is said, God standeth in the 'edah, etc. And whence even three that judge, because it is said, He judges among gods, etc.' i.e. the divine presence is amongst even three who constitute a beth din, or house of judgment, to administer justice. So Christ may have meant that His presence is with the smallest court of justice' which represents the Church. Cf. Expositor, March 1887, p. 229.

* The Eucharist was certainly regarded from the first in the Church as a sacrifice. 'The conception of the whole action of the Lord's Supper as a sacrificial action (Opferhandlung) is found clearly in the Didache (c. xiv), in Ignatius, and especially in Justin (Apol. i. 65 f.). But Clement of Rome also presupposes it when he (cc. 40-44) draws a parallel between the bishops and deacons and the O. T. priests and Levites, and indicates the poo¢épeiv тà ôŵpa as their principal function' (Harnack Dogmengesch. i. 152

...

them He addresses the last discourses, which are calculated to prepare them in character and intelligence for the withdrawal of His visible presence and the n.1 [ed. 4 p. 231n.']). See Didache xiv: Karà Kupiakǹv dè Kvpíov ovvaxbévtes kλάOATE ἄρτον καὶ εὐχαριστήσατε προσεξομολογησάμενοι τὰ παραπτώματα ὑμῶν, ὅπως καθαρὰ ἡ θυσία ὑμῶν ᾖ . . . αὕτη γάρ ἐστιν ἡ ῥηθεῖσα ὑπὸ Κυρίου· Ἐν παντὶ τόπῳ καὶ χρόνῳ προσφέρειν μοι θυσίαν καθαράν. Justin Dial. c. Tryph. 41 : Καὶ ἡ τῆς σεμιδάλεως προσφορά, ὦ ἄνδρες, ἔλεγον, ἡ ὑπὲρ τῶν καθαριζομένων ἀπὸ τῆς λέπρας προσφέρεσθαι παραδοθεῖσα, τύπος ἦν τοῦ ἄρτου τῆς εὐχαριστίας, ὃν εἰς ἀνάμνησιν τοῦ πάθους, οὗ ἔπαθεν ὑπὲρ τῶν καθαιρομένων τὰς ψυχὰς ἀπὸ πάσης πονηρίας ἀνθρώπων, Ἰησοῦς Χριστὸς ὁ Κύριος ἡμῖν παρέδωκε ποιεῖν: the offering, he explains, is to be made in thanksgiving for the blessings of creation and of redemption through Christ's death; he then quotes the usual passage from Malachi i. 11, 12 and continues: Tepì dè tôv év παντὶ τόπῳ ὑφ' ἡμῶν τῶν ἐθνῶν προσφερομένων αὐτῷ θυσιῶν, τουτέστι τοῦ ἄρτου τῆς εὐχαριστίας καὶ τοῦ ποτηρίου ὁμοίως τῆς εὐχαριστίας, προλέγει τότε εἰπὼν καὶ τὸ ὄνομα αὐτοῦ δοξάζειν ἡμᾶς, ὑμᾶς δὲ βεβηλοῦν. Irenaeus IV. xvii. 5 : Sed et suis discipulis dans consilium primitias Deo offerre ex suis creaturis... eum qui ex creatura est panis, accepit et gratias egit, dicens: Hoc est meum corpus. Et calicem similiter, qui est ex ea creatura quae est secundum nos, suum sanguinem confessus est, et novi testamenti novam docuit oblationem, quam ecclesia ab apostolis accipiens in universo mundo offert Deo.'

It would not be in place here to discuss at length the sense in which the early Church believed the eucharist to be a sacrifice. Briefly however it is in place to remark that

(1) the whole language of the earliest Church seems most easily interpreted, if we suppose that the bread and wine, chosen out of the general offerings of the congregation and presented before God as a memorial of Christ's sacrifice with accompanying prayers, were regarded as constituting the thank-offering (eucharist) or oblations (gifts) of the Church and as expressive of that relation of sonship and purity and freedom of approach to God, which belonged to the Church in virtue of her redemption, as being the 'high-priestly race.' These 'gifts' were then offered for the consecration of God. They became no longer common bread but eucharist, made up of two substances, an earthly and an heavenly'; they became to the Church the Body and Blood of Christ.' This response of God to the Church's invocation, this mingling of heavenly and earthly things, gave to the Church's sacrifice a new power and brought it into essential union with the One Sacrifice, with Jesus, the mediator of the new covenant,' and with the blood of sprinkling.' But for this, the Church's sacrifice would have been most Judaic in character:

(2) the consent of the Church in regarding the eucharist as a sacrifice appears to fix the meaning of Christ's words of institution. In this connexion it requires to be observed: (a) That Justin Martyr interprets motiv as 'to offer' (Dial. c. Tryph. 41, just quoted, and 70), and this use of the word is common in the LXX without any qualification; e.g. in Exod. xxix. 36-41, Lev. ix. 7-22, it occurs ten times. But it lacks support in the New Testament and generally in Fathers and Liturgies. It enables us, however, in St. Luke xxii. 19, 1 Cor. xi. 24, 25 to give, as is natural, the same meaning to τοῦτο in both corresponding clauses, τοῦτό ἐστιν . . . τοῦτο ποιεῖτε : and in 1 Cor. xi. 25 also to make roûto the accusative, as the sentence requires, to both verbs, rotire and nívηre. (b) That there is, in the words of institution, an obvious reference to the words of Moses in Exod. xxiv. 8, idoù rò aiμa τns dianкns. The blood there referred to is blood of sacrificial application-blood of sprinkling.' Accordingly, the blood of Christ in the Eucharist is His blood considered as being sacrificially poured out or shed, and the body of Christ in the Eucharist is His body as being offered 'for us.' (c) That àvápnois in the LXX means a memorial before God; see Lev. xxiv. 7, Num. x. 10, Ps. xxxvii. [xxxviii.] and lxix. [lxx.] (titles); but, on the other hand, see Wisd. xvi. 6, Heb. x. 3, and the references in the liturgies: Meμrnμévol oùν ŵy di' ¡μâs væéμeɩvev, K.T.λ. See more at length The Body of Christ (Murray, 1901), pp. 264 ff. and note 20 pp. 312 ff.

as in St. Matthew,

substitution for it of that new and higher mode of inward presence by His Spirit, which He should give to His Church when He was glorified. In all this Christ is dealing with them no less as apostles 1 than as representative disciples. After His resurrection He does not cease to deal with them in the latter capacity, but it would appear that the commissions, which in the 'great forty days' were no longer promised but given, were addressed to them in their official character and to them alone. It would appear to be undeniable, if it had not been so often denied, that these commissions, taken together, are commissions given to an abiding apostolate, destined to be permanent till 'the end of the world.' The eleven disciples' are expressly mentioned as the subjects of the commission recorded by St. Matthew as given on the mountain where Jesus had appointed them,' which invested them with His royal power to go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the threefold Name and teaching them to observe all His precepts, and which was accompanied by the promise of His presence with them all the days till 'St. Mark,' the completion of the age.' 2 The parallel account of the commission of Christ given in the verses which at present conclude St. Mark's Gospel describes it as given to the eleven.'3 In St. Luke's narrative, where in connexion with Christ's appearance on the evening of His resurrection mention is made of 'the disciples and those who were with them,' it is noticeable that, though there is a record of encouragement and enlightenment and promise, there is no record of a ministerial commission.4 There was, however,

1 See St. Luke xxii. 14, 29-30; St. John xiii. 16, 20, xv. 16, xvii. 18.

2 St. Matt. xxviii. 16 ff. It is urged that, as there were 'some who doubted,' so others must have been present beside the Apostles. I should have thought that, as a matter of Greek, oi dè èdioraσav must express a subdivision of the eleven,' who are the subject of the whole sentence. See Meyer in loc. At any rate they are the only people mentioned in connexion with the commission given.

St. Mark xvi. 14-18.

St. Luke xxiv. 33 f., but cf. Acts i. 1-5.