supra. But the probability is very small that any really ancient tradition lies behind such additional facts as he reports about the Alexandrian presbyters and the development of episcopacy in Egypt. The following reasons seem sufficient to prevent our attaching any weight to his unsupported evidence.

(1) He is so ignorant of the period to which he assigns the ' ecclesiastical revolution' caused by the creation of the Egyptian episcopate, that he is actually unaware of the existence at that time of infinitely the most important man of the age-Origen. When he comes to deal with the fifth Council he writes thus: 1 There was in the time of Justinian a bishop of Manbag (episcopus Manbagensis), by name Origen, who taught metempsychosis, denying a resurrection. There was also Ibas, bishop of Edessa (Rohensis), Thaddaeus, bishop of Massisa (Massisensis), and Theodoret, bishop of Ancyra, who asserted that the body of our Lord Christ was phantastic and had in itself nothing real.' This will suffice as a specimen of his historical knowledge. Pearson enlarges on his ignorance and blunders (Vindic. Ignat. part I, chap. xi. [ed. Oxford, 1852, p. 294 f.]).

(2) But it may be answered that however ignorant of the Greek church writers, and of church history generally, he may have had access to Alexandrian traditions. Have we reason then to think that his statements represent ancient Egyptian tradition? I think not. Partly because Jerome, had he known what Eutychius relates, would not have kept silence about it. But also and this is more important --because Severus, bishop of Eshmunain in Egypt, who wrote a history of the Alexandrian patriarchs in the same century as Eutychius (c. A.D. 978) and professes to have consulted Greek and Coptic remains in the monastery of St. Macarius, knows nothing of what Eutychius relates and gives a great many details about the election of early patriarchs quite inconsistent with the supposed position of the twelve presbyters and involving the existence of other bishops. Renaudot complains (Hist. p. 23) of Severus' ignorance and doubts his knowledge of Greek, but at least he knows more of the period of Demetrius than Eutychius does. He abuses Origen out of all reason; but he knows his period and his fame as a scholar and writer. Now Severus makes St. Mark ordain Annianus as bishop, and three presbyters, and seven deacons, and then proceed into Pentapolis and appoint in many places bishops, priests, and deacons (Evetts pp. 144, 145). He represents Cerdo (the third bishop), as having been elected by bishops and priests with the faithful laity and that too by lot (ib. p. 150), and Primus (the fourth) as chosen out of the 'orthodox people,' not from among the presbyters (p. 151), and Celadion (the eighth) as elected by

ap. Migne tom. cit. col. 1073.

Condensed by Renaudot into a Latin version Historia Patriarcharum Alexandrmorum (Paris, 1713) but now published in the Arabic text, with English translation, by Mr. B. T. A. Evetts (Patrologia Orientalis i. 2, 4, V. I, X. 5, Paris, 1907-1915).

the people with the bishops (p. 153). The only one among the early patriarchs, according to Severus, who was chosen from among the presbyters was the tenth patriarch, Julian. Thus the complete disagreement of the more credible Severus with the statements of Eutychius seems to deprive them of the claim to represent a valid tradition.

(3) Eutychius' information about the absence of bishops in Egypt till the times of Demetrius and Heraclas seems inconsistent with what we know of the history of the period. Photius records,' on the authority of Pamphilus, the author of an Apology for Origen, the following facts: 'Demetrius' love is turned [by Origen's ordination] into hatred. . . . Moreover, a synod of bishops and some presbyters is gathered together against Origen. And they, as Pamphilus says, vote that Origen should be banished from Alexandria and neither live there nor teach, but that he should not be deposed from the honour of the presbyterate. But Demetrius, with some Egyptian bishops, removed him also from the priesthood, those who had formerly supported him subscribing this decree.' Now about this evidence there are two things to be said In the first place it is scarcely possible to reconcile Pamphilus' statements about a 'synod' and about 'some Egyptian bishops' with the figures given by Eutychius for the Egyptian episcopate under Demetrius. In the second place Pamphilus was an enthusiastic disciple of Origen, and if this synod of bishops who overrode the mixed synod of bishops and presbyters had been a new thing created simply by Demetrius and lacking altogether in constitutional authority, it is very unlikely that we should not have been told so. Nay more, we should surely have been able to catch in Origen's own language about bishops subsequently some tone of disparagement, some hint of novel claims made in the name of episcopal authority; but all his language quoted on pp. 127, 128, dates from the period after his expulsion and deposition. Dr. Bigg speaks of the patriarchate of Demetrius as involving 'the bustle and excitement of a revolution,' and he alludes to ‘a usurpation which

1 Apparently he speaks of the election of Agrippinus the tenth patriarch in these words (Renaudot, Coll. Lit. Orient. i. p. 381: Evetts p. 153): the people assembled again with one consent, and laid their hands upon a man of the congregation who feared God, and whose name was Agrippinus; and they appointed him patriarch, and set him upon the evangelical throne.' Renaudot thinks this phrase in Severus makes it possible that Eutychius only meant to imply that eleven presbyters 'got hands laid upon the new patriarch.' This, however, is improbable.

It may be said that still later historians, Georgius Homadius (El-Makin), an Arab Christian who died in 1273, and the Sheikh Taqi-ed-Din El-Maqrizi (fourteenth century -translated by Rev. S. C. Malan in Original Documents of the Coptic Church), support Eutychius in different degrees. But the former is said to be made up out of Eutychius (this portion of El-Makin is not edited), and El-Maqrizi undoubtedly depends upon him. 'A gifted man,' he describes him, 'who wrote a useful history' (Malan's translation p. 87).

⚫ Photius Bibliotheca cod. cxviii. ap. Migne Patrol. Graec. ciii. col. 397. Pamphilus was martyred in A.D. 309. The book was completed by his friend Eusebius, bishop of Caesarea.

• Nearly all the works of Origen cited in those pages belong to the time of his residence at Caesarea.

lay heavy on the priests.' 1 Now Demetrius died in 231; this 'usurpation' was carried further, according to Jerome, in the episcopates of his successors by the abolition of the old method of appointing bishops. Yet Origen, writing about A. D. 249, speaks of the Alexandrian, among other churches, as characterized by mildness and stability (πраeîα kal EvoTaons, c. Cels. iii. 30), and thinks apparently that the fault most likely to be found in bishops and clergy is a want of zeal.2

(4) Eutychius' information seems inconsistent with a document which appears to let in light upon the very early days of Egyptian church history. The document generally known as the Apostolic Church Order (which is to be distinguished from the later Apostolic Constitutions and Apostolic Canons) is, as it were, the beginning of the canon law of the Egyptian Church. Its history indicates Egypt as its source, and Harnack, its last editor, rightly remarks that it has a provincial origin. It is a composite document, and appears to contain fragments of very different epochs; some chapters (16-21) on the election of bishops, on presbyters, readers, deacons, and widows, seem to come from very early days. The chapter on the election of a bishop is very curious: 'If there be a paucity of men, and anywhere the number of those able to vote for a bishop be less than twelve, let them write to the neighbouring churches, wherever a church happens to be established, that three chosen men having come from thence, and having put to the test him who is worthy-namely if any one have a good report of the heathen, if he be sinless, if he be a lover of the poor, if he be temperate, not a drunkard, not a fornicator, not covetous, nor a railer, nor a respecter of persons, nor such like things: it is good that he should be unmarried, but if not, a husband of one wife ; educated, able to interpret the Scriptures, or if unlearned, meek in character, and let him abound in love towards all; lest the bishop come to be convicted in any matter by the multitude.' 5 Here we have

1 B. L. p. 100 [ed. 2 p. 134]: 'the Stromateis were written during the patriarchate [episcopate ed. 2] of Demetrius amid the bustle and excitement of a revolution'; and p. 110 [p. 155]. Even if the facts as given by the tenth-century writer were correct, it is to be noted that the accompaniments of usurpation and excitement and revolution are wholly the creation of the nineteenth-century writer.

* It should be remembered too that in Athanasius' day there were, as he tells us, about a hundred bishops (¿yy`s ékaróv) in Egypt, Libya, and Pentapolis (Apol. c. Ar. 71); and a generation earlier the same number is given in the encyclical letter of Alexander of Alexandria (ap. Soc. H.E. i. 6) ήμεῖς μετὰ τῶν κατ' Αἴγυπτον ἐπισκόπων καὶ τὰς Λιβύας ἐγγὺς ἑκατὸν ὄντων. The growth from four when Heraclas acceded (A.D. 232) to one hundred when Alexander wrote (c. A.D. 323) would have been extremely rapid.

* Texte und Untersuch. Band ii, Heft 2, p. 193 ff. and Heft 5, p. 6.

• At latest, Harnack says, the first third of the third century' (Heft 2, p. 212). The remarkable position of the 'reader' above the deacon to which Harnack calls attention has also to be noticed.

* c. 16 : . . . ἐὰν ὀλιγανδρία ὑπάρχῃ καὶ μήπου πλῆθος τυγχάνῃ τῶν δυναμένων ψηφίσασθαι περὶ ἐπισκόπου ἐντὸς δεκαδύο ἀνδρῶν, εἰς τὰς πλησίον ἐκκλησίας, ὅπου τυγχάνει πεπηγυία, γραφέτωσαν, ὅπως ἐκεῖθεν τρεῖς ἄνδρες παραγενόμενοι δοκιμῇ δοκιμάσαντες τὸν ἄξιον ὄντα, εἴ τις φήμην καλὴν ἔχει ἀπὸ τῶν ἐθνῶν,

...

καλὸν

popular election, the possibility of illiterate bishops, heathen surroundings, and everything that points to early days and out-of-the-way communities. This makes it all the more noticeable that there is to be a bishop elected even in communities where there are not twelve voters. This is better evidence than Eutychius can offer!

On the whole, then, I think it is absurd to take Eutychius as an authority in the way in which some modern writers-notably Dr. Bigg -have done. I believe the evidence would suggest

(1) a widespread episcopacy in Egypt generally, as elsewhere, even in the smallest communities :

(2) a large degree of popular influence in the election down to the Nicene age.

C.

RITES AND PRAYERS OF ORDINATION.

(See pp. 131 ff. [Greek] and 162 ff. [Latin].)

A. GREEK RITES OF ORDINATION.

I.

THE Ordination Prayers of Bishop Serapion (see above, p. 131) are as follows:

Laying-on of hands of the making (Karaordσews) of Deacons. Father of the Only-Begotten who didst send Thy Son and didst ordain affairs (рáyμaтa) on the earth, and hast given rules to the Church and orders (rážeis) for the help and salvation of the flocks, who didst choose out bishops and presbyters and deacons for the ministry of Thy catholic Church, who didst choose through Thine Only-Begotten the seven deacons, and didst freely give to them Holy Spirit, make also this man a deacon of Thy catholic Church, and give in him a spirit of knowledge and discernment, that he may be able purely and unblameably to do service in this ministry (Necroupyla) in the midst of the holy people, through Thy Only-Begotten Jesus Christ, through whom to Thee (is) the glory and the strength in Holy Spirit both now and to all the ages of the ages. Amen.

Laying-on of hands of the making of Presbyters.

We stretch forth the hand, O Lord God of the Heavens, Father of Thy Only-Begotten, upon this man, and beseech Thee that the

μὲν εἶναι ἀγύναιος, εἰ δὲ μή, ἀπὸ μιᾶς γυναικός· παιδείας μέτοχος, δυνάμενος τὰς γραφὰς ἑρμηνεύειν· εἰ δὲ ἀγράμματος, πραὺς ὑπάρχων . . . μήποτε περί τινος ἐλεγχθεὶς ἐπίσκοπος ἀπὸ τῶν πολλῶν γενηθείη.

1 The text here translated is that printed by Brightmen in Journal of Theological Studies i. 266.

Give him the graces
Let a divine Spirit

Spirit of Truth may dwell (èridnuñoŋ) upon him. of prudence and knowledge and a good heart. come to him that he may be able to be a steward over Thy people and an ambassador of Thy divine oracles, and to reconcile Thy people to Thee the uncreated God. Thou who didst give of the Spirit of Moses a holy Spirit upon the chosen ones, give a portion of holy Spirit also to this man from the Spirit of the Only-Begotten, for the grace of wisdom and knowledge and right faith, that he may be able to serve Thee in a clean conscience, through Thy Only-Begotten Jesus Christ, through whom (is) to Thee the glory and the strength in Holy Spirit both now and for all the ages of the ages. Amen.

Laying-on of hands of the making of a Bishop.

Thou who didst send the Lord Jesus for the gain of all the world (olkovμévns), Thou who didst through Him choose the apostles, Thou who generation by generation dost ordain holy bishops, O God of truth, make also this man a living bishop, a holy1 bishop of the succession of the holy apostles, and give to him grace and divine Spirit, which Thou didst freely give to all Thy true (yvnoios) servants and prophets and patriarchs: make him to be worthy to shepherd Thy flock and let him still continue unblameably and without offence in the bishopric, through Thy Only-Begotten Jesus Christ, through whom to Thee (is) the glory and the strength in Holy Spirit both now and to all the ages of the ages. Amen.

II.

The ordination rite from the Barberini MS. of the end of the eighth century (see Brightman Litt. E. and W. p. lxxxviii: the MS. is, however, no longer Barb. iii. 55, but Vatic. Barb. gr. 336) is printed in Morinus (de Sacr. Ord. pars ii. p. 64 ff.), and is to the following effect :

(a) For a bishop. The archbishop reads the declaration of the election: the Divine Grace . . . appoints such an one, the well-beloved presbyter, to be bishop.' This he reads 'holding his hand upon the head of him who is being ordained.' Then, after the Kyrie Eleison,

1 ἅγιον. Perhaps we should read ἄξιον ' worthy.

This is the ȧváppnσis iepá (pseudo-Dionysius ap. Morinus de S. O. pars ii. p. 57). It was made in the case of each order, and means that the consecrator (ieporedeσtŃs) is the interpreter of the divine election and does not act by the impulse of his own favour (idía xápir). This emphasis on the choice of divine grace is common to all (apparently) of the oriental rites of ordination.

The rites of ordination, Greek, Latin, and oriental, are given in Morinus de Sacr. Ord. pars ii.: for the COPTIC see pp. 506-508 (as in the Apostolic Constitutions and the Latin rites, the presbyters are compared to the seventy elders); for the JACOBITE, pp. 479-488 (it contains directions for impressive solemnity of manner in the consecrating bishop-'manus deprimit tremulas... oculis in altum cum timore aspicientibus' pp. 481, 484, 487): for the MARONITE, PP. 396, 404, 419. In this last the idea of succession by laying-on of hands is strangely traced from God on Mount Sinai,